My mum wants me to get a mortgage with her, advice please

theoretica

30k is a really tiny mortgage to sacrifice your ftb benefits for.  Have you and your mum investigated unsecured loans?

Emmia

If you're named on the mortgage you'll be jointly liable for the payments, so if she stops paying or gets into arrears... Guess who will be getting chased for payment.

You.

Being on a mortgage will remove your FTB benefits but will also be taken into account when you want to buy your own place and so will count against you in terms of the affordability of your borrowing then.

Irrespective of this, I wouldn't be liable for a mortgage on anywhere that I wasn't also listed on the deeds / land registry as an owner.

As everyone has said, you should say 'no' to this

BonaDea

Everything you've said is screaming out to me that this is a disaster waiting to happen - not only financially, but (if it all goes belly up) to your relationship with your mother.  The answer to her is very clearly 'no', so your focus needs to shift towards finding a way of saying this without damaging things with her irrevocably.  Her plan sounds completely madcap anyway, assuming she doesn't have a track record in successfully fixing-up and profitably selling on properties.  As others have said, if she's dead set on it, she should wait until she gets the inheritance, however long that takes, to do the work needed.  Can she live in it in the meantime?  Or if not, in a caravan on the site, as others do when they're doing up properties?  
 
And by the way, I think it to her discredit that she's even made this request of you.  I wouldn't dream of putting any of my children in that position.

GrumpyDil

Agreed with all of the above. £30k is right at the bottom end and I actually think most mortgage lenders would not lend that amount.

Secured loan might be an option but I'm with everyone above that this is a terrible plan and likely to end in tears. 

Jami74

Does she have much experience of renovating properties? If it's been on the market for x number of years, they've accepted £39k less than asking price and it might have a crack. It might take a lot of work to make it habitable. Sounds like the sort of place that needs to be bought by a builder who will have trade accounts to get cheap materials, the right contacts and be able to do the work themselves or get their apprentices to do it to keep costs down.

Will you get a mortgage? Will you still have an income when you go travelling? I am pretty sure when I applied for a mortgage I was asked if I was expecting my income to change significantly. Not being accepted for a mortgage might be your get out. 

It's really hard when your life-givers ask something of you. I would also struggle to say no if I thought there was a way I could give them what they wanted even if I didn't completely agree with it. If you agree, you could be reeling from the repercussions of this for years to come. Or, your Mum might turn it around for £20k and sell it in a few years at a massive profit and you might be better off for it.

BikingBud

elmorganx said:

Can I just add some information on the CCJ- she was given this due to her being unaware that her case of an unpaid parking ticket was even going to court and the court granted this as a result. She could pay this but she feels it’s the principle of it, having to pay so much for a parking fine. She was 9 minutes over on her parking ticket. Even with this on her credit file it’s still really really good b

Lots of good information to address and challenge that here:

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/categories/parking-tickets-fines-parking

Advice fr0m there may assisting in clearing any perceived obstruction. I would suggest that you steer your mum towards **NEWBIES!! PRIVATE PARKING TICKET? OLD OR NEW? **READ THESE FAQS FIRST!** Thankyou! 

Debbie9009

If your Mum has had an offer of 180k on this house and it really will be worth 320k when renovated then it needs a lot of work doing, and unless your Mum has a track record of renovating properties and knows lots of good tradespeople then there are many many ways that this could go very wrong.

The question to ask yourself is if it could be worth 320k after the work has been done then why aren’t investors/ builders etc interested in buying it ? You say it has been on the market for x years, then if it could really be worth 320k then it would have sold quite some time ago.

This house is likely to be a major money pit, so chances of your Mum being about to give you some of the profit is very low, as it’s likely there won’t be any.

As others have said if you are planning to go travelling then you are unlikely to get a mortgage, and please don’t be tempted to lie on the mortgage application when it asks if you know if your circumstances are going to change, if you do that and get caught then you can add mortgage fraud to the list of complications, not something you want, especially if you want to purchase a property for yourself at some time in the future.

I don’t think anyone on here is going to say this would be a good idea, I would use your wanting to go travelling as a way to say no.

FreeBear

elmorganx said: and there may be a crack running down the side of the house.

Had a look at a couple of houses with Lil Sis last year - Both in need of modernisation, both with cracks in the rear gable wall. With the first property, a small extension had been added and a doorway knocked through some 60 years back. Would have been OK if a lintel had been installed, but it wasn't. As a result, the wall has dropped and cracked all the way up to the roof line. To fix would require jacking up the wall, inserting a lintel, and then stitching the crack - Major expense.

The second property could well have been suffering from a similar problem (or a failed lintel). The crack was not so pronounced, but what was a bigger problem was a 25-50mm gap between the problem wall and the ceiling inside. Without the structural repairs, I was estimating renovation costs in excess of £50K - Fixing the wall may well have doubled the cost.

A hairline crack following mortar joints is not always a major issue. But if the crack goes through bricks, the repairs could be substantial. Even if you go for a level 3 survey, a recommendation will come back to get a structural engineer to take a look. And an SE will probably need to do invasive investigations to determine the cause and recommended repair. The fact that this property has been on the market for X years and now being progressively reducing in price should be warning enough that there may be some serious and costly problems.

WellKnownSid

elmorganx said:

Hi, so the house she wants to buy was originally up for a lot higher but it’s not sold in x amount of years and so they’ve kept dropping the price. The house is on the market for £219,000 but my mum has gone in with a lower offer and it’s been accepted. So the house it’s self needs a lot of work, the area is amazing and she’s been told that once the house is done up it will probably sell for about £320,000. 

elmorganx said:

My grandparents owned the property and once it’s sold they will all receive around £50k if not more. It’s just my aunty is having trouble selling the house as people are interested and then don’t place an offer but it’s still on the market. 

As others have said - this is a completely hare-brained scheme.

To put it bluntly, your family cannot even sell a "free" house and turn a profit.  That track record shouts that a house that will "probably sell for £320,000" is just la-la-land wishful thinking.

Even if by some miracle she did pull it off, you wouldn't see a penny from this adventure until your Mother agrees to make herself homeless.

There is nothing in it for you, but everything to lose.

Rolls Royce ideas on pushbike incomes as my Father would say.

Again, as others have said, you need to figure out how to say no in the nicest possible way...

amnblog

This is really tricky, when you have a close family member who is a dreamer and trying to pull you in to their schemes it can be a problem.
 
Could one of your Sisters or Aunts or Uncles talk to her to put her off this idea?

Clear issues from a professional point of view.

1. Mums age, you being on the mortgage will not in most cases, make any difference to this issue
2. You both have credit issues, if you find a lender it will probably cost you a chunk to repay the mortgage early
3. Mum on deeds, both on mortgage? Why? You pick up the risk but don't 'own' the asset
4. If Mum does not, or cannot pay the mortgage it is 100% your problem
5. The mortgage broker sounds like a idiot trying to get a deal at any cost
6. If the property is being sold for £180K it is not worth anywhere near £320K when sorted
7. If it were any kind of deal it would not have taken years to sell - sounds like a cash purchase for a seasoned developer
8. What does Mum know about property refurbishment? She has found an idiot for a Broker, will she find one for a Builder?
9. If the mortgage does not get settled it will count against you on affordability when buying your own home later. If the mortgage goes unpaid it wrecks your credit file. It will mean you will pay an extra 3% tax (or more) when you buy your first home.