at a loss

reandsa

I am writing this in desperation to see if anyone out there can suggest reasonable ways we can help our daughter who has managed to get herself in truly deep hot water with her house (mortgage). Briefly she allowed herself to be talked into letting her boyfriend use her house in Essex as collateral for a loan of £70,000 which they then used (at his request) to buy outright a property in Florida. Arrangements being she would deal financially with living arrangements here and he would be responsible for the mortgage - which is a joint one!! The mortgage still has 8 years to run, he has left her - she now has a £600 odd a month mortgage to pay which she cant afford. Her name is not on the Florida house so if Santander foreclose its her house in Essex which goes and her and the two children are out on the street. We have paid a couple of payments for her to try and solve things, but we cant keep it up being old fogies ourselves. Santander are not being very helpful at all. can anyone come up with anything? I would be eternally grateful.

debt_doctor

Hi,


Is the £600 pm mortgage a direct result of the loan to buy the Florida property, or is there more borrowing to cover the Florida property?


If the UK home was sold, how much (if any) profit would be made once all borrowings were repaid?


DD

longtermplanner

Can you clarify things please as we need to be very sure what is going on.

Your daughter owns a house in Essex in her name only.
This was either mortgage free or had a low mortgage?
Her ex then persuaded her to remortgage or a get secured loan for 70k which was used to buy a house in Florida in his name?

If that is correct, I would suggest she needs to see a solicitor who will write the ex a letter saying that either he needs to continue paying the loan as per their agreement or he needs to sell the property in Florida to pay it off. And if he doesn't she will sue him for the money.

alastairq

If the Essex home were re-possessed, daughter & kids would not be homeless..merely having to seek perhaps to rent a house?

reandsa

first - thankyou to all who responded, made me feel a bit less alone. The £600 p.m. is to repay the loan (mortgage) which was used to purchase the florida property outright. That property is in his name only. Her house in Essex is in her name (was mortgage free when the ex came along), but the mortgage is in joint names as he couldn't raise the cash himself. He just seems to have no morals or common sense at all.
If she has to sell her house in Essex it would be to effectively buy his house in florida for him = without any input from him at all. it seems very wrong, even though we all know how stupid she has been over this, we are having to deal with the aftermath! it isn't easy.

alastairq

Never is easy, picking up the pieces?

How many would listen, when one asks casually, why spend so much on a wedding, when [the chances are?} they'll be divorced in 5 years time?

Why go all out for joint finances, since they only cause trouble when we inevitably get divorced?

I know, I now....all seems like a 'good idea at the time?'

The above, from someone who has been married, & divorced, 3 times...........[seemed like a good idea at the time???]

arcon5

If the house was in the UK and not Florida then we might be saying she has beneficial interest in the property despite it being in his name. However, it's not so we don't know.

Seek proper legal advice.

longtermplanner

reandsa wrote: »

If she has to sell her house in Essex it would be to effectively buy his house in florida for him = without any input from him at all.

That money wasn't 'given' to him to buy a house in Florida. Any sensible reading of the transaction shows that the mortgage was to purchase the house in Florida so she has beneficial equity in that.

If he wants to claim that it was a gift, then it is up to him to produce documentation about this, because the reasonable starting point is that it was not.

She can demand that the money is repaid to her indeed she can sue him for this, but a better first step if for her to see a solicitor who will write her ex a letter explaining this.

She needs to go and see a solicitor asap to get this started, before the arrears on the mortgage get to an unmanageable level.

arcon5

Also, if her house is repossessed then she'd be paying rent somewhere for a sum quite close to the £600 per month mortgage payment, so I'd advise her to write up a statement of affairs detailing her income and outgoings to try establish where she can cut back.

Also see if she qualify a for any kind of benefit - housing benefit maybe.

reandsa

I am very grateful to you all for the advice. Will get her to contact a solicitor to lay it all out and see if they can help (without costing her - read US for that!) an arm and a leg!