Adding wife on the mortgage & deeds

kokolino23

Hello,
We've made an application for a remortgage and my wife will apply as well (she wasn't previously).
No issues with this so far as the legal fees are covered.
When we've started the application with our solicitors, we've been asked to pay a fee of £250 for the transfer of equity (fair enough). On top of this, we'll be charged for up to £1k (not clear exactly how much) for adding her name on the deeds as well.
Would this fee related to how much the land registry charges for this service or the solicitors could have their own fee as well?
Adding her on the mortgage should be already covered by the initial fee (solicitors fees are included with the mortgage).
I'm wondering what's the best option for us to save money on this.
Should we leave just the mortgage with our names on it and deal with the deeds at a later stage?
Thank you

kokolino23

A quick Google search regarding this sparked more questions.
Do we need to pay stamp duty or capital gain tax if we were going to add my wife on the deeds?
Our mortgage will be paid off in 2 years time, would it help to get this done at the time?
Cheers

kokolino23

Another thing...we've been married for 15 years but due to some odd circumstances, she wasn't on the mortgage when we purchased the property a while back (still married at that time).

CSL0183

What’s the importance of having her on the mortgage or deeds at all?

You are married so half the assets are hers in the event of divorce and presumably all hers in the event of your death (will)

K_S

kokolino23 said:

Hello,
We've made an application for a remortgage and my wife will apply as well (she wasn't previously).
No issues with this so far as the legal fees are covered.
When we've started the application with our solicitors, we've been asked to pay a fee of £250 for the transfer of equity (fair enough). On top of this, we'll be charged for up to £1k (not clear exactly how much) for adding her name on the deeds as well.
Would this fee related to how much the land registry charges for this service or the solicitors could have their own fee as well?
Adding her on the mortgage should be already covered by the initial fee (solicitors fees are included with the mortgage).
I'm wondering what's the best option for us to save money on this.
Should we leave just the mortgage with our names on it and deal with the deeds at a later stage?
Thank you

@kokolino23 A £1,250 fee for the transfer of equity (which always includes adding/removing a person from the deeds) is quite high. In some circumstances (unlikely for a married couple I think), separate legal representation will be required in which case there are additional legal fees.

For a low value property, the LR registration fees are < £100 in most cases.

kokolino23

I've just had a look on the gov website and if the property is mortgage free, we can add someone else as a joint owner, the fee is only £100.