Professional squatter scams

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jman0war

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Has anybody heard of this happening in Ireland?
So far it seems mostly USA & Spain but I'm sure it's happening elsewhere.

Basically a person or persons break-into a house, when the owner or agent discovers them the police are called.
The squatter tells the police they are the legal renter of the premise, and show them a fake lease, and sometimes fake utility bills to pretend they've been there awhile.
The police, not able to determine if said documents are real or not, brush the whole thing off as a landlord/tenant dispute, tell the owner it's a Civil matter and there's nothing they can do.
The owner is then left trying to commence a legal eviction.
In Spain, that process can take 2 or 3 years.
Often the squatter demands a payout from the owner, and this can be a quicker way to get them to leave.

I imagine with the pro tenants rules, coupled with the rather sparce garda response in the best of times; such a scam would be highly successful here.
I'm wondering if the DoJ or gards are even aware that scams like this occur, and do they have even the slightest outline of a response?
I also imagine the headache of a PRTB fine for "non registered tenancy" the owner would surely be met with.
 
jman0war said:
The police, not able to determine if said documents are real or not, brush the whole thing off as a landlord/tenant dispute, tell the owner it's a Civil matter and there's nothing they can do.
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Squatting is always a civil matter.
Unless the Gardaí catch them in the act of breaking in in the first place it's nothing to do with them.
jman0war said:
I imagine with the pro tenants rules, coupled with the rather sparce garda response in the best of times; such a scam would be highly successful here.
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And yet you haven't heard of it happening here?
 
ClubMan said:
And yet you haven't heard of it happening here?
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Give it time...
I suppose what OP is asking is would the guards be aware of the potential of such scams happening in Ireland? Do they keep abreast of what is happening in the world, and the potential new crimes that might appear in Ireland. And if so, do they come up with procedures to deal with them?

I would imagine the answer is no...
 
ClubMan said:
A civil dispute about squatting is not their responsibility to deal with.
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In this specific case, but the question still remains Do they keep abreast of what is happening in the world, and the potential new crimes that might appear in Ireland. And if so, do they come up with procedures to deal with them?
 
ClubMan said:
A civil dispute about squatting is not their responsibility to deal with.
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I can imagine how this would run here:

1. Squatters take over your property while it is vacant between rentals.
2. You call the guards who say it is a civil dispute because the squatters claim to be tenants.
3. To get them out civilly, the only option is via the RTB.
4. You have to register the 'tenancy' with the RTB in order to start the eviction process.
5. The squatters now argue that they are tenants - you registered them!
6. Even though they won't be paying rent, the eviction process takes years with an unsympathetic RTB on the landlord's back. One mistake and you're back to square one.

Let's hope that this doesn't become a thing here.
 
Point 3 is wrong, I think. In this situation there is no tenance and the landlord can commence eviction proceedings in the Circuit Court, not in the RTB. The squatters may object on the grounds that they claim that there is a tenancy, but that's an objection they'll have to make in the court proceedings and the court, not the RTB, will determine whether there is a tenancy or not. On the facts stated, there obviously isn't a tenancy. The eviction proceeds in court, not in the RTB.
 
Colin4444 said:
In this specific case, but the question still remains Do they keep abreast of what is happening in the world, and the potential new crimes that might appear in Ireland. And if so, do they come up with procedures to deal with them?
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There's only a "new crime" if the Oireachtas legislates to create a new crime. So if a new pattern of behaviour starts creating problems that current laws are inadequate to address, its primarily for the Oireachtas, not the Guards, to do something about that.

There's a somewhat relevant precedent. In the late 1960s/early 1970s there was a rapid growth in activism involving occupations, especially of vacant or derelict properties, or of properties that were to be redeveloped commercially rather than for housing. While the State didn't want the guards, and the taxpayer, to take on the job of resolving disputes about land rights or land use, it was also concerned that the protests and occupations could become disorderly or dangerous. The Forcible Entry Act 1971 resulted, criminalising the use or threat of force to occupy land, or to remain in occupation of land.

The key point is that it wasn't the guards that decided to do that; it was the Oireachtas. The guards had to implement it. but they couldn't plan in advance for implementing it, since they couldn't know that the Oireachtas would legislate in these terms.
 
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Yes, it happens in Ireland. It is currently more common in Ireland that house/apartment is let to people who are none the wiser. As far as they are concerned, they have legitimately rented the property. BTW, The people doing it in Spain are often of Irish origin.
 
I dont see the problem here. I would be forcibly removing anyone who broke into my property without my permission. They werent invited, so they cant be tenants or licensees. If the gardai arrive they should be arresting the criminals who broke into your property. Next people will be thinking if they wake up at home and a family have broken in they now have rights to live in your living room.
 
Yeah. But unless the guards actually witness the breaking and entering, or unless you, the landlord, did, a charge of breaking and entering is not a realistic option.
 
Fun fact: Theres is actually no crime of "breaking and entering" in Ireland.

If an intruder on propertry is prosecuted, it will usually be
- under the Forcible Entry Act 1971, already mentioned, or
- for burglary or aggravated burglary under the Criminal Justice (Theft and Fraud Offences) Act 2001, or
- for one of the trespass offences in the Criminal Justice (Public Order) Act 1994 .

None of these offences is proven simply by the fact that they are on your property. Whichever one you choose (or, more precisely, the prosecutor chooses) there will be additional elements that must be proven, and you will need a witness who can give the evidence necessary to prove those elements.

If you simply turn up one day and find people living, apparently peacably, in your house or apartment, you are not that witness because, on those facts, you can't testify to any element that would prove that they have committed one of the above offences. (And indeed they may not have committed any offence - as Towger points out they may genuinely believe they have rented the property, just not from you.) The guards you call generally also can't be that witness; they have seen even less than you.
 
TomEdison said:
If you simply turn up one day and find people living, apparently peacably, in your house or apartment, you are not that witness because, on those facts, you can't testify to any element that would prove that they have committed one of the above offences. (And indeed they may not have committed any offence - as Towger points out they may genuinely believe they have rented the property, just not from you.) The guards you call generally also can't be that witness; they have seen even less than you.
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Lets tease this out then. You go on holiday for the summer. I break open the door of your house on day one and I advertise your property for rent. And I take a deposit and a months rent in advance from the people who I rent your house to and go on holidays to the Bahamas myself never to be seen again. Nobody has witnessed anything.

What happens when you come home and find someone who as far, as they were concerned genuinely believe they have rented your house, but you are trying your key in the lock and its not working? I dont think that you are going to go off and live in a hotel while the law or the RTB sorts out who is living in your house or not. Are you?
 
JamieB_ said:
Lets tease this out then.
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Another variant. You rent out an apartment on airbnb. Someone who stays there copies the keys, later advertises it as a long-term rental, takes a deposit and first rent and moves in a tenant while it is unoccupied, then disappears. Not beyond imagination.

JamieB_ said:
I dont think that you are going to go off and live in a hotel while the law or the RTB sorts out who is living in your house or not. Are you?
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If the Gardai won't get involved, you may have to.
 
JamieB_ said:
What happens when you come home and find someone who as far, as they were concerned genuinely believe they have rented your house, but you are trying your key in the lock and its not working? I dont think that you are going to go off and live in a hotel while the law or the RTB sorts out who is living in your house or not. Are you?
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Are they? As far as they're concerned they've paid a deposit and the first month's rent, and they've got a receipt and a tenancy agreement to prove it. Against that they've got some bloke they've never seen turning up on the doorstep and insisting that he is the true owner of the property. And he doesn't even have a key to the property!

Patfert1 has it. The properties that get embroiled in these scams are usually not someone's primary residence. They are properties that are temporarily vacant for one reason or another - part of an estate in administration, soneone's holiday home, an air bnb property, whatever - particularly properties that, for the time being, nobody is paying much attention to. It's much easier to occupy propeties like that for long enough to run this scam, and they are much more likely to be in a condition where they can plausibly be rented to an innocent third party.

So in such a case the people actually in your property genuinely haven't committed any crime - they are innocent victims of the scam, like yourself. (And, even if they are not, it may be hard to establish that fact, much less prove it.) The guards are not going to arrest them, or forcibly remove them. You try to get them to leave by agreement; if that fails, you head off to court.

An even more disturbing variant on the scam has been run in Australia, where fraudsters not merely rent out but actually sell properties. They take control of an unoccupied property; by means of forgery or identity theft they assume the owner's identity; they sell the property at arm's length for market value to an innocent third party. The property concerned might be, e.g., a house left vacant while the owner is working abroad, so there are weeks or months to pull off the scam. Once the transfer to the third party is registered, he gets good title — registration is conclusive as to title. The defrauded true owners are left seeking compensation from the land registration authoity, or trying to chase the fraudster to recover the sale proceeds, but either way they don't get the house back.
 
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Landlords are treated very badly in Ireland.

But is there a danger of becoming totally paranoid with threads like this? Anyone reading the heading would think this was a frequent occurrence in Ireland. It might well be a thing in other countries, but there are no verified reports of it here yet.

Landlords have enough stuff to deal with - do they need to be made paranoid about something which might never happen?

JamieB_ said:
Next people will be thinking if they wake up at home and a family have broken in they now have rights to live in your living room.
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This is what I am afraid of. People won't leave their home because of some unfounded story that while they were at the shops, some squatters move in. And when the Gardaí are called, they will say it's a civil matter.

Brendan
 
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