Charge put on my property

[Freelancer10]

I have a joint mortage with my ex wife. We bought the property together in 2000. In 2005 i moved out and into a council property. While we were together we bought a car on finance. i became ill and could not make the payments. The finance company put a charge on the property we mortaged together. I have not paid since June 2007.
I offered the car back to them but they refused.
I offered �100.00 per month but they refused now the are saying they will force a sale of the property if i dont pay off the debt.
I have not lived at the property in over 4 yrs my ex lives there with my son who is 16 and a student, my wife is a teacher and the income is not great. Can the finance company (who only came after me for the money) force the sale even though i dont live there. I will do anything i can to prevent the sale as it is my wife and sons home although my name is on the mortage
They are claiming �10,000 from me which is a combination of Personel Protection Insurance, HP and interest

[Ethel]

The house in an asset of yours - your name is on either the Registered Title or the Deeds. The fact that you don't live there is irrelevant.

The company can go to court to try to force the sale as it is your asset. See a solicitor or CAB as soon as possible.

I can't understand why you weren't covered by PPI when you first went sick, unless you were already in arrears.

[Freelancer10]

As it was an old illness reoccured i was not eligible to claim
The mail sent to me to inform of court was sent to my old address even though the HP company knew of my new address so in turn i missed the original court case to explain

[themas]

There must have been a County Court Judgement against you before they got the charging order. And the terms of that judgement must have been breached. It may be that it was a "forthwith" judgement - i.e. pay the whole debt immediately - or an instalment order you could not afford.

Whichever it was, you could have gone back to Court for a redetermination but it is now too late to do that. However, you might still be able to apply to Court for a Variation Order to try to get an instalment payment order that you can afford. You need to take advice on whether this is possible at this stage - as Ethel says, see a solicitor or CAB. If you get such an order, then provided you comply fully with it (do not miss a payment by so much as one day) they cannot go for an order for sale.

All the above assumes the debt is solely yours. But you say "we bought a car". If the HP was in joint names then they should be chasing your ex as well as you.

[Freelancer10]

Thank you all for your advice i can see i must see a solicitor

The car was purchased jointly but there was a clause which gives the HP company the choice to chase one or both the applicants
The original CCJ was a "Forthwith"but i was unaware of the proceedings ( due to not recieving mail) or i would have set up an instalment plan
I of course knew i owed for the car
when the HP company went back to court and were granted a charge on the property I was advised at the time that the charging order would stay for 3 years and get renewed (possibly) if i then made no attempt to make a offer of payments . I can see from your answer that this is untrue
I thought that the charging order would simply stay until the house was sold, by us, It was only when they threatened me with a forced sale that i stood up and took notice

As i am now dealing with the HP companys Solicitors I recently offered again to return the car but was informed it was of no commercial value to them and as they still have a financial interest in the Car i cant sell it.
I also offered pay �100 per month until my circumstances changed but this was refused
Although yesterday i rang the HP company and asked would they take monthly payments of �100 until the case got to court and surprisingly they accepted my first payment of �100
Thier solicitors seemed quite shocked that they accepted the money.
i am hoping that as they have and i continue to make regular payments,although the debt will never go away at least the forcable sale of the house may be put on a back burner, so to speak.
I will go to a solicitor early next week and see if we can go to court and have some sort of variation order put in place
Unfortunetly my Income at the min is low �300 per month so �100 is the most i can pay back monthly but as the interest is charged at �80 per month my offer does not seem very realistic
I

[NYCSavage]

Ask them to freeze the interest now that you are paying.