It's ours not mine - or is it?

This is the right answer.

I really don't understand a lot of the responses on this thread. He is your life partner. How could you not put him on the deeds? Seriously, I wouldn't even think twice about this with my husband. Everything we have is ours together. Every pay cheque, every bonus or unexpected windfall would always be to the benefit of our family. I can imagine leaving him off house deeds ' to protect my future'. WTF, he is my future!

Do you have children together? Have either of you taken a hit in terms of earning potential for the care of your family unit? Is all other money shared? These are the things I'd want to know about before considering the reasonableness.

Was this expectation of a gift ever verbalized or indicated in any way by the gifter or just something you had a feeling about?

And if it was a known understanding did he put his time and money in to the repairs/maintenance/upgrades on the basis that he understood the place would one day be yours plural or yours singular?

This.

You haven't paid the mortgage. You paid rent. Don't marry this man. Keep your house as an asset for your children.

It's your house alone.

I would put it in your name.

Rental payments are just that. Rental payments.

The fact they are now gifting you the property has nothing to do with the fact you were renting it for 15 years.

You need to protect yourself and your own DCs' futures.

I'm guessing he never wanted to get married ... but would now if he thought He'd get half your house? If that's even partially true, don't marry him and put the house (gift) in your name alone.

When you rent , you know you never own that house and aren’t paying towards owning it. The payments you have paid together are just rent not a claim to ownership.

Ultimately , it’s up to whoever is gifting it and it’s likely they will want the house to solely belong to the family member.

It does depend on who is getting the house, what the relationship is like etc. Remember that no matter how much you’re in love now this could always change and be messy. If it were me - as a mother with children who aren’t my husbands - if it was gifted to me , as I’m married , I would be happy for it to be both as if we split I could remain in the home and option to sell to move elsewhere . However , if it was my husband being gifted the house I would want to be part owner too as with renting you have the security to stay if you split but if we had a bad split it could put me in a situation to be homeless with my children.

Surely the answer here is that the "gift" is the 50% you haven't paid in rent, and that comes just to you. The remainder you guys have contributed to equally is then split two ways - so he gets 25%, you get 75%?

Why didn't he buy a house himself & leave Op out of the mortgage?

I'm not sure her bad credit can be blamed?

I'd look into paying him for the renovations.

I wouldn’t add him on deeds. Yes, you paid in together but you paid and renovated without knowing/assuming that the house may be left to you one day; paying rent isn’t buying equity into someone else’s house.
the relative leaving the house to you is a separate event.
another thing- say you add him to the deeds; who will the house be left to in the event one of you dies? Will all kids inherit? Yours only?

What stopped him from buying a property and renting it out to cover the mortgage all these years? Not OP.

It's a gift from her family to her; the fact that they have been living there is irrelevant.

Ask him to get married. If he is for it then the house should be 50/50.

If he doesn’t want to get married keep it 100% yours. He doesn’t want to get married for a reason!

50-50 or repay him his share of structural improvements.

I genuinely think if the man had due to bad credit caused the woman to miss out on buying a house then people would be saying the woman was entitled to a share. I think it’s the fact that this relationship has disadvantaged one partner, whether that’s by missing out on another opportunity or by compromising your career.

Would these posters give away half the value of a house given to them? I really doubt it. Do what secures your future.

I think the issue is that you are conflating the payment of rent over the years [and what this amounts to] with the gift of the property. If it is the stated case that you are being given it because you have paid rent to the value of half of it, then DP may have a case to feel aggrieved - but unless you were paying rent from the outset with the prior agreement that it would ultimately be gifted to you - that it was effectively a down-payment on the property - then your DP has simply been paying rent to the family member and has no rights to the property.

If, as I gather, there was no agreement of this kind [in writing or verbally agreed], ie that you were simply enjoying a reasonable rent and secure tenancy from a family member, then the rent paid is irrelevant to the fact that they have decided now that they will gift it to you, and you specifically. Your DP will have to get over it. After all, if he rented from any other third party he would not expect to be given a share in it after any period of time, would he?

I am assuming that he has not spend huge sums on the property over and above what a long term tenant might ordinarily do with permission from the landlord - built an extension, spent a fortune on a new kitchen etc [because he understood it was not his or your house, but a rental]. If he has done so you may, morally feel, that you are obliged to refund him a portion of this money, but there is no legal obligation to do so.

If your family member chose to sell the property tomorrow and not gift it, he would have no claim to any part of the property or redress for monies spent on it. That they are gifting it makes no material difference to his position in law.

I am not sure how you navigate this with your DP, but legally he has no rights unless you marry him at some point, when the property becomes part of the marital assets. I’d tae legal advice before doing so though so you are full aware of the cost to you of doing so.

No, I wouldn't. It's your house OP.

50/50. If it was the other way round you would expect this.

No I would not go 50 50. You arr not married. Thisnis a gift from your family to you, so you always have a home. If your partner leaves, he can force a sale or make you pay him half of current value. That would be insane of you. Leave it in your name. Don't tell him it's yours.

And for those stating if the sexes were flipped we’d all be saying the woman had a right to the house, it’s only in the case where she has given up work or a career to care for there children. This is not the case here.

You e already been though one divorce that left you financially destitute, why would you risk that situation again.

Rent isn’t an ownership. By paying a monthly amount for 15 years doesn’t mean you have both “bought” the house. It’s yours because of your relative. It’s luck. But it’s your luck and will enable you to have a secure future and set up your children.

Your partner can invest what he will save in rent for the future. He has a house and a home with you, but without you, and that’s his call.

The house can be left your children. It’s it’s in both you names it may end up in his kids hands if you die first. Then your children won’t get anything.

If you die first the house will be his, what if he then remarried and is outlived by this wife. The house would be hers.

Why on earth would she put in a new kitchen? I can understand some carpeting to an extent, but a whole kitchen blows my mind

100% it will have been the OP's poor decision otherwise she would have specified it was him.

As others have said, if the genders were flipped on this people would be going mental about pay half of costs but not getting any of the property.