Repossession - how government's Pre-Action Protocol helping families

 In November 2008, government issued certain guidelines to all judges in England and Wales which will help many families facing the threat of repossession. These guidelines were called pre-action protocol, or the guidelines to action judiciary can take before a lender repossesses a house and evicts a home owner.

Under the so called pre-action protocol, judges must grant the repossession order only of all other measures to keep people in their homes have failed.

In other words, judges must show more sympathy with the home owner rather than the lender. it is difficult to say how many people have benefited as a direct result of this protocol. However figures from the Ministry of Justice show that house repossession claims issued by the courts after this protocol been introduced have dropped to half.

However some people say that the protocol may be leading to yet another repossession time bomb as it is merely delaying or deferring some of the repossession claims. Whatever the truth, it is certainly helping many families to stay in their homes for the time being, and giving them another chance to sort out the financial mess they find themselves into.