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.

The gift/loan was made many years ago when OPs DH was single. Circumstances have now changed. He is no longer in financial hardship and is perfectly capable of providing for his own family. There are many reasons why these older people might want their money back. The crux of the matter is what was the understanding when the gift/loan was made. I suspect DH has conveniently forgotten what was said at the time and nothing was put in writing. We are only hearing half of one side of the story - what OPs DH has told her. We haven’t heard ILs POV. It is therefore easy, but still not right, to assume they are in the wrong.

@sandyhappypeople

What I give to my DC is a gift not an investment. But I don’t want the money to support their partner, either in the marriage/relationship or in the event of divorce. So we will have it sewn up however best advised at the time.

People rarely see stepchildren as their ‘own child’, have a look at all the threads regarding them. I wouldn’t be unkind or exclude - I would pay for presents/days out, but as for big sums of money - absolutely not - they would have a bio father or mother and family to help there, not my responsibility and not my grandchild.

It’s my money and up to me how I give it or choose to protect it and my DC. Seen divorce in the family where a spouse who brought nothing walked off with a v large six figure sum. And a situation where someone took up with a new partner who had one child, that child had issues and now has several children who also do, the whole lot are a financial drain on the partner who took them on and divert money from the bio children and grandchildren who are perfectly decent and undeserving of being treated poorly.

Tbh I really would hope that I can guide my DC to not involve themselves in complicated situations where they take on responsibility that isn’t theirs. And I will absolutely protect my money and theirs as best I can to ensure that it is for them and their children.

I think it’s fair as it will be clear from the outset. For OP it isn’t as it’s all retrospective, or perhaps it isn’t but her DH didn’t tell her.

Either:

• Suggest they get their money back but never see you or either of your kids again.

• Don't give it back and prepare for the fall out (although I'd be tempted to go NC/LC anyway).

If it was gifted then they are CFs and their attitude to your eldest is appalling. Your husband entertaining it in the slightest validates them and how they're choosing to divide your children. Unless he has told them he wants a divorce and they're trying to help him, who benefits from it is none of their business. A Will would resolve issues re inheritance and that's between you and your husband.

80k is a lot of money. For ANYONE, that being said :
I don't think op is being unreasonable in her hurt.../her pil's attitude to her and stepchild.
But is there not another way round it? Adding money to a 650k mortgage seems well...a tad silly. When u have 140k left ? Can't you build an extension or something?
Most people ARE never this lucky. 80k was a gift to hubby. But does allow u to live there. And whatever others say ...he isn't their biological grandchild.

They sound pretty nasty tbh
If they had that attitude to my son I don’t think I could ever have much of a relationship with them

If and it's a big if! You wanted to appease them, I believe when you next purchase he could put the original deposit in a deed of trust with the beneficiary being their blood grandchild, which would ring fence it.

Personally I think they are totally out of order and should be told so but you may want to consider this to keep relations cordial. If your else's ever asked, you could explain she has the potential to inherit from her Dads side and this 'evens' things out.

Now that he's married its a marital asset. You are paying the mortgage on the house and have biological children with him. This only makes sense if they are concerned you'll get divorced or that you and your husband will pass some of the value on of the house as inheritance to you eldest.

They sound incredibly mean to be honest and not people I'd want to be around.

However, a compromise would be setting up a contract making it clear that the £80 in the house isn't a marital asset and in case of divorce you wouldn't have a right to it. Who you DH leaves money to if he dies though shouldn't be any of their business.

Why are people so awful about stepchildren! I am an elder stepchild from a previous relationship and was never treated any differently. Does no one ever think about the trauma being excluded/treated differently will cause to a child?

They know, they just don't care because the child isn't a blood relation.

I feel sorry for people who's capacity to love is so limited.

OP would be the one walking off with it, not her child. Their position is no different to any other parent who gives money to a married child.

Try being a divorced DM to 2 DC. You then meet and don’t marry your DP as you’ve been twice divorced and your youngest child is seriously ill so you don’t want more children. This was my stepdad and his DM against my DM. He’s Irish lapsed Catholic and we are all English. My DM got questioned as to why she wasn’t Catholic and didn’t she worry would happen to her after she died in a religious sense?! There was also suspicion that stepdad had bought the house in London and was keeping us all, mot the case total opposite!

We rarely saw Irish step grandparents and they were nice on the surface but when I got sick with gastroenteritis there whilst visiting (caught from a friend of stepdad’s uncle who we stayed with and told no one we had it) I was in hospital for a week on a drip, lost a stone in weight and was in isolation. Step grandmother didn’t believe me and didn’t want to call a doctor to the house and accused me of lying about being ill, I was 11! She was contrite afterwards bringing me a huge lovely book in hospital and pressing money on me there and then sent regular generous money gifts to me and DB at Xmas and birthdays.

Same. Some of the comments are a revolting. Thankfully my step grandparents were lovely and kind people who never treated me any differently. In return I looked after them both in their final years. Unlike their 'bio' grandchildren who couldn't give a rats. But then they didn't have much money, so I wasn't the evil step child trying to con them out of their life savings.

She will also be walking off with the lion’s share of raising, caring and providing for their son’s child.

The gift they made to their son will continue to allow the mum to provide the kid with a better standard of living and opportunities their grandchild would not have had if her mum was struggling with money. Those funds have a greater impact in the early years of a child than getting them when they could only be used for a fancy holiday or kitchen.

My MIL keeps waxing lyrical about the millions DS will inherit when she and SIL pass away. I imagine that by then he will be over 50 and with not really a need for that money. It would have been more helpful if they had put their hands in their pockets to help with medical bills, or to contribute to the costs of expensive food he required for years due to medical issues, or to help to pay for the boiler to be fixed so her rich to be grandchild didn’t have to sofasurf for weeks to avoid freezing in his own home, but no, they never offered and really, looking at how she raised her son no to care about anyone, I didn’t expect anything at all anyway.

After divorce, my father, who was not rich, raided his pension funds to help me get just over the threshold for a lower cost mortgage, to keep a roof over his GC’s head and save him from more upheaval. Without that money, DS would have had a more difficult upbringing, as even working full time, I simply couldn’t afford the local rents where we lived and the waiting list for council homes was immense. Dad never said the amount he put in to help me get a better mortgage deal needed to be returned or paid to DS if circumstances changed, he just assumed I would do my best to ensure his grandchild was well cared for and happy and that that would cost me far more than any money he could provide.

What do his siblings say?

I was just wondering why the exes vasectomy was relevant

Because (unless his circumstances change), he won't have any other potential beneficiaries

What horrible in-laws, wanting to exclude help to a family with a stepchild, and to one grandchild as he has a step brother!
I have helped all my chldren buy houses. I had to sign morgage agreements to say it was a gift - no strings attached.
I would give everything I own to help my children - I don't care if their partners are married to them, their children are biological, etc. They are my children, they are what I care about, and that includes ALL the people I care about.

I have to acknowledge all of the many supportive messages but I haven’t really got anything to add. While we have talked about nothing else we haven’t made any decisions. There is no backstory and I my husband wasn’t lying about the initial gift it literally never came up. I met him 13 years after and married him 15 years after.
if you met my parents in law you would think that they were the kindest, most generous and hospitable people you had ever met and this is why this has come as a shock.
They are family focused and their children adore them. They grew up in a close knit community.
They are nice to my older child but obvious differences in treatment aren’t really obvious as nieces and nephews are with one exception, much older and my youngest much younger.
The only time my husband spoke to his mother about my eldest was when she would collect her other grandchild from the same school as my eldest but ask to take my youngest so she could take my youngest to the park with her other grandchild and distant cousins grandkids who go to same school. All that achieved was to exclude little one not include older one.
When another of FiL’s cousins bought elaborate Easter eggs for grandchildren but not my eldest FiL did turn up next day with an identical one for eldest.
FiL owned a restaurant and the glitterati would be patrons so he’d often get to take grandchildren to freebies but my eldest was never included. At events, of which there are many eldest is included and treated well but introduced as Arnos’ child.
I am despairing but those who suggested that I had had an immaculate conception with my eldest made me laugh. Ex’s vasectomy took place before birth but definitely AFTER conception!

I do think people can be naive about relationships with step kids. Mine, now adult, don't regard my parents as grandparents or me as a mum but our relationship is fine. DH and I have taken steps with our wills to differentiate between them and our DC and to recognise financial differences between us when we got married . After all, his children will inherit from the maternal side of their family whereas our DC will, obviously, not. However, no one, whatever the relationship or circumstances, should be asking for return of monies given as a gift.

That's a crazy way to treat a child that's been part of their lives size 2 years old...

They shouldn't get the money back. The original £80k could be ringfenced from divorce but that's as far as I would go in terms of compromise.

Your wills and inheritance should be up to you and DH to decide. Your DH should be really firm with them.

Sorry to hear this OP, I must admit I find the parents position somewhat offensive. Parents are there to help their kids not screw them over.
Similarly I gave both my younger brother and sister sizeable deposits for their first house purchases (20-25 yrs ago) as I could afford it. I only asked for the original sum back, hey maybe I missed a trick, but then they are family.

Imagine if the child in question wasn't in fact a stepchild but adopted because the son couldn't have children with his partner/ wife. Imagine what would people say about treating an adopted grandchild that way.

This is absolutely disgusting, how anyone can treat a child like this is abhorrent.

Or donor conceived. I've heard a few stories of grandparents/extended family not seeing donor conceived children as "real" children.

glowfrog I am an adopter and a bio mother and a lesbian. I had enormous problems with my own in-laws, for example them telling me, when I was a guest in their home, to take my child out for the day because a relative was visiting and so it was 'family time'.

I have certainly read threads on here when posters defended similar behaviour, saying you can't dictate someone's feelings and it's natural to favour blood yah yah.

It's true you can't dictate feelings, but you can expect some bloody manners. Making children feel like a dirty little secret is never OK.

Awful @Ketzele. Sorry to hear that.