In-laws want their deposit back

[ArnosLeach]

I married 5 years ago and I have a three and a half year old and a nearly nine year old from a short lived relationship.

Full background as I am anticipating the questions I would want answering.

The nine year old sees their father once a month for a weekend. I assume that my ‘ex’ owns his house. He had a vasectomy before our child was born. We do not communicate on any level other than if arrangements need to change. He pays a set amount every month but every month will buy shoes/clothes etc.

We moved into the house my husband had bought fifteen years before. It has doubled in value. Following a miscarriage last year we are trying to conceive again and we are looking to move house. We mentioned this to the in-laws a fortnight ago. I did not know that they had provided DH with deposit.
They have now asked for twice the deposit back comprising the original sum and the proportion of what that deposit has added to the value.

They feel that my elder child will benefit from their largesse. We are both completely gutted by this. A bolt out of the blue.

OP, you have benefitted very nicely from your in-laws genorosity which enabled your DH to get on the property ladder when he did, and also from your DH solely paying the mortgage for 10 years and mainly paying it for a further 5. You have really brought no money at all to the table except for 1/3 mortgage which really is not much in exchange for housing you and your older son. I think you have no business complaining now, or in taking this personally when a ring fencing arrangement has also been applied to their other child's gift

If the OP and her DH are going to engage with the parents on this - and they are not obligated to, I am also not confident they will be appeased - then this is the right approach.

Of course is my brother dies first there's no saying his wife would honour that agreement but I believe she would.

@ThreeRingCircus no no no no no no! Get it done officially - there are so many threads on here where the surviving partner inherited everything and did not follow the deceased's wishes! It needs to be written into the will that each partner's share is ringfenced for their bio children and that in event they die separately the original will stands - same for remarriage.

I agree with this.

My mother took steps to ensure her estate would be going To my sister / her son and not 'stepchildren' - not because she was an Evil Grandmother but because the 'stepchildren' were adults when my sister came to the marriage and didn't feel part of the family to my mother!

I don't think this would mean my mother is a an evil witch, just the reality being that her children and grandchildren included y sister and her son (and not the adult children from her husband's previous marriage).

however, asking for a gift back is not on. If DP's parents - rightly or wrongly - are concerned about lack of equity among the (biological) grandchildren (because of dilution vis a vis OP's oldest), then perhaps they could ok at reducing his share in the will rather than trying to retrieve a gift?

@CleansUpButWouldPreferNotTo because they are all the mothers child equally

I wouldn't leave one of my kids out even if they were inheriting more from elsewhere

And you are wrong wrong wrong

oh and dumb dumb dumb.

RTFT (slooowly, clearly) and you’ll hopefully understand.

none of this makes sense to the point where it actually sounds fake.

they've acknowledged it as a 'gift' at the time, but now want 'double the value back'.

You say it's because of your child (their stepchild), but if that was really the case, why would they not just ask for their original investment back?

WHO said it was because of your child?

Why hasn't your DH asked them about it?

Why has he offered them 80k back 'as way of a compromise' but you won't ask him why he's done that?

Why didn't you know about it in the first place?

All totally suss if you ask me, if it's not a load of rubbish then there's way more to this story then is being let on.

Wash your hands of these horrible people.

And don't repay them a penny either!

Tell them that if they let you keep the GIFTED deposit, you will ensure that when you move to a bigger property, your eldest child lives in the cupboard under the stairs like Harry Potter

I'd just tell them that you're not moving house anymore. If they ask why, say that you were trying to upsize, but if you lost £160k it wouldn't be possible. So theres no point in moving now. Then do a slow fade and once you are NC, consider moving then.

I wouldn't be giving them a penny back. It was a gift and the fact the other siblings do not have to pay their monies back because they don't have stepchildren is another slap in the face to your family

I would be telling them to go away and bark at another tree.
and if your husband doesn’t tell them to go away you should consider walking away.
Awful in laws.

Exactly, things don't add up, one way or another. We have lent money for a deposit to one of our children and her partner (with the approval of the other, and to be deducted from our estate after we are gone. But if she then got married to someone else, and that someone else was not particularly friendly to us, perhaps- and they now were so well off that they could afford to significantly upgrade as the house has doubled in value- and if perhaps our own circumstances had declined - then perhaps fair enough to say 'if you can now afford a huge posh house, you could perhaps repay the money we lent you when you needed it. None of us know what the arrangement was at the time with son in this case. It was 'gifted' as it was the only way to avoid tax, but we don't know what the exact arrangements were.

Don't know about you, but £80.000 is a massive sum of money for most people, and if the house has doubled in value, then in some circumstances it would seem fair to repay part or whole.

Advice to walk away = advice to walk away from inheritance too. Ah well, so much more for the other children.

The gift was made to their son. It has nothing to do with grandchildren. Did they think it gave them a say in choosing his wife?
This boils down to punishing their son for marrying a woman with a child. They need to be told it's not the 1800s anymore.
It's not the same thing as leaving money to biological grandchildren in their will.

I've not read the full, 28 page, thread. But it may be worth investigating if there are any tax or benefit implications (for example inheritance tax, or pension credit) if they receive a large sum back from you. It may be better for them to keep the money crystallised in property.

Not an accountant.

Wow what nasty In-laws. Want it back plus interest blooming cheek.

This is bonkers!

If I was your dh I'd not be giving them any money back. They're not asking his siblings for their money back are they. They're punishing him and penalising him for having a step child basically?! For being a caring responsible family man? Baffling.

If this were my parents this would be a hill our relationship could happily die on.

Here is an idea
If you bought the new house as tenants in common with you owning 1/3 and willing your share to your first born and your husband willing his 2/3 between the children you had together would that placate the inlaws? Would need to be a lifetime interest in the property for the other person but at least then as far as the horrible grandparents are concerned their blood grandchildren get more but your child still inherits from you.

How are they in general as grandparents and parents? I imagine they have form ...

I assume you or DH have spent serious money on improving the property over the 20 years since purchase, otherwise the remaining mortgage of £140k on a house that was £325k with an at least £80k deposit seems too large for a repayment mortgage and too small for interest only.
Since your PIL have not paid for any upkeep or improvement to their "investment" they should not reap the benefit of the increase those improvements brought.

She's not complaining. She's asking advice on behalf of both her and her husband on how to deal with this. You make it sound like she's a leech. They're married. She is contributing as best she can while she has young children. No doubt her contribution will increase further down the line.

I would have DH explain that it is unfair to ask for money back because he is a stepfather as well as a father.
The money was a gift and his to do what he wanted with, when it comes down to it.
The idea that they don’t want his stepchild to be treated equally to his biological child is insulting and he would be in danger of destroying his family unit if he did favour one child over the other.

In other words - his parents can go fuck themselves.

Personally, if I could afford to I would give them their £80k back then tell them to do one.

I don't think it's unreasonable too ringfence the value of the house pre marriage and dh gets that if you split