I am at a massive crossroads in my life and have no idea which way to turn.

[NaiveIdiot]

I have been stupid, I know that. I need to take decisive action, but I just can’t see the wood for the trees.

10 years ago I married DH. He is from a well-off farming family. I am not, and his family have always been fairly nasty to me for being ‘poor’ with ‘rough parents’ and a ‘gold digger’ (I’m not either btw, I’m just a normal person from a normal family with normal jobs in an end terrace. Not that it matters). Also because I have a regional northern dialect whilst they don’t (southern England and v posh).

For the last ten years I have lived in a house with DH on the family farm. We have spent around £150k renovating it to a beautiful standard on the understanding it would be ours. However FIL has never signed it over to us on the excuse that I will then divorce DH and take half.

DH has always had it implied to him that he will take over the farm one day, but I can’t see that ever happening. In fact I would be astounded. DH is adamant that his father (who is a very difficult and unpleasant man) will not let him down. I am convinced he will, and that heartache and trouble lie ahead.

To cut an extremely long story short, I have now spent over ten years living in a place I hate, where I don’t fit in and have no friends. His family have bullied me relentlessly which is a whole thread of its own. I am hours away from all my friends and grow further apart from them every year.

We live in and maintain a house that we don’t own and I believe never will.

DH does not see it this way. He is sure his dad will come through. He has tried to discuss it with FIL but FIL will not make known his plans for succession. DH has 2 sisters and a brother, none interested in farming but one is a golden child who definitely wants the lot (and I believe will get it).

I have issued an ultimatum that I can’t live like this, that he needs to find out what his dads future plans are, so that we can leave and make our own lives. He tried but his dad wouldn’t tell him.

I don’t know what to do. I don’t want the place, I want to be hours away from these awful people and awful memories, I don’t want a single penny from them and I want our own home.
DH is very enmeshed in stately homes thread childhood, he wants his childhood dream of farming at home. I don’t believe he’ll ever get it, but if I push for us to leave now then he will resent me forever.

On the other hand if I leave on my own with the kids, I can’t support them as they’re used to living. And they’d resent me forever too as they love their dad, who is a very kind and decent person.

I do ok now if this ‘outsider point of view’ is helpful or not but when a couple get married - they become the unit.

‘Together choices’ trump parents wishes.

You already know what their hearts are - hard, snobbish and selfish. So any holding on to false hope has to make way for reality.

Your DH and you are getting nothing.

As that as the starting point where do you and your husband go together now to build your life from today?

Farming nearer to where you used to live?
Different job altogether eg live in land management for a stately home (fil used to do this)
There are options and it’s not hopeless.

Is he going to do a King Learvand demand to know which child loves him the best?

Sinking all that money into a property you don't own feels weird.

I'd be looking to buy somewhere of your own, as a couple, maybe write that lot off as a loss, even if it does mean a much smaller place. And start living a tyrant-free life.

Is your own farm business on the rented land bringing in enough money to equate to what your DH would earn in a job employed by someone else? Or are you the primary breadwinner?

Who works on the family farm- just FIL and casual labour or does he have a farm manger; is it a profitable business?

How can your DH possibly be happy with not speaking to his own mother yet living on her doorstep? Do they see your children?

So basically as it stands now, you get a house rent free, in return for minimal help on their farm and farm your own rented land nearby? I think this makes it easier. You can stay on build up a nest egg/deposit and then move or buy somewhere suited to your income OR stay on and pocket all your saved rent for setting up when pil die and you get evicted. There is no way you are inheriting in this situation. They hate you both.

Surely the chances of your DH being left the farm/a share in the farm are slim to none now, anyway, if he’s not spoken to his mother or one brother for years, barely speaks to his father and only works minimally on the farm now? Is the brother he’s not speaking to the ‘golden child’ sibling?

I mean, is your DH’s argument for staying that leaving would mean he definitely Italy wouldn’t inherit, but by staying, he still has a chance? It seems like a very flimsy hope. Or is it in the hope his parents leave him the house you currently live in, without the farm?

Is there any point in having a meeting between all the siblings (or even the ones who communicate), to clarify what, if anything, each has been told?

His relationship with FIL is very strained because of it and they barely speak. He hardly works on the farm anymore
I don't understand. Why on earth does DH think that he is going to inherit?

OP, I suspect that if they despise you that much they will give the farm to DH (assuming they actually do) on the basis that he divorce you.

And then he will go through with divorcing you because he’s already shown that his family are more important to him than you and his children.

Yes. It seems an entirely baseless hope.

I'd assume from this you won't inherit anyway.

I sit him down - state if his Dad had clear plan for him to inherited then he'd have said - so now you need to proceed as if there is nothing in future.

So is the issue he wants to farm and you need to find a way to do this that pays a decent wage and pension when he won't be inheriting land - which as I understand it is bloody hard.

This sounds exactly like one of these cases in the courts that hit the newspapers . Landed people promised something and the siblings challenge or someone gives a lifetime of work on the basis they'd inherit only to find they've been cut out the will .
You can't base your future on what maybe only what you know as facts now .
You need a home of your own
You hate where you are now
You hate your in-laws . Those are the facts you know now . Don't waste another 30 yrs like this .

you paid £150k onto a home you do not own?

I can’t get over that bit.

can you get back any money you've invested in the house?

You will need to push to leave. Your husband won’t do it and seems to be wallowing.

It absolutely can.

The place I work has the main house and some of the land owned by the mother. Her sons have an equal share of the remaining land.

It’s obvious he’s not inheriting anything.

Move back north. Buy or rent near your own family and friends and he rents land to farm in the exact way he is currently doing.

you paid £150k onto a home you do not own?

It's a sunk cost fallacy at this point - it's done and the money is gone- they could stay there and enjoy fruits of their labour and put money away for a future plan if rent is low but that counter against the OP being so unhappy there.

You seem to be working on the premise that if you leave DH will be unhappy but you don't know that.

Right now you both have a miserable experience and pinning future happiness on a handful of empty promises.

You have an opportunity to create a future built on what you both know makes you happy. Start there.

My BIL is from this sort of a family. He was working the home farm on the future promise,(he didn’t have his own bank account or money) future promise.

His younger brother was working an adjacent farm that was originally being rented but then purchased.

In his thirties my BIL found out that not only was he not getting either farm, the home farm had already been transferred to his brother whilst BIL was doing his Agricultural Certificate (in Ireland this is compulsory).

You should both know that some fathers are very willing to ruin their children, and that their misogyny and hatred of an unapproved DIL easily outweighs any affection they have for their own child.

… and I should add this was before he met my sister.

some fathers are very willing to ruin their children, and that their misogyny and hatred of an unapproved DIL easily outweighs any affection they have for their own child.

Yes. I absolutely see this but I don’t think he’s quite there yet.

Im also convinced, rightly or wrongly, that if we do leave at my instigation, FIL will then tell DH that had he only stayed he would have had everything <sad face> in order to make DH resent me forevermore.

I agree with those that it is just an assumption DH will be unhappy (at least unhappy permanently) if you walk away. Sounds like FIL is enjoying power over his kids by dangling the farm in front of them and he knows your DH particularly wants it and by doing this he can reaffirm that he has more power over him than you.

But don't get drawn into their power games and what they think.

I think you need a Plan B and if DH needs some counselling and extra support from this change in plans, he can get that. But it cannot be making him happy to exist in this limbo and to be being 'played' by his father this way.

The best revenge is living well and it sounds like you do have your own resources, so DH needs to stop begging for scraps and forge his own future for the sake of his family. They're going to disapprove of whatever happens that isn't their will anyway, and yes, they will likely 'blame' you and claim 'Mr NaiveIdiot would have got the farm but for NaiveIdiot!' (which will be a total lie), but they will only be showing themselves up as petty and controlling

I've known people in this situation and its awful, so sympathies to you. I don't know what it is about farming — the isolation, the constant financial ups and downs, the 'family farm' mindset — but so many older farmers seem to have an issue of controlling and bullying their children.

It's the reason why in my rural part of the world every small town has a branch of one of the big-name legal firms who specialise in family businesses/ farm inheritance/ family disputes. There's money to be made by lawyers in farming family feuds. I don't think you're being alarmist, I think there's every chance your DH will end up embroiled in a legal case. They are really common now, even with small farms.

You're stuck and trapped. In your position I'd consult a solicitor and find out what your rights are just so that you know. And I'd keep working in my good job and create an escape fund for the time the children have flown the nest and I need to get away.

I'm just remembering what I know about a local farming family, two branches of which live on the same farm at opposite ends of a track but don't speak. No wonder the numerous stories in the Bible of elder and younger siblings in families of property being variably screwed over by parents, in-laws and each other have always struck such a chord in the world.

I always promised myself after seeing my mother a slave to a house that meant something, that I would never let that happen to me.

The fact that you have effectively set up a separate operation with your dh is excellent news. A separate place to live for you both, if he will join you, is the next step.

Interesting @NaiveIdiot that I cross posted saying they'd pretend DH would have got the farm at the same moment. We both know that is bullshit - I think in fact that may be the question to DH 'If we walk away, you do know your dad will say you would have got the farm otherwise, and you do know that will be a lie, right?'

Because it could be an issue if he will let that get to him and create resentment. He needs to see that one coming and know it's not true.

This is truly bonkers or maybe you are being exploited on a huge scale, but why sink all that money into a property you don't own? Do you have any legal agreement about recouping the money ? Do you have the receipts, any agreement re doing it up in lieu of rent? I would suggest you seek legal advise soon.

To be fair to OP, sinking money into the property has happened over time and clearly, only over time has it become more obvious the farm isn't going to come to them and there's no point in castigating OP and husband for doing so.

My Granddad was very forward thinking I now realise, he sold it and divided the money between the number of children he had. That was in 1980.

@NaiveIdiot I've a lot of sympathy for you and if you want to push them in to the silage I'll say you were at my house watching netflix. Seriously though, if you can get your foot on a ''real'' ladder, somewhere, a small two bed apartment in a location that isn't over priced, please just do it. You need to have something that isn't built on a wing and a promise.