Special Guardianship Order & a gifted deposit

notarealname1

Hi all,

My partner and I are looking to buy our first house in Wiltshire. To help us, my partner’s parents would like to gift us £10,000 towards the deposit.

They aren’t her biological or adoptive parents. She was placed with them under a Special Guardianship Order when she was a child and lived with them until she moved out as an adult. They’ve always been her parental figures, just never formally adopted her.

Obviously under a Special Guardianship Order, the people she considers her parents are legally her caregivers, with parental responsibility. In practice, they had all the rights and responsibilities of a parent until she turned 18.

What we're trying to work out is whether lenders will accept a deposit gift from special guardians in the same way they would from parents or adoptive parents.

I also understand that we’ll need to provide a gifted deposit letter confirming the money is a genuine gift (not a loan), along with ID and bank statements from the donors. I just don’t know if there’s anything extra we’d need to provide in this situation, given the guardianship background.

Has anyone here been in a similar position with special guardians gifting a deposit? Did your lender accept it without any issue?

If need be I can always reach out to a few lenders, but I thought it was worth asking here in case anyone has had first-hand experience — or in case my post helps someone else in the same situation down the line.

marcia_

notarealname1 said:

Hi all,

My partner and I are looking to buy our first house in Wiltshire. To help us, my partner’s parents would like to gift us £10,000 towards the deposit.

They aren’t her biological or adoptive parents. She was placed with them under a Special Guardianship Order when she was a child and lived with them until she moved out as an adult. They’ve always been her parental figures, just never formally adopted her.

Obviously under a Special Guardianship Order, the people she considers her parents are legally her caregivers, with parental responsibility. In practice, they had all the rights and responsibilities of a parent until she turned 18.

What we're trying to work out is whether lenders will accept a deposit gift from special guardians in the same way they would from parents or adoptive parents.

I also understand that we’ll need to provide a gifted deposit letter confirming the money is a genuine gift (not a loan), along with ID and bank statements from the donors. I just don’t know if there’s anything extra we’d need to provide in this situation, given the guardianship background.

Has anyone here been in a similar position with special guardians gifting a deposit? Did your lender accept it without any issue?

If need be I can always reach out to a few lenders, but I thought it was worth asking here in case anyone has had first-hand experience — or in case my post helps someone else in the same situation down the line.

 It doesn't matter who the gift comes from so long as the paperwork is in place to prove the where the money came from and that it is genuinely a gift. 

MWT

marcia_ said:

notarealname1 said:

Hi all,

My partner and I are looking to buy our first house in Wiltshire. To help us, my partner’s parents would like to gift us £10,000 towards the deposit.

They aren’t her biological or adoptive parents. She was placed with them under a Special Guardianship Order when she was a child and lived with them until she moved out as an adult. They’ve always been her parental figures, just never formally adopted her.

Obviously under a Special Guardianship Order, the people she considers her parents are legally her caregivers, with parental responsibility. In practice, they had all the rights and responsibilities of a parent until she turned 18.

What we're trying to work out is whether lenders will accept a deposit gift from special guardians in the same way they would from parents or adoptive parents.

I also understand that we’ll need to provide a gifted deposit letter confirming the money is a genuine gift (not a loan), along with ID and bank statements from the donors. I just don’t know if there’s anything extra we’d need to provide in this situation, given the guardianship background.

Has anyone here been in a similar position with special guardians gifting a deposit? Did your lender accept it without any issue?

If need be I can always reach out to a few lenders, but I thought it was worth asking here in case anyone has had first-hand experience — or in case my post helps someone else in the same situation down the line.

 It doesn't matter who the gift comes from so long as the paperwork is in place to prove the where the money came from and that it is genuinely a gift. 

That isn't true for all lenders, so this is something to discuss with a broker, but even where the lender has rules requiring gifts to be from 'close family' there may be an opportunity to have this considered as an exception.

silvercar

marcia_ said:

notarealname1 said:

Hi all,

My partner and I are looking to buy our first house in Wiltshire. To help us, my partner’s parents would like to gift us £10,000 towards the deposit.

They aren’t her biological or adoptive parents. She was placed with them under a Special Guardianship Order when she was a child and lived with them until she moved out as an adult. They’ve always been her parental figures, just never formally adopted her.

Obviously under a Special Guardianship Order, the people she considers her parents are legally her caregivers, with parental responsibility. In practice, they had all the rights and responsibilities of a parent until she turned 18.

What we're trying to work out is whether lenders will accept a deposit gift from special guardians in the same way they would from parents or adoptive parents.

I also understand that we’ll need to provide a gifted deposit letter confirming the money is a genuine gift (not a loan), along with ID and bank statements from the donors. I just don’t know if there’s anything extra we’d need to provide in this situation, given the guardianship background.

Has anyone here been in a similar position with special guardians gifting a deposit? Did your lender accept it without any issue?

If need be I can always reach out to a few lenders, but I thought it was worth asking here in case anyone has had first-hand experience — or in case my post helps someone else in the same situation down the line.

 It doesn't matter who the gift comes from so long as the paperwork is in place to prove the where the money came from and that it is genuinely a gift. 

Some lenders will only accept gifted deposits from family members, hence the question. I would think a lender would consider this in the same was as a parent gifting a deposit, there just isn’t room on the form to have printed words to cover this situation, but essentially the SGs are parents in all but legal name.

notarealname1

I really appreciate the input. I’ll reach out to a few lenders directly to see whether they all give the same answer or if the responses differ.

marcia_ said:

 It doesn't matter who the gift comes from so long as the paperwork is in place to prove the where the money came from and that it is genuinely a gift. 

The reason I raised the question is that my initial research led me to this article, which does list specific relationships for who can and can’t gift deposits: [turns out I can't share links yet, the article is from Halifax under help and advice, Gifted Desposits]

That said, as others have pointed out, policies vary from lender to lender. I’ll see what a few of them say and share an update here once I have a clearer idea.