Toxic relationship and stuck on a 5 year mortgage

[alannacarter]

Hi All,

I have had a relationship with my partner for 5.5 years and in December 2020 we decided to buy a house together. This relationship has been toxic but he always complained that I never gave it a proper chance and that things would change once we were living together. We got together when I was going through a divorce (I knew him for 3 years before that) and during this period my head was all over the place and I feel he took advantage of my situation and was jealous of my ex-husband and everybody else. Then when I felt I was over my divorce I thought I would try and give this a proper go as I had more of a clear head. I decided to rent my house and get some of the equity to put as a deposit on the new one. He sold his and used the proceedings towards the deposit as well. I have 2 kids aged 12 and 14. He has a 8yo. Since December I have been painting, cleaning, unpacking and doing most of the housework, 90% on my own. He has a dog and rarely cleans after it. He barely helps with anything and every time we had an argument it has been me that had to go and try to make him see sense so we would be on speaking terms again. Anything is a reason to leave the bedroom and sleep in his son's bedroom. He also accused my son of being a bully which is totally not the case.

I have now realised that I should have never given this chance and feel totally trapped on a 5 year mortgage. If I leave now I will lose 40K which I really cannot afford to do as a single mum. He is manipulative and emotionally abusive. Since we bought the house it has only been me coming to him to sort any disagreements otherwise he is quite happy to stop speaking to me to increase his abuse. My kids have been feeling very uncomfortable to even go to the kitchen when he is there. My kids live with me and he sees his son every 2 weeks.

Seeing that I cannot leave for financial reasons, would you recommend that I report his abuse to any local service/council/doctor? Solicitors would cost me a fortune and I would still lose the money I invested (20K stamp duty and 20K early redemption fees) if I sell now.

When we bought the house we drafted an agreement with the solicitors that we would recover our individual investments in case of a sale but as it stands right now we still have 4.5 years to go and I can't recover any losses yet.

I feel so sad and guilty that I have put my kids through this and don't see a solution before any time soon until I recover my losses. I fear that if I lose this much money I may not be able to re-mortgage my previous house.

I feel so guilty and upset for my kids.

[Amelia666]

I’m sure you’ll get advice from people who know more than me, but even on a fixed term is there not a way of buying out early? I‘M sure there’d be a fe but I thought this would be a couple of thousand, obviously not ideal but why is it 40k?

I’m sorry you’ve ended up in this situation

[Amelia666]

Fee*