What's fair in terms of £ when I move into my husband's inherited family home?

oneneedstocleartheattic

We have a pre and post nup in place outlining what's mine is mine, what's his is his and what's ours is ours.
In due course my husband will inherit his mortgage free family home from his parents. It's habitable but needs a six figure sum spending on it to bring it up to scratch. There may not be enough inherited money to pay for that.
This is my husband's sole asset and he intends to leave it to our son in due course. I'm cool with all of that.
Because of this inherited home which we will all live in we can sell our current home and put it into our pensions. This is a huge financial benefit to both of us and will basically pay for our retirement.
My family have nothing so can't leave anything - there's a huge family wealth disparity. 
My question is:
* What is fair in terms of my financial contribution to the household? I don't expect to live there free of charge. Do I pay £500 PCM and it pays towards utilities/council tax etc?
* What is the wisdom of putting a five figure chunk of money (from sale of current home) to spend on upgrading the inherited house with my husband matching me penny for penny with his contribution? 
Be grateful for insight, wisdom and lived experience from the hive mind on here.
Thanks in advance,

MyRealNameToo

oneneedstocleartheattic said:

We have a pre and post nup in place outlining what's mine is mine, what's his is his and what's ours is ours.
In due course my husband will inherit his mortgage free family home from his parents. It's habitable but needs a six figure sum spending on it to bring it up to scratch. There may not be enough inherited money to pay for that.
This is my husband's sole asset and he intends to leave it to our son in due course. I'm cool with all of that.
Because of this inherited home which we will all live in we can sell our current home and put it into our pensions. This is a huge financial benefit to both of us and will basically pay for our retirement.
My family have nothing so can't leave anything - there's a huge family wealth disparity. 
My question is:
* What is fair in terms of my financial contribution to the household? I don't expect to live there free of charge. Do I pay £500 PCM and it pays towards utilities/council tax etc?
* What is the wisdom of putting a five figure chunk of money (from sale of current home) to spend on upgrading the inherited house with my husband matching me penny for penny with his contribution? 
Be grateful for insight, wisdom and lived experience from the hive mind on here.
Thanks in advance,

You're aware that prenups have very little weight in England & Wales? Who was the one bringing the excess into the relationship that thought they'd be protected by them?

Why shouldn't you live for free? You're his wife/husband not his lodger. He hasn't paid for the home and nor have you so why should only one benefit from it? 

You seem to imply it will be your "forever home" and be passed down so the "wisdom" of putting money into the property will depend on what you value in life and if new kitchen/bathrooms etc are going to make you happier than an extra £X per year in retirement. 

The_Unready

I'm with the previous poster, and I'm surprised that the issue of monthly payments has even come up. Pre-nups, post-nups and the like don't give the impression of an equal partnership to a casual observer.

elsien

What proportion of the bills you pay is really down to individual incomes and how you arrange your day today finances between you.
It has nothing to do with homeownership, deposits or anything else.

Keep_pedalling

This sounds close to financial abuse to me, you are married and have a child together it is highly unlikely that the starting point of a divorce would be anything other than 50 / 50 with more going to the main child carer `(assuming we are not talking about an adult child). 

There is nothing wrong with protecting children’s inheritance in the event of the surviving spouse remarrying but the norm would be to draw up a will with an immediate post death interest trust to protect both the child’s inheritance and the long term security of the surviving spouse.

tacpot12

As per the comments on the Pre-and-post nuptual agreements, the starting point in the UK is a 50/50 split of assets if you divorce. 

In order to cement this idea, I think you need to broach with your husband that you should become a "tenants in common" owner of the property when it is inherited. He can give you half the house with no implications for inheritance tax. Once you both own equal shares in the house, it is sensible to invest qually in bringing the house upto stratch. If he is isn't going to make you a co-owner, I wouldn't invest anything in the house (even though you are entitled to half the house if you divorce - the court may give the pre/post nuptual agreement some weight on this). And once you both own equal shares in the house, you can leave your equal shares to your son, while retaining the right to live in the property while you want to do so.

As to what you contribute monthly, I would recommend making a token contribution/gift to your husband for him to save/spend/invest as he wishes. You shouldn't have to give him anything, and many would not do so in your situation, but you are saving the rent and mortgage costs because he is inheriting it without a mortgage. 

You should contribute half of all the costs of running the house: Council Tax, Insurance, Water Rates, Energy, Window Cleaning, Phone/Broadband, TV License. I use a spreadsheet to capture all these costs and split them equally with my partner (we're not married). We have arranged it so that someone has some of the bills in their name, and the other person has the other bills in their name. This helps when Banks or other institutions want to identify you and need a utility bill in your name. So if the regular bills that I pay add up to £300 pcm and the bills that my partner pays add up to £200 pcm, she would make a monthly payment to me of £50, so that we are both paying £250 pcm. This works for us, but needs us to adjust the balancing figure when any of the bills change. This is easy enough to do, as we arrange it so that I always owe her someothing and I just go into my online banking and amend the standing order when I need to. Some people would find this a bit too over the top!  

You should also expect to contribute half of the maintenance costs of the house, so I would save £150 pcm into a savings account in your name so that when repairs are needed, you can contribute to these. You savings will be a marital asset should you ever divorce, but if the house does need something doing to it, it is great to be able to have access to some money immediately. 

Ultimately any marriage is an arrangement that both parties have to agree to, so it's a matter as to what can be agreed and what feels fair. 

ian1246

I actually disagree with the previous posters.

Pre-Nuptials have a legal basis in the UK, provided that both parties have approached them in an open and honest manner and both parties have had independent legal advice. A good example of this is the recent case in the telegraph and other newspapers where the husband only got 0.5% of the multi-million £££ wealth his ex-wife had, based upon the existing Pre-Nuptial.

The reason it was overturned on appeal is due to insufficient/fraudulent disclosure by the ex - not because it wasn't deemed legally relevant - Fraud can invalidate any agreement.

A court doesn't have to follow pre-nuptials, so they are not 100% legally binding, but ultimately if its been entered into by both parties of their own free-will and its been done in a fair and just manner with appropriate legal advice, then the court absolutely will give it significant amounts of weight when it comes to a final settlement, since ultimately that is what the parties agreed to with their eyes open.

That said: I disagree that you should be paying a monthly cost to live in the house - its one thing for it to remain owned predominantly by your husband (if that's what a legal agreement you've both agreed to sets out), buts its entirely another matter to have to pay rent. I would suggest that you should both be paying equally (or proportionately based on your respective income) towards the joint living costs (i.e. utility bills) and then when it comes to the home's ownership, held on a tenant-in-common basis with your share of the home reflective of your investment in the property from the sale of the marital home i.e. if you invest the equivalent of 25% of the house's value in renovating it (from the proceeds of the house sale), you then get a 25% share of the house. Any maintenance costs should be covered equally by you both since your both living there.

Your husband shouldn't however be profiteering from you - there's a difference between respecting each others individual property (as per what you agreed) and financially exploiting the other. This is veering close to financial abuse with that £500 payment.

Emmia

Presumably your husband has a will stating your son inherits, excluding you?

If he does, and in the event of your husband's demise, and your son inheriting 100% of house (especially when he is an adult), where would you be expected to live?

Your son may not want you living there, may want to sell to invest in a different property etc., or many years down the road might get married and then divorced himself necessitating a divide of his assets, or goes bankrupt with the same effect - if you were still living in the property then you'd be evicted at that point.. where do you go then?

I think if your husband doesn't want you to have any ownership rights, then you should only pay your share of the utilities, council tax, groceries etc. nothing more. if upgrades are needed to his property, then as he owns the house (not you) he should pay for the upgrades (not you) This is the kind of advice I'd give to someone in a similar situation who is unmarried.

The money you don't spend should be saved to ensure you can buy/rent your own place in short order if the relationship breaks down. As you have agreements that say what is his is his, and what is yours, is yours...

I feel a bit sad for you though that your marriage/relationship is like this, especially as you have a child together. I'm certainly not an "all in" single current account person as we have our own current accounts where our salaries are paid, and savings and investments - but the home we live in belongs to both of us, jointly and we pay for maintenance and upgrades to that place jointly.

Spendless

If youre in England/Wales then a pre nup might not be taken into account if the marriage is long or the needs of the other party isnt met (eg 1 cant hoard the bulk, whilst leaving the other with next to nothing). This is something that The Legal Queen on SM often comments on. 

Whats the contingency plan for providing for you if you were to be widowed?

Tbh this sounds like your husband is saying the property is to go to  'his family' blood line only so you dont count. (Ive come across this attitude before and it caused deep rifts and resentnents) Why should your joint property be sold in due course to upgrade your husband's 'family home' that if he dies before you will go to your son with disregard for what happens to you.

If it was me I'd be wanting a frank talk about it all, including how it could possibly leave you vulnerable in later life. I dont think Id be going ahead with selling a current property to live in an inherited one that your husband clearly only sees as his. 

sheramber

Why do you need to ask strangers on how to arrange your marriage financial affairs.?

You should be discussing this with your husband, including all potential disadvantages.

What is fair is for you, as a married couple, to agree but you appear to have a very one sided marriage. 

oneneedstocleartheattic

Thanks for your POV.
Do the following clarifications change your steer at all?
* Our wills allow me to stay on in the inherited house until I die, if my husband predeceases me.
* My husband lived in my house, before we got hitched, for years and paid me a modest rent which I used to pay off my mortgage faster. Any renovations, upgrades, maintenance were my financial responsibility.
* The queries around controlling and coercive behaviour? You're barking up the wrong tree. Everything we do is 50/50: work, parenting, etc. Moving into this inherited house is the first time that equitableness will no longer reign - hence my reaching out for fresh ideas and wisdom.
I am striving for fairness. I don't want to be a freeloader. But I also don't want to be a mug either.
My husband has no expectation for me to contribute to the renovation costs but realistically, it needs a shedload doing and I don't want to live in a time warp house for two decades while he does it bit by bit as he can afford it.