AIBU to not want to be an unmarried SAHM?

[EnglishMuffins]

Just wondering what people’s thoughts are on my situation.

I was married for several years and had 2 DC with my exH. I had always worked part time to be around for our young DC in a general admin job. Upon divorce , exH stayed in marital home and bought me out of my share. I took some furniture, no savings (in fact debts that needing reconciling) and no claim to his pension as he said the pot was too small to even consider sharing it 50/50 after only a few years being married.
I lived with family as I couldn’t afford to buy or rent on my PT salary, and we share custody of our DC 50/50.

Fast forward a couple of years and I met DP. He was also a divorcee. Their split was amicable, no DC involved. We bought a house together about 18 months into our relationship and soon after we unexpectedly fell pg (I said unexpectedly as there are fertility issues on both sides but a blessing all the same and we were delighted).
When our child was born we decided I would give up my job to be a full time SAHM. We also needed a bigger house so sold up and moved , but this time my name was no longer on the mortgage as my lack of income decreased our borrowing prospects. So my initial lump sum I invested into our first property (from my divorce settlement) which had also grown as property prices went up in value and the mortgage was paid off (I might add that for 18 months I contributed towards the mortgage and bills) is now tied up in a house that is in DP sole name. I feel naive but he said that we’d just have to base it on “trust”.

My issue is, I really thought that by now, DP would have proposed marriage. He’s not dead set against it, but he says things like “don’t do it!!” When we drive past weddings and things , and I just generally get the feeling he doesn’t see a second marriage in his future. Our child is almost 2, ive given up on my job, a career, paying into a pension, independence , I sold my little car.. have no savings or means to save , am solely reliant on DP wages . Meanwhile he is climbing the career ladder, paying into a pension, accruing savings and saving what I imagine would be a vast monthly sum in childcare costs.
AIBU to expect him to marry me? I just feel I’m in a vulnerable position, with nothing to fall back on. I want a secure future for my child and my DC from my previous marriage. I would even like to share a name with DP and our child and I guess rubber seal our family unit? So both financially, and romantically, I’d like to be married - but DP has no interest . Then part of me feels like a gold-digger for thinking he should marry me and give up 50:50 if we were to split.

What are the legal implications of not being married vs being married?
DP has a will, I don’t. DP has insurance through work that would pay off the mortgage - I guess this would be taxed? I have life insurance. No savings and a tiny pension from my PT job.

Sorry - my bad, just read your last post. Well done you for having the conversation - not easy. Glad he understood and you have a route to go down. My thoughts would still stand on a job. I’m really sorry re the marriage proposal - hard to hear. Worth a further conversation - you need to understand. Ask him to be blunt if needs be

I have to say, never relying on someone else’s income (long term) would be in my top three life advice points for young people. It rarely ends well. It’s incredibly destructive.

Hell yes. If there's one single thing I want my daughter to learn from me, its this.

@JustHereWithPopcorn

Christ how much money did you put towards the house that is solely in his name? Did you have anything drawn up to say if you spilt up etc he owes you that money? You are in a very vulnerable position you need to get this sorted ASAP

Contract by habit is a thing. You paid into that home and if you can prove that then it will be treated by the courts the same way as if you were named on the mortgage. Just keep records of what you pay and you can't be done over, assuming your lawyer or yourself mentions and asks for this in court; contract by behaviour/implicated contract.

YANBU, you want security that comes with marriage. That's what marriage literally is; it's a contract.

I am wondering why you aren't discussing this with him. You're both adults and can have a discussion about intentions. If his intention is to not marry you then you will need to draw up a different kind of contract around finances which again, would be taken into account in the courts should be one day attempt to just kick you out onto the street.

Also, ensure you're being a great parent and have a proper connected relationship with your child so that they would never simply watch you be treated that way either.

That sounds really worrying, especially if your share in the first house was invested into the second one and you’re not on the deeds now. Was this amount of money documented? If you’re worried about your finances, is your relationship good with partner and can discuss finances? If it isn’t you probably need to get legal advice and find a full time job and start paying into a pension and save. If you were married you would have more rights.

Seems to be some confusion over whether you can be on the deeds but not the mortgage. I thought you could but a couple of years ago we wanted to raise some money by mortgaging our flat and found we could raise more if the mortgage was in my wife's name only. But to do this I had to transfer my ownership stake to her--called a "Transfer of Equity".

@thepeopleversuswork

I have to say, never relying on someone else’s income (long term) would be in my top three life advice points for young people. It rarely ends well. It’s incredibly destructive.

Hell yes. If there's one single thing I want my daughter to learn from me, its this.

But in a marriage it's not one person's income, it's the family's income, that's the deal. And as a mother you do need to be there for your children and working a job is just not as important as that. Marriage is security.

Also his mortgage provider wouldn’t have me on the deeds as they insist on being first charge

Wtf

I haven’t worked for decades and I have always gone 50/50 on the mortgage and deeds with Dp as he was when we last bought a house.

Make sure when you get your £25,000 ring fenced that it is as a percentage of the value of the house when you bought and not just £25000 as you don’t want that paying out to you in years to come when it will be worth very little.

I wonder if he or his solicitor will come up with excuses why you can’t have your percentage of the house ring fenced

This might have already been covered but why isn’t your name on the deed?

When me & my now husband bought our house, I was thr one with savings and a higher paying job and we were asked if we wanted to put the house into joint ownership or proportional share - it doesn’t matter who actually pays it out if you two the mortgage is different to the ownership of asset (as if you are the one maintaining the house then that is a contribution too…. As it won’t cost as much to repair if it is looked after)

We went down 50/50 route & I had made sure my plans were known about our future together… we were buying a house big enough to have kids & I wanted to be married first so there was no confusion (& we’d been together 7 years at that point)

Legally speaking you are in a much weaker position if you’re not married AND your name isn’t on the deed or your contribution officially recognised anywhere

Maybe point out you don’t need to have a wedding to be married & that you’d consider a courthouse wedding for legality & party at some point type thing (maybe that party could be your ‘wedding’ once he’s already agreed to the legal bit)

Hope you get sorted but I would deffo start building my own nest egg if I were in your situ x

Ask him either to marry you or give you your money back.

The op is a grown woman and needs to take personal responsibility. She’s given up everything, literally everything, she’s even given him her divorce settlement,, she gave up her job, she’s given up her pension, the lot. She has nothing, literally nothing
These are choices she unbelievably made. They are not his fault. Everyone knows the risks you face as a homeless jobless unemployed adult with no pension and no savings, the op chose this route for herself, willingly

This ^

Also, what someone else said about advising their daughters not to become reliant on someone else.

Sorry to be harsh but I'm really surprised that you have chosen to give up your career/ income/ pension/ independence twice and just trusted and relied upon a man. It's a real shame that you didn't learn something after your first experience. You were very fortunate that your family were willing to help and house you and the children.

You need to see a specialist lawyer asap and get back to work as you have no protection as an unmarried SAHM.

'But in a marriage it's not one person's income, it's the family's income, that's the deal. And as a mother you do need to be there for your children and working a job is just not as important as that. Marriage is security.'

The OP isn't married. Even if she was, why is it more important for a mother as opposed to a father 'to be there' for the children? These particular children may have their mother around all the time but I suspect they would prefer not to have to live in poverty because their mother has given up her job and all their financial security because of her choices.

I think you need to take legal advice. The fact that you put money into the house on trust will have some validity in law but I think you need to get this hammered out and into the open with your DP. Is your name on the deeds? I understand that after being married and divorced some people are hesitant to remarry but if that is the case it is even more reason to get clarity on property ownership. I think if he refuses to have this conversation you will have to ask him to return the initial sum you put in plus interest. You are right to be questioning this situation.

To be fair, the pregnancy wasn't planned and he doesnt owe you half of his house if he's invested a lot more financially. You are also able to live in a house you wouldn't have been able to afford without him.

FWIW I'm also divorced with dc but work full time. I've met men in worse financial situations than me and I'd never marry them. Best thing you can do is regain your financial independence and work full time.

Although the two issues you raised may be related they are not one and the same. He should marry you because he wants to or you may both be miserable in the end. In terms of the house, all should not be lost if you can prove (e.g if you paid money into his account for the first house or was on the mortgage or somehow) that the funds from that house which (hopefully) you can prove you contributed X amount to, went to buy this house that he is sole owner of. The only issue is that if your relationship did break down, establishing your rights may be an expensive business. You say you don’t want to be an unmarried SAHM but maybe it is worth considering whether it is better to go out to work build up your pension and other benefits and let him pay childcare! It is definitely worth having a discussion with your DP about how you’re feeling? In terms of marriage , if you want to get married and he is not too keen, maybe you will need to propose.

Not just about splitting (which is important and you should absolutely protect yourself) - what if he dies though? I would see a solicitor.

It’s great that he’s agreed to do something about your money. So strike whilst the iron is hot and book an appointment with a solicitor tomorrow

You need a % share so if your house cost £250k when you bought it you need a 10% stake for you £25k.
However you contributed to the mortgage of the previous house so those contributions need to be included.
If the £25k was from your divorce and what you put into the previous house, it will have gone up by the time you sold it. So you could have actually put £35k into the new house so you would have a larger %.
Don’t rock the boat with anything else until you’ve got the house sorted.
After that consider an increase percentage of the property as time goes on. So if you are together 5 years you get another 5% and so on until you have 50%.
If you get any inheritance keep quiet about it and don’t share it
I think he’s agreed easily to the house as there is a paper trail that you contributed and therefore he would have to give it back in the event of a split. Now you could angry he could drag it through the courts but he would probably be advised it would be cheaper to pay you off

If he isn't going, to change his mind about marrying you, just tell him, you want to go back to work as you are bored at home, your child could go to nursery. Yes, it might be another part time job, but then you could, put some money aside, then if things go south, you will have some savings. You didn't get much from your first marriage aprt from 2 kids, if he is earning more than he can cover childcare.

@neithernever

Dont see why your name cant be on the deeds!

The mortgage and the deeds need to match don't they? So if OP can't go on the mortgage then she can't go on the deeds?

Not necessarily. When I split up with my exDH, he needed to be taken off the deeds as he was in so much debt and neither of us wanted a charge put on the house by any of his creditors. In the divorce, he was taken off the deeds, but he had to stay on the mortgage because I wasn't earning enough money to take it on. I then stayed in the house with the DC and took on the responsibility of paying the mortgage.

@EnglishMuffins

Just to update. We had the discussion last night and DP was genuinely unaware of the financial position he’d put me, and of my concerns. He agreed wholeheartedly to get a declaration of trust drawn up to ring fence my investment in the house. He also suggested my name going on the deeds. Marriage was never on the cards though. I was waiting like a passive fool for a proposal that was never coming. He said he wouldn’t rule it out completely forever, but he seemed far more agreeable to going down the legal route to tie matters up rather than the marriage route. For reasons he couldn’t really get across to me..

No no no no

“Ringfencing the money I put into the house” is not good enough. You need your name on the deeds full stop. A solicitor will explain to you why. Do it immediately.

PS that is garbage also about the mortgage. Whether your name appeared on the mortgage and/or deeds or not, he would have had to declare you and your DC as dependents when he applied for the mortgage. (And if he didn’t, he lied and that’s fraud).

It's not accurate to say you will have no claim on the house. You have and you could. You would need to prove what money you put in etc but it can be done. I know this because my ex tried it with me and we weren't married.! However it will require lawyers and money and difficult to sort out after the fact. Problem is he now has you over a barrel. I would go to citizens advice and see where you stand. Also start taking power back now by getting a job etc. Good luck.

I feel bad for the op. So basically if you split you get your 25 k or whatever back and that’s it?

My DH was in this position with his ex-P - the mother of 3 of his DC. Not married, her name on the deeds of the house they had bought & restored together, she’d changed her name to his by deed poll as his was posher than hers.
I met him 2 years after they had split up. She was letting him live in a caravan in the garden & he was still maintaining the house & when she was away for work keeping it all going, including holiday lets in the barns they had converted.
I advised him to check out the legal situation. He was under the impression Common Law marriage is a thing - it is not (in England anyway). Nothing, after over 20 years. He’d let it go unchallenged for too long to do anything about it: the legal advisor said “don’t do it again.”
A couple of years ago she sold the larger of the converted barns for around half a million.

Op, just to say I’ll be back later with some relevant stuff on marriage vs the legal side.

Meantime I reckon other posters will say LTB. But it’s more complex than that

My husbands the only one on the mortgage as me being a SAHM brought the amount we could borrow down too but the solicitor wrote that if we split up I get 50% of the house.

I’d get something drawn up ASAP.

@EnglishMuffins

I said peanuts in the “scheme of things” - it was a mere drop in the ocean of what DP borrowed to get us this house. And it wouldn’t be of use to me as a deposit seeing as I have no job to get myself a mortgage..

Because you don't earn/can't get a mortgage, if you were alone you would have to rent. Rental tenants require A DEPOSIT.