MMD: Should Jennifer do the deeds with Brad?

NiKNiK_4

I bought a house back in 1991 - location location 'n' all that - I invited my pregnant girl friend to move in - whilst she rented out HER flat.
We were happy with this set up for 15 years. Then as we were not getting any younger we decided to get WILLs drawn up. At this point we were advised that if I died suddenly that my girl friend would not automatically get my house and my money and even if she did, then minus inheritance tax. 18 months later we got married - BIG MISTAKE! Marriage is slanted against the one who has the most money! 5 days less than 9 months after getting married my now wife said that she wanted a divorce!!
2 and a half years of separation later I am having to sell MY house and end up giving my now ex-wife 56% of the sale price!!

Moral of the story - whilst in love and planning to live with each other get a 'DEED of TRUST' drawn up - that states exactly who owns what and by exactly how much - this way when you do break up there's no arguing.

And lastly - if you bought it and your name is on the DEED keep it that way.

If you feel like sharing then buy another property where you both own the same percentage.

I did not do any of this and I have lost my £800,000 pound house - get legal advice - its worth it.

Adrasteia01

Definitely not. Let him pay her rent instead.

If they marry, then reconsider. I don't see any reason why the deeds would need changing though - it sounds a bit dodgy actually.

AnneB22

Absolutely not! If I were Jennifer I'd be querying why Brad was so keen to be put on the deeds. Presumably he would have to pay rent somewhere else, so he's no worse off by not being on the deeds.

As a compromise, can Jennifer offer him a deal whereby he pays less rent to her than he would elsewhere? That would give Brad a bit of extra cash which might help him with his finances.

Hoodsfanx

Don't confuse money / finances and, for want of a better word, love.
Equal contributions, in the present, in the past and in the future or all hell can break loose. If Brad cares enough, he'll not complain. If he doesn't, keep fishing, Jennifer, you'll catch a good 'un eventually.

Whitedove

NO NO NO! Even if he is a very nice and loving person, for the rest of his life! Accidents happen and his family, or anyone he owes money to, could end up forcing her to sell her house.

Kernow_Kid

My OH bought a house a few years ago, then I bought one to rent out.
I moved in with her and paid 'rent' with a proper book and contract, and we kept this up on the grounds that if it all went pear shaped we could walk wawy with no problems.
10 years on and we're still not married, but have now bought a house together with a 50/50 split on the profits if we separate.

Jen should keep everything split and noted.
Its too easy to lose everything to a partner these days.

justtoclarify_2

Even if Jennifer doesn't put Brad on the deeds, if he moves in he should sign an agreement to vacate the property in the event of a sale or on request. This applies to anyone who you invite into your home who is over 18. Normally this is need to take out a new mortgage (the vacate on sale part) and applies to anyone not named on the mortgage, but you should do it if this occurs mid mortgage term. Imagine if Jennifer wants to move and Brad for his own reasons doesn't and becomes a sitting tennant.

Love is fine but take legal advice with regard to your home.

serendipity2706

Get the house valued, take off the existing mortgage, get him to pay half of the current collateral, and set up a direct debit, then I MIGHT consider it.

eg current house value £100,000, mortgage £50,000, he pays £25,000 (half of collateral) in cash and half of monthly mortgage payments.
If he's bad with money he wont have the lump sum so, no problem.
If he does have lump sum, Jennifer can invest it in high interest account so when/if it goes sour, she can revalue the house, pay him back his lump sum and come to some arrangement over any outstanding profit from the interest earned on the high interest account.
She may even make a bit of profit...

pollyanna24

cheltenhamgirl wrote: »

I'm in a similar situation with my partner now and after reading all of your comments i'm a bit worried! Mine's a bit different though because it's just that we're looking to buy together...we're both in rented at the moment....

We've been together for about a year and a half, and we both rent our own places. We've just found a house that we want to buy, and are in the process of organising mortgage etc. However, he has been notoriously 'ditsy' with money in the past (not paying bills on time, going slightly overdrawn quite often...more through being useless than overspending) and now has a bad credit rating meaning we can't get the best mortgage deal.

Do you think it's a bad idea to buy somewhere together? He would be putting in more than half of the deposit? I thought it was ok, but after reading your comments I'm worried!!

I can appreciate how scary it is to start up for the first time. However, you are in a slightly different position here than the hypothetical question as you are starting off together, so there will not be anything like equity built up or anything.

I see you are worried because your partner is more lapsy-daisy than you with money. My bf is exactly like this and so I deal with everything to do with the money side of things.

We started off putting a certain amount of our wages into the joint account that would be enough to cover any joint bills and then everything else was ours to deal with our personal bills (mobiles, he had a car, I needed a travel card etc.). I drummed it into him that before anything else, as soon as the money hit his bank account, I wanted his share.

Last year, we changed all this as he was still being lapsy daisy about stuff like car insurance. Get stressed when it was coming up and stick it on his credit card etc. So I basically took over everything. I can appreciate that this only works when one side of the relationship is willing to let the other deal with everything, but this works for my bf as the money we give ourselves our of our wages is his to do what he likes with. We get paid similar amounts and where he has a car, I have to get into London everyday, so the "personal" outgoings are fairly similar. Even if they weren't we have realised we are in this for the long run and any leftover money from our wages, goes into a savings account.

lordjim

Some great replies... but I think they should both seriously consider this:

Sell the house and rent a new one together. This way they get to start afresh in a new house together, which they have chosen together. This is far better than one partner moving into the others territory. Jenn will get all the more !!!!ed off when Brad starts changing things and leaving his mark.

Also, this way Jennifer gets to ringfence and do something sensible with her capital where Brad cannot touch it. If Brad refuses then he is definitely a gold digger. I suppose they could rent the house out and then rent somewhere else themselves, but deciding to keep the property on the basis of capital gains is pointless at this point in the economic cycle.