Nama-bound firm completed work worth €5.3m

A LOSS-MAKING property company whose loans are going into Nama completed work worth €5.3 million on residential property for its owners and their children during its last financial year, accounts just filed in the Companies Office show.

Attempts to contact Laurence or Mairead Keely, directors of Kimpton Vale Ltd, of Carpenterstown Road, Castleknock, Dublin, were not successful.

Accounts for Kimpton Vale for the year to May 20th, 2009, show it “raised an invoice of €1 million including VAT to directors Laurence and Mairead Keegan regarding the construction of a residential property” during the year.

The accounts do not give any information in relation to payments arising from the invoice.

The accounts also state the company was contracted to build residential units for the Kimpton Vale Partnership and that an invoice of €4.32 million was raised on their construction and fit out.

Mr and Ms Keegan are members of the partnership, according to company office filings, as are Sarah, Sean and Aine Keegan, all with an address at Auburn Drive, Castleknock, at the time the partnership was established in 2005. The latter three were all students at the time. Mr and Ms Keegan notified the Companies Office in February 2009 that they now live at Georgian Village, Castleknock.

The accounts say transactions with interested parties were conducted on an arm’s length basis.

Kimpton Vale Ltd, of Carpenterstown Road, Castleknock, is wholly owned by Laurence Keegan since May 20th, 2009, when his wife transferred her shareholding to him. The accounts show it made a pretax loss of €873,549 and had accumulated losses of €3.89 million at year’s end. Bank borrowings were €8 million. Company filings show mortgages with AIB.

“The company’s borrowings are due to be transferred to Nama although the timing of this and implications thereon remain uncertain,” the accounts state.

Directors’ remuneration in the year was €104,000, down from €606,283 the previous year. The company paid €147,000 rent to Mr Keegan. The previous year’s accounts for Kimpton note its turnover had fallen by 72 per cent to €4.4 million and it was loss-making.

Mr Keegan was restricted from operating as a director by the High Court in January 2004, arising out of his activities with Torose Construction Ltd. The share capital of Kimpton is set at the threshold that allows directors restricted under Section 150 of the Companies Act to act as directors.

In 2002 Torose Construction, which built developments at Castleknock and Templeogue, made a €6.93 million settlement with the Revenue.

In July of last year Kimpton Vale got planning permission from An Bord Pleanála to build houses and apartments in south Dublin on the site of a 19th-century convent which it had illegally demolished.

Mr Keegan was named last year as having invested €4 million via Davy in developer Bernard McNamara’s stake in the Irish Glass Bottle site, in Ringsend, Dublin.