Buying a house, fiancee moving in with me - cohabitation contracts?

Craig_Peterson

Hi there,

Please excuse my ignorance as this is all new to me but basically I am looking to buy a new place shortly and move my partner in. Here is the circumstances as I hope it helps shed more light on the situation.

I currently am nearly 6 years into paying off my current house which is a 2 bed semi detached bungalow. I put £25,000 down as a deposit on it and bought it for £85,000 so am expecting a good chunk back when I sell it.

I am also selling a property of my late mothers which I will then split between myself and my sister - the expected sell price on this should be around £170,000 so £85,000 coming my way.

I am looking to go for a property around the £160,000 / £170,000 mark and will be mortgaging the remainder.

Unfortunately my partner has a very dark credit history and won't be accepted on the mortgage but I want to make sure that we are both protected, just in case things dont go according to plan in our relationship (the old can never be too careful thing).

What I was wondering was, is there a legal contract for cohabiting that covers us both.

Obviously I would want to protect the monetary investment I am putting in as she will not be contributing anything at all initially - only contributing to the ongoing mortgage costs.

The same holds true that if we were to part ways that she would be covered for the contributions made towards the mortgage payments.

This is where Im not sure how things would work though.

We live in Scotland too so not sure if that has a baring on the law differences.

Any help or advice greatly appreciated.

Thanks

Craig

Guest101

Once you get married all your property becomes joint anyway, so waste of time isnt it?

Now if you split 1-3 years, its considered a short marriage, so you would be entitled to return (more or less) to your situation before marriage (so ou would retain your home - and she could claim the payments, no need for a contract for this), but 3+ years and it'd be a 50/50 split to start with. More or less in each persons favour if there were kids etc

densol_2

Guest101 wrote: »

Once you get married all your property becomes joint anyway, so waste of time isnt it?

Now if you split 1-3 years, its considered a short marriage, so you would be entitled to return (more or less) to your situation before marriage (so ou would retain your home - and she could claim the payments, no need for a contract for this), but 3+ years and it'd be a 50/50 split to start with. More or less in each persons favour if there were kids etc

I agree - put kids into the mix and she has the golden ticket should you split up. Somewhere in my mind I want to give my kids a lump sum to buy towards a house ( if I sell the big house we are in ) and it pains me to think a woman could walk off with it. Yeah ok to house the kids till 18 etc but the courts tend to ' give ' houses to the one responsible for the kids - usually the woman.

Guest101

densol wrote: »

I agree - put kids into the mix and she has the golden ticket should you split up. Somewhere in my mind I want to give my kids a lump sum to buy towards a house ( if I sell the big house we are in ) and it pains me to think a woman could walk off with it. Yeah ok to house the kids till 18 etc but the courts tend to ' give ' houses to the one responsible for the kids - usually the woman.

That's not strictly true.

Generally the parent with care (usually the mother) is entitled to live at the property until the youngest has left full time education at which point the house must be sold. However, since she is paying the mortgage during this time, she is entitled to a far greater share than the Non resident parent. Hence why it might seem gifted to them - though it's not.

If the PWC cannot afford the mortgage, the house must be sold.

However for this to happen, the PWC must be named on the property/ have an interest in the property.

If your (presumebly) son(s) owned the property on their own, with no marriage. The mother would never have a claim on it, regardless if they had children or not.

Craig_Peterson

Thanks for the replies.

We are looking to live together for at least a few years before marriage and we are not looking to have children until a few years after that.

Thanks