Bleak house... court battle over Dickens' former home

THE £19million ex-home of Charles Dickens is the site of a fight between a high-end estate agent and her bank.

- By Paul Keogh

Deborah Fiorentino could lose the Grade I-listed Regent's Park mansion after being sued for not paying her £17.85million mortgage.

After taking out the loan against the mansion, a mews house and a Hampstead property, Ms Fiorentino ran up huge arrears, a court heard.

Luxembourg-based lender Banque Havilland is demanding the house and a judgment for £10.2million owed, claiming that despite being “supposedly a high net worth individual” she cannot pay the mortgage.

Ms Fiorentino, 63, claims the bank “unreasonably” stopped a re-financing, costing her millions of pounds.

Bleak House author Dickens lived in the seven-bed home overlooking a boating lake in the summer of 1861.

Luxury