To not want PIL to buy us a v expensive house

[sashimiandsake]

Sorry this is long, don't want to drip feed! Also NC bc of financial info... DP and I are 24 and 23 - we were each other’s first BF/GF when we were 15 to 17 and a year ago we got back together when he moved to London for work (I've been living here since 18 for uni). We've known since we got back together that we would get married someday, but we didn’t think it would be this soon… however, he is European, and we decided to safeguard our future against Brexit. Our wedding is next year, and DP's family are paying for almost everything as they are really quite wealthy and insisted on helping!

Atm we live together in SW London in a lovely Victorian house, sharing with four friends, and we have a healthy savings account due to this, some inheritance and the fact we have reasonable jobs. But now we're getting married we feel we need to leave our houseshare days behind! Our options are:

1. PIL have reached out to our landlord and they would be open to selling to us. Valuations put it at around £1.1 million (eeeeek, crazy money). We'd then use our savings to renovate it as there's a few problems our landlord hasn't dealt with. I ADORE the house and I've lived here for four years so it really feels like home... but it's SO MUCH MONEY to accept from them. We've also never had any handouts from them before.... and now a wedding AND a house in less than a year? My side of the family and friends think I am being ridiculous not to immediately accept. However, I am also a bit worried DP's family would use it to try and control us, as they have form for using money to do so with his two sisters. We've assumed the house would be in our names not theirs but I've realised typing this it's not been clarified...

1. My DF and I own a rental house together in East London (future crossrail area) that we bought from the sale of my DGM's house three years ago. DF has asked if we're sure we don't want to live in it and I could buy him out of his half over time. I don't like the area and wouldn't feel totally happy letting my Dcat out there (I realise I sound mental ). But the house itself is nice and the area is gentrifying.

1. Sell the East London house and buy a flat with a mortgage in our area in SW London (DF happy with selling)

1. Leave London altogether. I grew up in the East Midlands and it's how DP and I met as my DM and his older DSis live in the same village (where we're getting married next year). We could get a little cottage in the village with our savings and have a teeny mortgage. SIL is due her first baby in July so we’d be close for future DN. However, I don't have a driving licence and I felt very isolated most of the time growing up there even though I love visiting now. DP could relocate his job but I'd have to give mine up. But then I could try and start my own interiors business like I've always dreamed of... I'd also still have the East London house (with DF of course!)

AIBU to even consider options 2-4?

I am also a bit worried DP's family would use it to try and control us, as they have form for using money to do so with his two sisters. We've assumed the house would be in our names not theirs but I've realised typing this it's not been clarified...

You've answered your own fears.
I also notice they went above your heads and spoke to your landlord - entitled much?
What about your friends? Throwing them out of their home like this could seriously affect your friendship.

You don't know where your jobs may take you in the near future - so why not carry on as you are until you both have a solid idea of what you want to do?

Personally, i would say you want to get used to married life before you start thinking about buying a house.
When you're ready - YOU look at your options and find one that is suitable for you - financially especially.

Million pound houses usually come with huge council tax bills/insurance/maintenance etc....why would you want that kind of expense so early in your marriage?

If you do decide to accept then get your own lawyer to go through it all with you.
PIL will no doubt be making sure their investment is protected from any future claim you make should things go wrong.

i hope you're confident at being assertive with pil - they sound like the types to bully you into doing things their way.

OP there is no way, if I had a million to buy my DS a house (which sadly I do not) that I would put it in joint names with his gf of 1 year. No matter how lovely she may be. You're still getting a good deal living rent free, and if your marriage does work out then eventually DH can sell up and you can purchase a house together, possibly move to the midlands? At 23 I'd stick with the best for your career and move in 5-10 years if you are planning a family

Hope it works out well for you!

I also notice they went above your heads and spoke to your landlord

Good grief, I missed that bit

Could you perhaps clarify, OP - did you definitely not know about their approach to the landlord?

I also notice they went above your heads and spoke to your landlord

I missed that too. Wow. So, basically, if that's how it went and they don't end up buying it, they've in all likelihood given your landlord the idea of putting it up for sale anyway...

Take it. I was once engaged to a multimillionaire but it ended over different reasons. I searched him out on Facebook some years ago and he and his wife were drinking Champagne on a boat in the French coast. Could have been me!

Why would your friend need to move out?

Gosh, you lot are so suspicious. Could the PIL have contacted the landlord to enquire if he was willing to sell as a surprise especially as the couple love the house. If they were really that controlling they would have picked a house our for them and just bought it and insist they live in it. They haven't, they asked if it was for sale and now they have put it to the couple.

I guess if you flgo along with pils buying your house you've lost nothing & you still have your house in east london if things go tits up. Go for it.

Lost nothing, except potentially the friendship of the best friend they'd have turfed out of the home she found for them...

Not saying that's a reason definitely not to do it, but it is worth thinking about alongside the financial considerations. It's hard to imagine how the friendship wouldn't be affected.

Have you considered explaining to them how you feel about not wanting to accept such a generous gift and see if you could meet in the middle somewhere, so you sell your place and give them those proceeds to put towards it and either you can ask if you can pay them back in the same way as you would pay a mortgage, or if they don't want that (especially if they have a lot of money so might not like the idea of a gift being repaid) how about you offer to pay money into an account either their own or yours each month that will be saved and if for eg you have children in the future, all those payments will be used to buy a home for them? This way you are effectively paying an amount each month and paying their generous gesture forward to the next generation

I would clarify option 1 first but I think option 2-4 would make me feel much better, as tempting as option 1 is!!

I would say that you should take it as it will transform your life.

But you need to sit down and have totally open and honest conversations about money.

If you get married then both this property and the one in east London will belong to both of you.

You seem overly focused on the house you are living in. House sales often fall through so you need to bear that in mind.

It is so common for parents to help children witj housing. Please don't say no just because of worries you haven't even discussed with them.

I would go for an option 5.

Sell the house you own with your DF. Ask PIL to give the same amount of money to their son. Buy somewhere together, with a mortgage. That way you are chosing the house, you are in it equally, you don't have to evict your friends and they don't get to say that you only have it because of them.

You really don't need a 4 bed house at this point in your life so this way you could get a smaller property that can be truly yours.

I also notice they went above your heads and spoke to your landlord

Massive red flag. I wouldn't even entertain option 1. Personally I'd go with 2 or 3 because I think living in London will give you more opportunities, if you can afford it.

Hi everyone, sorry for going MIA! I've been back at work today and it's been very hectic after the break. DP and I sat down and talked to our housemates last night and told them the situation - we said it wasn't 100% confirmed yet but that if we did move forward with it, would they be comfortable with it? We had a really honest and open discussion in the end and agreed that we would be happy for everyone to continue living with us for at least until this time next year at the same rental rate and that we could re-evaluate then. It also transpires that my best friend and her DP have been talking about buying themselves a flat (with his parents' financial support) in about a year anyway, so my worry there was for nothing

Sorry, huge paragraphs again!

I also had a rather long phone call today on my lunch break with my DM and she told me that she was the one who proposed this to begin with
It appears PIL told SIL they wanted to give us some kind of good start to our marriage in the form of property. SIL told DM, knowing she would be very happy about it (they are quite good friends, can wave to each other from their kitchen windows) and DM wondered if it would be possible to buy our existing house. She rang up my DF to retrieve the info first (my rental guarantor, so he has all the property/landlord details) and when he okayed the idea, asked SIL if she thought PIL would be receptive to the idea... she said yes, so DM phoned MIL and PIL apparently thought it was a lovely idea!

So yes, they did go behind our backs, but at my family's bequest, so I can't be angry at that... the fact that my parents appear to be so involved in this as well is making me feel slightly more like this is the right thing to do.

Divorce hasn't been that much of a concern for me to be honest - not because I have an idealistic view that DP and I will be together forever (although I obviously do hope so) but because my own parents finalised their divorce at the end of last year and although they brought inequal amounts of money to the marriage they each came out of it satisfied with the division of assets. Afaik both sets of my grandparents paid for a lot of things during my parents' marriage (school fees for DBro and I, house deposit, damp proof course etc) and it hasn't been a problem in their divorce...

It's my DGM's 80th birthday party this weekend and PIL are invited so hopefully we can all find a quiet moment to talk about this then. DP, DF and I have also all booked Tuesday afternoon off work next week for an appointment with DF's solicitor to make sure any concerns we do have aren't just railroaded by the older generation

WTF....... Your Mum phoned your boyfriends parents about this 😱😱

Um, there are a lot of people involved in your relationship. Are you happy about that?

Bloody hell, are you and your housemates the cast of Made in Chelsea?

Fucking middle class problems!

I wouldn't want to be controlled by someone as they bought me a £1million house. But maybe they won't, if it's in your names consider it early inheritance.

I'd go to the midlands and learn to drive - get more for your money

YABU using the phrase "reached out to."

Sounds as if you can do the midlands thing later when you are at that stage of life. Stay in London for now.

OP, you sound weirdly infantilised by all this inter-familial negotiation over your head. To be honest, everyone seems to behaving as though you're about fourteen and need looking after, with minimal consultation. If this is normal for you, then I doubt you're going to feel any more disempowered by your PILs putting conditions on their purchase of an expensive house, because you're so used to it. Why didn't your mother ask you or your partner about the house you're renting, rather than going straight to her ex-husband, for instance? Or don't you have your landlord's contacts because your father handled all that? Aren't you in your mid-20s?

And your parents' financially-amiable divorce doesn't mean that yours, should it happen, would be equally unproblematic. Don't be naive about this. You are young, and it doesn't sound as if you've had time to have other serious relationships -- if you had, you might see how quickly a previously cordial relationship with ILs/boyfriend's parents can cool. It's possible to shift from 'lovely daughter-figure/girl next door' to 'scheming grasping bitch' over night.

Ask my sister. She'd been with her partner from the first week of university for 14 years - settled, monogamous, both sets of parents, who lived close to one another, the best of friends. When they broke up after 14 years, they had a recently-bought house, bought at the height of the Irish property bubble -- he'd contributed more of the deposit, but she'd paid the mortgage for the time they'd owned it, as he'd gone back to university. It became a cut-threat mess, with the families (gentle, not wealthy people, unused to conflict) falling out catastrophically.

I'd add my two pence but I think Chavelita has covered it completely. There are an awful lot of cooks stirring this pot, OP, and I imagine that inevitably leads to a natural pressure to not want to decline these very nice gifts. Don't let gratitude and a natural tendency to defer to the "grown-ups" lead you to make decisions against your own interest in the belief that everyone will always be acting in your best interests.