From Longman Dictionary of Contemporary Englishrepossessre‧pos‧sess /ˌriːpəˈzes/ verb [transitive] BFLto take back cars, furniture, or property from people who had arranged to pay for them over a long time, but cannot now continue to pay for them → bailiff, repo man Eventually the bailiffs came to repossess the flat. —repossession /-ˈzeʃən/ noun [countable, uncountable]→ See Verb table
Examples from the Corpus
repossess• Marsh had spent some of the money on buying a Jaguar, followed by a Porsche which had now been repossessed.• The champagne corks popped but then the reporter told us the house had been repossessed.• Most of the money is owed by people whose homes have been repossessed and sold for less than their outstanding mortgage.• Figures released by the Council of Mortgage Lenders last week show that about 80,000 homes were repossessed by lenders in 1991.• His car was eventually repossessed by the auto loan agency.• He or his collection agent will try to repossess everything you own.• This reluctance of lenders to repossess homes owes little to sentiment: few lenders want to sell assets into a falling market.• Most mortgage lenders stress that they are not keen to repossess homes.• A hundred thousand homes have been repossessed so far this year.From Longman Business Dictionaryrepossessre‧pos‧sess /ˌriːpəˈzes/ verb [transitive]FINANCEPROPERTY to take back a car, property etc from someone who had arranged to pay for them over a long time, but cannot now continue to pay for themCreditors are seeking to repossess 10 jets.→ See Verb table