Does my mum owe my money, or AIBU?

[Toddlertown]

Genuinely conflicted on this, so need some non biased opinions.

I’ll try to keep it brief.

When I was in my early 20s my mum split with her then partner, she had enough money for a deposit on a flat but couldn’t borrow enough on her earnings alone so I went on the mortgage with her. She did not live there, she lived with her new partner.

I lived in the flat with a flat mate & we split the mortgage & all bills equally so mum had no expenses.

Two years later, she sold the flat for 30k more than she bought it for, she then went on to buy a house with her partner & I went back into private rental.

I gained nothing from it but I never expected/wanted to. It helped my mum out & I thought at the time, it didn’t really make any difference to my life so that was that.

Fast forward some years & I now have a partner & young children of my own. We have recently been looking into buying after being left a generous, but not huge amount of money from DPs nan.

Now going through the mortgage application, I have found out because I am not considered a first time buyer (because of the flat with mum when younger, despite no financial gain.) the stamp duty for us is almost 5k more then it would be if I hadn’t had that mortgage in my name. 😮

5k is a huge amount of difference!! & I never knew this!

Now my AIBU..!

AIBU for thinking my mum should be responsible for paying the increased amount? I can’t bare the thought of asking her & feel like I’m being a shitty person. But equally I didn’t gain a single dime from that flat but now I’m looking at being 5k down because of it and that doesn’t seem fair either?

YABU - it’s your responsibility to pay the extra
YANBU - your mum should help you

Thanks!

It's unfortunate but technically you're not a first time buyer so you have to pay stamp duty. I would probably drop it into the conversation in passing if it were me but if your mum doesn't offer then you'll just have to suck it up.

51% YANBU
49% YABU

🤦🏻‍♀️😂

I know mum didn’t profit from us being there

But she did. By £30k.

I don't think you should. The tax break wasn't available then, so she had no way to know how it would impact you now.

I don't think you can recap the loss retrospectively. In the long term, 5k on a mortgage is not the end of the world. It will even out if you are fortunate enough to inherit at some point.

I think your mum owes you £15k

You both took out a mortgage on a flat. You were a co-signer.
You paid half the mortgage payments
The flat sold with £30k profit

Half of that £30k should have been yours when the flat sold.

I wouldn’t ask her but would mention what’s happened. She might offer, she might not.

Totally agree with @PlanDeRaccordement your mam owed you £15k.

I can't vote for some reason.

I also agree your mum owes you 15,000.

YANBU. Definitely she wes you the 5,000 without question.

YANBU.

At first my opinion was that you shouldn’t expect her to agree but that there is noting in asking.

However, as previous posters have pointed out she profited by £30k on a mortgage you paid half of!

I’m not a lawyer but to me she owes you half of that!

*owes

How about you sit her down and explain the impact it has had on you. Hopefully then she will offer you the money. Her profit will be reduced to 25k, which is not an inconsiderable amount and you don't lose out by 5k.

When I first started reading the OP I thought the question was going to be,

“Does my mum owe me £15k?”

and my answer would have been absolutely yes!

I think it would be reasonable to ask your mum to help you with the fees. You were a signatory only to help her with her funding. That's now penalising you. Asking if she'd help offset the penalty is a fair request.

It's really cheeky that she used you for the mortgage but then took the profit alone. I'd be asking her about that as well as the 5k. She knew what she was doing and took advantage of you now doing your own fact checking.

Hang on.

You bought a flat and paid half the mortgage. The lodger paid the other 50%?

Why didn't you get 50% of the equity when sold?

Assuming she can afford it, given she used you to make 30k in profit, I think it would be reasonable for her to cover your losses that only came about because you helped her out. To some extent, I agree with PlanDeRaccordement that she should have given you some of the profit, though since you didn't put down any deposit I wouldn't say half.

(although YABU to say she owes you money - she doesn't owe you anything but as you helped her out, it's fair to ask her ton help you)

I agree too, your mum owes you 15k. Which isn’t great to think about. How old were you when you sold it? Is she financially astute? If she is, that’s a pretty mean thing she’s done there.

Yes why didn’t you take half of the £30k profit when the house was sold when you owned half of it?!

I don’t think you can ask your mum on the basis of “you owe me”. It’s just Sod’s law the first time buyer benefit now exists. I think you could ask your mum if she could help you in anyway with the stamp duty.

I don't understand how you paid the whole mortgage but she got all the profit?

You did your mum a favour, you lived there instead of renting somewhere else. So you would have had to pay rent in any case like you say.
I voted YABU because if your mum hasn’t offered you shouldn’t ask. It’s one of those things that neither of you would have known about. We would all love to go back and un do a decision given the benefit of hindsight but life doesn’t work like that. As annoying as it is, you still did something good for your mum.

Good luck with buying your home

Was your name on the title of the house or just on the mortgage?

I think you should have had half of the profit once your mum got her deposit back. To give you nothing is pretty tough, especially since you had to move from a secure home (that you actually OWNED half of) and go back to renting.

I’m starting to feel a bit angry on your behalf now. Your mum sold your own home out from under you, made you move back into renting and off the property ladder, and now you have to pay more.

Talk to her. If you were my child I would do my damned best to help you as best I could.