AIBU to object to my husband taking a large loan for a friend?

It wouldn’t. There is no protection - it’s fraud.

OP truthfully how much do you trust him ? No high street lender is going to give him a £30k unsecured loan if he tells them it’s for a friend who’s already up to his eyeballs in debt, has maxed out his credit and can’t get a loan himself because the high street banks consider him too much of a risk. He will have to lie - that’s fraud.

It’s very possible that an unsecured loan of that size won’t be approved anyway, so given that he’s prepared to put the financial future of his family at risk to help this friend, how much of a leap is it to him committing mortgage fraud and trying to secure a loan against the house without your knowledge ?

You know that this is madness. If he has to take out a loan to lend the money he can’t afford to lend it. It’s as simple as that. If he’s determined to go ahead, at the very least you should protect yourself by registering for alerts from the land registry website so that if he tries to take out a second mortgage, you will be alerted, and you’ll get alerts if lenders are carrying out financial searches on the property. This kind of thing is marriage ending - I know from experience. You need to be prepared and protected.

Your husband probably doesn’t know how to reverse this as he’s already told his friend, he would do this. He could say that the bank wouldn’t approve the loan due to his debt and affordability checks. That would be enough to satisfy his friend and at least your husband gets to save face.

I just cannot imagine paying the monthly payment for several years, on what is effectively someone else’s loan, with no guarantee that they would ever take over these payments, or indeed ever pay me back. I couldn’t imagine ever walking into that setup.

Some years ago, my brother was considering setting up his own business, and was seeing what investment he could get from various sources. I was one of the people he asked. I told him that I would lend him 5k on the basis of being my brother who I loved, as that's what I could afford to lose if it went tits up. If he wanted more than that, I needed to see his formal business plans, and we needed to draw up formal agreements. And that was for an actual brother.

This would be an absolute no for me and your husband should respect your views on this.
You and husband are not responsible for someone else’s finances. Friend or not.
This could just all go so horribly wrong for you both.

has the friend shown your husband the figures?
list of people he has borrowed from, the amounts, the total amount he owes, what the realistic profit will be etc
so he can show that he can actually pay everyone back what they are owed?
will he put in writing that he owes your husband this money and how it will be paid back and what will happen if for any reason he can't finish the project?

I would hit the bloody roof if my husband did this

Your DH needs to tell him he'd love to be able to help but you have no savings because of your own works and you simply don't have the cash. Tell him he can use you as an excuse maybe that you won't agree to the loan even in his name?

If your husband's salary is high (not sure what qualifies as "high") why does he have debt and no savings?

In relation to the friend and your position you are absolutely not being unreasonable and I don't think your DH should be doing it without your agreement. It can affect both of you. If unpaid, creditors can take action against his assets including the equity in your home. Telling him you won't listen to him complaining about the money or requesting to live more frugally doesn't really cut it. He's wrong to do this without your agreement and it's a bad idea generally to not only loan someone a large amount of money but to lend money you don't have is insane.

That's not your decision. If your husband who already is making loan repayments asks the bank for £30.000 they are going to want security. What else can he offer them apart from your home?

If it were me I would already be checking that he hasn't already put your home at risk.

If this goes ahead this would spell divorce for me.

OP the reality is that if he defaults it will affect both of you. They can’t take anything in joint name if the loan is in his sole name, but if he has assets in his own name they can come for those. And if the loan repayments are made through your joint bank account, that will link it with the debt and will affect your own credit rating. Are you absolutely sure you trust him not to do anything without your consent ? If he takes out the loan in sole name he can’t secure it against a jointly owned property unless you consent and co-sign. How sure are you that he won’t do this fraudulently ? Please protect yourself. Register with the land registry website for alerts on your property. That way if any lenders do a financial search on the property you will be alerted, and if he tries to take out a secured loan without your knowledge they will alert you to that too.

This ‘friend’ is too much of a risk for high street lenders - he’s maxed out his credit line, so there will be other creditors before your DH, who will have legitimate proof of loan. What will your DH have ? He can’t tell the lender what he wants the money for so he’ll have to lie. It’s fraudulent from the start so there will be no protection. And if the lie is exposed that brings a different world of shit down on your heads.

"Phil only ever lent you money that he had in the bank already, Dave, he NEVER took out a loan to provide money to you. How much money do you actually HAVE that's available? Because a) that's the equivalent scenario so that's the maximum you can give him and b) if you DO have spare cash then why have you been lying to me about our financial position? If we've got more than you told me then we've got family needs to spend it on. I might be open to discussions about lending some of it to Phil but ONLY money that you have now, not a new loan."

His bags would be packed and on the driveway.

The OP just needs to make sure that they get the full sum back and ideally interest and more. If that can't be guaranteed then saying no would be sensible.

No. No. And No again. It will not be ‘guaranteed’. This man cannot go to high street lenders as they consider him too much of a risk to lend to. So that’s why he’s asking OP’s DH. There are other creditors. DH will have to lie to the lender to obtain the loan so it’s fraudulent from the start, which means there will be no record of money changing hands. So even if the project makes a profit, legitimate creditors will come first. There is no guarantee that DH will ever see the money again. This would be bad enough if it was money that he had in the bank but the fact that he has to take out a loan to do it is utter madness. If he hasn’t got it, he can’t afford to lend it.

The friend can't argue the toss with a turned down loan application

AND with other creditors also kicking in money

Imagine telling your wife she needs to be more frugal so that you can loan £30k to a friend.

This ‘friend’ has borrowed money from your DH before? And now, here he is again, asking for him to lend more money, and a much larger amount?

in all my 60-odd years not one of my friends every asked me for a loan. They never would, and neither would I of them.

I don’t feel that a true ‘thinking’ friend would ask another for a loan of this nature. Surely they’d think, oh, this is too much pressure to put on someone I care about, what if I can’t pay it back or something goes wrong, what if they feel too embarrassed to say no etc …

Your husband if being a wilfully blind fool if he says yes.

Lending it if you had it is foolish, taking out a loan to lend it is insane. What if (God forbid), something happened to one of you and he couldn't pay it back?

I've always been really cautious with money and when an unsecured loan was mentioned up thread I thought no. But this would be secured against your home! All so he can play generous benefactor and crib about the cost of everything behind closed doors. God no!

If no one else will lend his mate money he's never going to be in a position to pay you back. You could be ruined.

It's the principle as well. He's see his family go without to financially support another grown man.

I doubt very much the friend will be able to repay so I would not loan the money.