Advice on ex defaulting please

Thesocialparrot

Hello hope someone can help. My partner split from his ex around 6 years ago and we live together for the last 2.5 years. He is on their mortgage (never married if that makes a difference) and pays extra to her towards the kids which covers his share. They have 3 kids and he pays £600 a month which is nearly double the child maintenance amount if they were to become involved. She is an idiot with money and took another loan on the home to afford her luxury lifestyle which he didn’t know about until it showed up on a credit check. More recently she’s been choosing paying for luxuries over the mortgage and has defaulted with creditors knocking on her door. She has been given until the end of Feb to find a couple of thousand or default. We don’t live a luxury life and we do not have the money to bail her out (if we did it again this time then she will just carry on and we will have to do it again and again). My question is whether there is anything we can do or get signed to say he is no longer liable for the mortgage? Or can he force her to sell? If she sells then the debts stop and she can rent using whatever money is left. He doesn’t even want any of his money back that he put into it (a substantial sum!) just wants free of the possibility of having to pay her mortgage off when she finally messes up enough to lose it. What happens is she loses it? Would they make him pay anything? Or as she gets extra maintenance could he pay her less and pay some off the mortgage and would that count? Advice appreciated! He won’t do anything too bad against her because of the kids as we wouldn’t want anything bad between them. We’ve already said if or rather when she loses the house we will have the kids stay with us until the council House them but we are an hour away so kids would have to temp move schools etc so better if we can prevent this somehow.

foxy-stoat

Both parties are jointly and severally liable for the debt, so both your partner and his ex are 100% liable for the mortgage.

How did she take out a secured loan on your partner's house without him knowing?

What is the property worth and how much is left on the mortgage?

Once she defaults by 6 months they will look to start repossession process, which can and will take months.

Once the property is sold, agents fees paid, legals and other charges paid then whatever is left will go to the secured loan lender. If the property is in negative equity then they will come after your partner for it.

No point in forcing a sale is he doesnt want cash out of the property as it will cost thousands in legal costs and as there are kids in involved it will complicate things.

ACG

She must have forged his signature if the loan is secured against the home - unless he did sign it?

He is jointly liable for the mortgage.
He could probably get out of being liable for the secured loan if he were to argue it and possibly report his ex to the police for fraud. The question is whether or not he would do that with kids involved.

If the ex was able to take out a secured loan, I would imagine there will be enough equity in the house to ensure you do not have people knocking at the door. But his credit report is not going to be great and that may affect him down the line with moving home/remortgages/mobile phones etc.

But he is also 100% liable for the Mortgage. You do not say how much the mortgage is, but why does he not pay the £600 to the lender, or if less than that pay the mortgage and give her the difference? I would also get in touch with whoever the secured loan is with and ask why it is in his name and ask for it to be removed as he has never signed up for a secured loan.

Thesocialparrot

Thanks for that; yes she signed his name and was able to as he was rubbish and left his bank accounts registered to the address for ages.

I guess we need to find out if the equity is ok then and if it is then it’s not so bad as she has trashed his credit rating anyway with credit cards she also took out in his name etc so we are already screwed like that. If it’s negative then we need to figure something out ASAP but as long as it’s not then let her choose her fancy lifestyle over having her home.

I’ll find out how much the mortgage is; it’s interest only so it won’t be that much. If it’s not much then he can just pay them instead of her; although she would probably go to child maintenance then and say he isn’t paying so he has to pay her at least the amount they would say he has to pay! So complicated! His eldest is nearly 18 but studying a professional course which I think means he wouldn’t have to pay for her when she’s 18-will have to check; that would free up more to spend on the mortgage but once the kids are older we don’t want to still pay her mortgage off so actually...waffling I know but I think actually she needs to lose the house instead or we will be stuck paying forever!!

Thanks for the help guys, will break it to him later....

ACG

I doubt she would argue the amount being paid is not being paid as it is very easy to show that the mortgage was not being paid and that is a priority as it keeps a roof over the childrens head and the 2 combined total what was agreed - but thats using common sense so who knows what a judge or CSA might decide.

I would personally get this secured loan and credit cards sorted. If she is forging his name, a knock on the door from the police might prevent it happening again. The house wont be in negative equity but nobody is to say it wont be with Brexit. Rather than stick your head in the sand I would personally get his name of it. The last think you want is people knocking at the door in 10-20 years time and then trying to sort it all out with no paperwork in place.