Unmarried couples must share house proceeds

kunekune

If both names are on the title and it is a joint tenancy, the starting point is 50/50 - that's what joint tenancy means. It belongs to both of you. This only went to court because he wanted more.

Blue_monkey, there was a big age gap. He had actually retired before they bought the house, and it was his pension that was paying the mortgage. She had earnings, and paid for stuff for the children and herself; quite a common arrangement, man pays the 'essentials', woman pays for the 'extras'. But sometimes it backfires spectacularly when it goes wrong.

lynnexxxo

What difference does a big age gap make?

They bought the house to live in as a family and had children, Why on earth would anyone think she wasn't entitled to half the house?

izzybusy23

blue_monkey wrote: »

I actually am a bit stunned that a man and women who have lived together, had children together and the woman has given her life to bringing up THEIR children that he can consider giving her nothing at all to start again.

!!!!!! happens. I'd say he retired and she found out what a cantancerous old git he was and could not stand it for a moment longer (I dread the day my husband retires and I have to listen to his moaning all day, LOL!!) but at the end of the day her 'job' was being a full time housewife - a job which goes unpaid so she could not have contributed financially - so I am pleased that is taken into consideration. Being a housewife and all Not that we have a house anyway

Believe me, it happens! I left my job and all my friends to move 180 miles to live with my then partner. His house was a cr&phole when I moved in. I got a job, we got married and started renovating the house. He turned out to be violent and abusive, knocked me about, had an affair and then when I eventually had enough and left him, he filed for divorce (he was redundant at the time and got legal aid for divorce fees) and I walked away from that marriage and my home with £2500. I was initially awarded £5k but the solicitor took out his divorce fees before giving me what was left. The house had a mortgage of £33k on it when we married and when I left it was worth in excess of £90k.. and I walked away with £2.5k. I was told by my solicitor to not even bother challening it as I wouldn't get anything more. I was a bit peeved as it was my ideas and creativity that went into the house and helped make it worth more than it was, plus he wouldn't had been able to get a re-mortgage for home improvements if I hadn't signed a joint loan application with him.

He was a wily git.. very clever and cunning and never put me on the mortage or the deeds when we married, so I had no rights and had to register an interest in the house in way of securing some sort of pay off to put down on rented accomodation.

Edited to say, when I moved in with him I had £4k in savings which went towards helping pay for the mortgage etc until I found a job.. so infact I ended up with less than I started with.

glen8

quite right!!!

couples should have 50/50

she may not have paid anything towards the mortgage but I bet she paid for his clothes, food, children etc etc etc

what's happening to this country..........it's just like an american state

Debt_Free_Chick

There's more to this story than the Express have reported.

The house was owned 50/50 - but last year, a Court awarded him 100% of the proceeds. Quite why and what the background was isn't reported.

This latest case simply reverses last year's Court decision and puts them back "to square one".

So I don't think we can draw any meaningful conclusions from the story, without having the full picture.

To be honest, I would be more concerned that a Court could award 100% of the proceeds of a property which was registered as being in 50/50 ownership!

Debt_Free_Chick

And here it is

The full transcript of the judgment

pollyanna24

Debt_Free_Chick wrote: »

There's more to this story than the Express have reported.

The house was owned 50/50 - but last year, a Court awarded him 100% of the proceeds. Quite why and what the background was isn't reported.

This latest case simply reverses last year's Court decision and puts them back "to square one".

So I don't think we can draw any meaningful conclusions from the story, without having the full picture.

To be honest, I would be more concerned that a Court could award 100% of the proceeds of a property which was registered as being in 50/50 ownership!

Must admit, I find this a bit worrying and all! I am not married, but me and my bf jointly own our house (joint tenants).

At the moment, I earn more than my bf and we stick our money into a joint pot, so I suppose I pay more of the mortgage than my bf, but it's not really how we see things.

I am pregnant, so obviously I will give up work and bf will be paying the majority of the mortgage, but again any money goes into a joint pot, so it doesn't really work like that.

Is this effectively saying that in 20 years time, he could try and take all the house as he has been paying for most of it (even though I will have worked in kind, so to speak)?

I was always under the illusion that we both owned it and that was why we signed all those papers with both our names on!

kunekune

DFC, it was clearly an error of law by the trial judge. But it was slightly understandable, because the courts higher up in the hierarchy had not dealt with a case in which the couple were unmarried and there were both names on the title before. The trial judge therefore thought that the rule that he should apply was one that said, whatever the title says, ownership is in proportion to what money was put into the purchase. Although the woman here had paid for some household expenses she had never paid the mortgage. The result was that the man was awarded 100%. Obviously unfair. After this decision was made, the House of Lords looked at a similar case in which both names were on the title but the couple kept all their money separate and the woman basically paid for everything. The House of Lords came up with some principles that applied in this kind of case, the main one being that the onus was on the person claiming more than the legal title gave them (ie, anything if they weren't on the title, more than half if they were) to show that the intention was that they should have that larger share. In the HL case, the woman ended up with 65%; in this case, the presumption that if you are both on the title you get half each was not rebutted and the woman got her 50%.

kunekune

Pollyanna, under the principles the courts are applying at the moment, your bf would have to prove it was always your joint intention that your shares should not be equal. It's not an easy thing to prove. The basic rule will be that if you are joint tenants, you have equal shares. The only people who should be worried are those who think they are entitled to more. But if you are worried (and you don't want to get married, LOL), the solution is to have your current understanding put in writing. Ideally, this thing would have been done by the solicitor when you bought the house, but unfortunately it isn't always explained properly. If you can't afford a solicitor now, it would probably be sufficient to write on a piece of paper that your joint intention is to hold the house in equal shares and both sign it, then keep the paper in a safe place in case there was ever a dispute (note, that although I do teach this area of law, this is NOT given as legal advice, and someone else may well be able to suggest some appropriate wording than me, but the main thing would be to make sure there was evidence of what you had intended when you bought the house.)

neverdespairgirl

kunekune wrote: »

Blue_monkey, there was a big age gap. He had actually retired before they bought the house, and it was his pension that was paying the mortgage. She had earnings, and paid for stuff for the children and herself; quite a common arrangement, man pays the 'essentials', woman pays for the 'extras'. But sometimes it backfires spectacularly when it goes wrong.

A BIG age gap - he was 47, she was 17! I'm thinking more "dirty old man" than "poor ripped off OAP".