A businessman and his family who have been missing since their home burnt down in a suspected arson attack on Tuesday may have been about to lose the house to his creditors.

Christopher Foster, 50, who was last seen with his wife and teenage daughter on Monday night, is known as a flamboyant character who had had dealings in the oil industry in Russia and Dubai. But his financial problems appeared to be closer to home.

Land Registry documents are understood to show that the family’s house, near Maesbrook, Shropshire, was in the hands of a firm of liquidators, Butcher Woods, of Birmingham, and a high street bank. It is not known whether the Fosters were under any pressure to leave their home. Butcher Woods declined to comment.

Mr Foster was at a neighbour’s barbecue on Monday with his wife, Jillian, 49, and Kirstie, 15. Friends said that he appeared to be relaxed and in high spirits. Shortly before 5am on Tuesday villagers heard the sound of a car fuel tank exploding. Emergency services found that the family’s three horses and four dogs had been shot dead before the kennels, stables and main house, which appeared to have been barricaded from the inside, had been set alight.

The house was reduced to a blackened shell and investigators were still waiting yesterday for it to be made safe for search teams to go in. Police suspect that the family died in the fire.

Mr Foster’s company, Ulva, which supplied insulation for oil rigs, was wound up last year. He was described later by a senior judge as a “man not to be trusted”.

At one time he tried to buy back his company by putting his home up as security but he was unsuccessful.

Detectives have been trying to establish whether Mr Foster was attacked because of his financial affairs or whether he started the fire himself. They will want to know whether he feared that he was about to lose the house to his creditors.

On Monday night the Fosters appeared to be happy when they attended the barbecue, which was held by a wealthy car dealer in the village. “They were enjoying a few drinks and seemed in good spirits,” one friend said. “There was absolutely no sign of anything untoward.”

But yesterday a man who in 2006 was accused of trying to blackmail Mr Foster for £100,000 presented a different picture. Leo Dennis, 44, of Telford, who was one of two men acquitted in a trial at Shrewsbury Crown Court, said that he believed that Mr Foster had fled abroad to one of his “secret” properties in Europe.

Mr Dennis said: “I don’t think he’s dead. He’s got places he can go to, places scattered around Europe. They won’t find him or his family when they go in there.

“He was not a very nice man and now, with what’s happened, it will all come to light, everything he was involved in.”

West Mercia Police said that they planned to go into the building overnight or early today. Superintendent Gary Higgins said: “Until we can enter the property we do not know whether the family was inside at the time of the fire. It is a large property and there is a lot of debris inside, which will have to be painstakingly sifted through and examined. It is not something that can be done quickly.”

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