Please help family and rent

What? The law gives far more obligations than protections to landlords. The OP will be paying for a number of things out of pocket to fall within the law.

All very messy. No fault evictions come in May 2026. Left it a bit late really. They are not arguably even formal tenants . As you are not a formal landlord. With any corresponding legal requirements and paperwork in situ. Oh dear.

You can’t have it both ways though. You want to be different with family but you want the protection that the law gives landlords.

You told her she could stay as long as she liked rent free and now she feels entitled enough to move a partner in and not pay rent. You made assumptions that when she moved this dude in, they'd start paying you for rent but you never directly asked. Lady, she thinks of that as her house now.

Communicate. Tell them it's time to pay rent. You've subsidized her life for 5 years now and you and your husband are losing money. They're taking you for a couple of suckers.

I'm not surprised your husband is getting resentful. You're letting your sister, her kids, and now a boyfriend live off you and that's depriving your family of money that should be coming in.

My sister would never dream of doing this and not would I to her. The man is taking the piss too but your arrangement was with her originally so I’d start there. I think you’re very fair to be upset that she’s thrived on your hospitality - to the extent of moving in her new boyfriend - and I’d suggest you now give her notice to move on with her life.

And to not even pay for lunch?! Awful, I’d be very upset.

You said as long as she needs, she no longer needs a free house. Between them they have enough resources. It's not your job to provide charity to them. Tell them you now either need market rate off them or you need them to leave so you can get it back running as a buisness.

Can't believe they wouldn't treat you to lunch when you are providing them a free home. They all take

Who is paying the bills like CT. Are they in your name? Please dont say you are paying all of this too?

I am going to put it differently. Look at it from DSIS point of view. You are rich, you have lots of properties. You must be raking it in.. therefore she feels 'entitled' as your sister to be allowed to live in one of those many properties.

After all you are family!

You havent said anything even when she moved her latest boyfriend in so from HER point of view all is fine. If it wasnt you would have said something by now.

You can afford it so what is the issue?

I havent picked up from the thread but does she work?

Blimey.
You have let them live rent free in a one of your properties assuming rent would follow.
Of course charging rent makes you a landlord with all the required legals that go with that these days.

You need to find out your legal responsibilities to the property and perhaps to them. From health and safety checks, to insurance. Council tax. Presently you are the owner.
You need to find out what rights they may have or could acquire to the property by living in it rent free for a number of years.
What you cannot do is retain legal ownership but think there would be no impact by not formally being a landlord/lady. But I suspect you know this.

Yes, have the conversation. It doesn't matter that you don't 'need' the money - you could use it to invest in other things but it's actually the principle of it really. She and her new DP are CFs to expect to be kept in a free house, especially when he has his own home that they could have lived in together.

I'd say something along the lines of 'It's great to see you a DP now settled in the house. We wanted to talk to you now about agreeing some kind of rental moving forwards. The market value is around £3k a month but DH and I were thinking around £1.5k? Have a chat with DP and let me know what you think.'

Leave it with her. YADNBU.

I think just tell her now she and her dp are stable and she has a reasonable income herself you’d like her to pay rent. Then say as little as possible because she’s likely to feel blindsided and embarrassed. Fwiw I have been in a similar situation with family (though about providing holiday accommodation not living accommodation). It must be sorted before dh really resents them though.

I think your sister has taken huge advantage of your kindness and her partner is a freeloader. You have been a bit silly to have let this situation drag on and cause bad feeling.

Propose a proper rent or suggest they move on now. Don't offer a reduced / kind rent as this will again cause further bad feeling down the line.

When you were asked if this man could move in, that was the time to say 'Not a problem, we have been happy to help, but we will now expect x rent to be paid monthly, now there's an extra adult living in the property'. You should have then had a contract drawn up, and signed to state this.

It's entirely possible this man is paying your sister rent???? She's then pocketing the rent money he's paying her, and not passing any onto you!!

You need to speak to them both. If the above scenario is happening, he might not be best pleased to find out he's paying your sister rent, yet she's not paying you any!! He needs to be aware how much rent he's required to pay towards the property, as does your sister! Get a contract drawn up, make it legally binding.

I don’t know if this will help but I have a friend who hasn’t got much cash. She knows I am very comfortably off. However she is never willing to let me pay for stuff even though I am because it gets in the way of relationships and can lead to resentment.

Now while it’s completely understandable that you helped your sister out when she was on her knees, she should recognise that her situation has changed and remedy things. Your financial situation has nothing to do with it. Even if I had a friend who was a billionaire I’d still buy them lunch or a coffee occasionally. Otherwise I’m just taking the piss.

Glad to hear you're going to talk about it properly, finally! Way too much presumption and assumption and then feeling peed off in secret while saying nothing. What you actually said was she could live there rent free with no time limit and then when she asked if this guy could move in, you didn't take the very obvious chance to say "yes but that changes things so the rent will now be xyz".

You said nothing and just thought it would happen. But you'd acted like you were fine with it and didn't want any changes. Honestly, the lack of comms is loopy. She's not to know what you want if you don't say it. So say it clearly today and stop relying on mindreading. You've been kind but it's okay to change the set-up seeing as there's someone who can afford the rent there now.

OP is basically saying they have more money than they need by a long long way.

But it’s a principle point.

Silly man. That’s the most expensive couple of hundred quid he never spent 😬

That’s irrelevant really, it’s not to do with whether or not you could do with the money.

I’m completely with your husband. Living in your property free of charge, not short of money but still expecting you to pay half the lunch bill is outrageous.

So far it's cost you circa £150k!!

I would make it less personal, and couch things in terms of you and dh doing a financial health check/overhaul, and you need to ask dsis to start paying rent. This prevents any discussion of the boyfriend and what he earns/pays, and also overrides the previous free rent. It’s just changing times/circumstances.

I would mention that the rent “has been valued” at £3k or whatever, and see what she says. Obviously you can negotiate down, but she needs to know how generous you have been and how it would be thoroughly unfair to continue this.