Can i force ex to sell??

Nickie63

Ok so this is my situation, bit of a messy one so am just wondering if anyone could give me some sound advice.
Mortgage took out in 2003 with partner , not married, we split in 2006 due to his bad behaviour, i had to left and rent, after we had settled down i asked him to either sell up or buy me out, as i wasnt paying the mortage, well couldnt as trying to pay my own rent, he would do neither, now 6 years on he put it up for sale this year, we had a buyer, but due to his messing around and reluctancy to sell the buyers have now pulled out.
My ex is saying he would rather it was repossessed than let me have any profit from the sale as i hadn't contributed towards the mortgage for 6 years, i did how ever state that id asked it to be sold straight away when i left and he refused.
Can i force him to sell? Im aware there is some court order to do so but is quite costly and im not in a financial position to do so, also can i stop him from letting it get repossessed or is that down to him seeing as he is paying the mortage?
Also have now been sent a bill for the solicitors work they had done to date, given that i was unaware the house was on the market and had nothing to do with getting solicitors involved etc it all seems very unfair, he has now gone 'missing' leaving me with the bills to pay for the sale that never got completed.
Is is not possible for me to take over the house or the mortgage by the way as i am not financially well off to do so... hope that made sense.

timmyt

Nickie63 wrote: »

Ok so this is my situation, bit of a messy one so am just wondering if anyone could give me some sound advice.
Mortgage took out in 2003 with partner , not married, we split in 2006 due to his bad behaviour, i had to left and rent, after we had settled down i asked him to either sell up or buy me out, as i wasnt paying the mortage, well couldnt as trying to pay my own rent, he would do neither, now 6 years on he put it up for sale this year, we had a buyer, but due to his messing around and reluctancy to sell the buyers have now pulled out.
My ex is saying he would rather it was repossessed than let me have any profit from the sale as i hadn't contributed towards the mortgage for 6 years, i did how ever state that id asked it to be sold straight away when i left and he refused.
Can i force him to sell? Im aware there is some court order to do so but is quite costly and im not in a financial position to do so, also can i stop him from letting it get repossessed or is that down to him seeing as he is paying the mortage?
Also have now been sent a bill for the solicitors work if you did not instruct them then it is your ex's contract with them and he must pay they had done to date, given that i was unaware the house was on the market and had nothing to do with getting solicitors involved etc it all seems very unfair, he has now gone 'missing' leaving me with the bills to pay for the sale you have no bills if you did not contact with the bill raiser that never got completed.
Is is not possible for me to take over the house or the mortgage by the way as i am not financially well off to do so... hope that made sense.

you need a court order to force him to sell. I would see a family lawyer who offers legal aid by the sound of it.

Nickie63

Unfortunelty cant get legal aid when its to do with property as its classed as assets

paddedjohn

are you on thge mortgage? what was the equity in the property when you left in 06?

GDB2222

What's may well happen is that your ex- is going to stop paying the mortgage. He may already have done so. The house will be repossessed. The sale price will not cover the mortgage. You are jointly liable for the mortgage, and the lender will chase you for the whole of the shortfall. If this happens, assuming you have little money, you should file for bankruptcy. Otherwise, the lenders can chase you for this outstanding loan for at least the next 6 years.

Unfortunately, this is quite likely to happen, so you should start preparing for possible bankruptcy sooner rather than later. For example, buy some clothes to last you the next couple of years, that sort of thing.

[Deleted User]

I'm sorry to be the bearer of bad news but going bankrupt will not protect from claims re outstanding mortgage. Look at the bankruptcy part of the forum.

OP, I am sorry this is happening to you. Try and book a free half hour appointment. Take any documents u have with you proving you are/aren't a part owner and try and get an idea what is the next step. Barring that you could try Citizen's advice.

If he has 'gone missing' (if you have keys) it could be a good time to sell. If you are able to get a court order to force him to do so. I think one of the questions u need to ask the solicitor is what do u do if he won't sign anything agreeing to a sale? Explain he's gone missing too (why u need proof of part ownership).

princeofpounds

Yes unfortunately you need a court order to sell. It might be harder to organise but you might be able to achieve this without a lawyer by representing yourself. It does not necessarily need to be that complicated, although it can get complicated.

If you did not commission the lawyer etc. it is unlikely that you actually have any liability to pay those bills. They should be chasing him.

All the people talking about bankruptcy - it's not entirely clear that the property is in negative equity. They have owned it for 8 years so there is is a good chance it is not so although a repossesssion is a disaster for the OP's credit rating it is not necessarily bankruptcy situation, although it could be.

OP, as for 'stopping' a repossession, that is unlikely unless you start paying the mortgage yourself. Nothing is 'down to him' as it is likely that both of you are on the mortgage if both of you are on the title, so frankly you and he never split up as far as your finances are concerned. You are as responsible for the mortgage as he is.

johnbusby

Does the ex have a point here? Why not offer to pay him the mortgage money that you "owe" out of the proceeds of any sale - it seems fair and might get him back on side with regards to selling the house

pimento

If he has gone missing, move back in and instead of paying rent, pay the mortgage.

princeofpounds

Does the ex have a point here? Why not offer to pay him the mortgage money that you "owe" out of the proceeds of any sale - it seems fair and might get him back on side with regards to selling the house

Whilst I would totally agree with this normally, and it might be a practical step to get cooperation, in this case the OP does claim to have asked for the sale on break-up, which was the right thing to do. The ex seems to have created his own problem in this regard.

If he has gone missing, move back in and instead of paying rent, pay the mortgage.

Not a bad idea, except that the ex could move back in at any moment and the OP does say they can't take the whole house on due to the expense.

dancingfairy

Hi - here's what I would do:
1) find out how much the house is worth - check out rightmove etc for similar houses in your area etc, and find out how much equity (or not) their is in the house. Clearly your actions will be different if there is say 20k equity or 2k.
2) Speak to your mortgage lender - find out how much in arrears you are, what the balance on the mortgage is, what they can do to help you etc. You should at least be able to find out when payments were last made and whether they have started reposession proceedings or not. It is unlikely they will let you go interest only or put the arrears at the end of the mortgage without your ex's permission but you do need to ask them for their policies to help people.
3). Go to your local CAB /Legal aid centre to ask about help for enfocing a sale - if they can't help you then I would ring around law firms in your local area that specialise in this sort of thing and ask for a free initial consolutation or for a fixed fee half hour or something - this should give you an idea of how easy /hard this thing is to do and how much they will charge.
4) You then need to weigh this up against the equity (or not) and see whether it is worth trying for a forced sale or not.
5) Can you get hold of your ex at all - through his friends, family, work, facebook as you might be able to sort something out.
6) Assuming that there isn't enough equity to go for a forced sale then you need to look at how much the bill for reposession/mortgage shortfall is likely to be. Assuming you aren't going to run off and hide for the next 12 years of your life (I think they can chase you for 12 years) then you need to decide whether to try and get an unsecured loan to pay off the mortgage shortfall, whether you can come to some sort of arrangement with the mortgage company or whether to file for bankruptcy. The debt charities such as National Debtline, CCCS or your local CAB can help you with this when you have a better idea of figures and how much you are likely to end up owing.

As other ideas can you move in yourself and rent out a room to a friend? can you rent the house out locally to cover the mortgage? All things to consider.
Anyway hope that helps.
Best of luck
df