Bankruptcy reprieve for Cullen... but he faces fight to keep house
BILL Cullen has won a onemonth reprieve from going bankrupt – but must also fight off a bid to repossess his home before the week is out.
As previously revealed by the Irish Daily Mail, the former Apprentice boss, 75, has been on the verge of being declared bankrupt over an alleged €8.1million debt to Danske Bank since July.
Yesterday, a judge gave the businessman – who is suffering ill health – another month to try to negotiate an alternative solution to bankruptcy with the Danish bank. However, Mr Cullen has another fight on his hands in the next 48 hours, as he tries to stop the same bank from seizing his Co. Kildare mansion, Osberstown House.
The Mail has learned that this Thursday, in a separate division of the High Court, Danske Bank will ask a judge to grant it possession of the 18th-century property. The bank will ask the court to issue a ‘well-charging order’ against Osberstown House.
If that order is granted, it would lead to an automatic sale of the property. That repossession suit is being taken by Danske Bank, the former National Irish Bank, on foot of the same €8.1million debt. The bank has been pursuing Mr Cullen over that debt since 2012 on foot of a 2011 loan.
Mr Cullen and his partner Jackie Lavin have always vowed to never surrender their home and so far, Danske Bank has not succeeded on that front.
In July of this year, Danske Bank served Mr Cullen with a ‘final’ payment demand for €8.1million – before asking the High Court to bankrupt him.
The bank claims that the debt hasn’t yet been satisfied.
Over the past three months, since the High Court last adjourned the case, Mr Cullen has been trying to negotiate a
‘Debt hasn’t been satisfied’
debt solution through a personal insolvency practitioner – an alternative to bankruptcy.
In the High Court’s bankruptcy wing yesterday, Rory White BL, for Danske Bank, told Judge Caroline Costello the bank had agreed a ‘simple one-month adjournment’ with Mr Cullen, who was not in court.
Judge Costello set November 27 for the case to come before her court again. If Mr Cullen is declared bankrupt between now and Christmas, then he would, in theory, have to surrender all of his assets and cash for distribution among his creditors.
Three years ago, Mr Cullen told a court that his ‘health and relationships have suffered greatly’ due to his financial stresses.
The nature of his condition has never been specified in court.
In July, the businessman’s barrister Keith Farry revealed that Mr Cullen was ‘going for treatment’. Mr Farry said he had letters from consultants in a Dublin hospital attesting to his illness.
The past five years have been tumultuous for the entrepreneur, who was head judge on TV3’s The Apprentice between 2008 and 2011. Ms Lavin appeared on the show as one of his advisers.
In October 2012, he lost control of his prized Renault dealerships to bank-appointed receivers. Then in April 2013, he lost control of his five-star Muckross Park Hotel in Co. Kerry. However, in 2014 he made a fresh start with a SsangYong car dealership on Dublin’s Naas Road.