Husband scammed. Change house to my name?

[Sunnydaysaregreat]

It's looking very likely my husband has invested tens of thousands of pounds (turns out most of it is his family's as they thought he knew about money) in a scam investment. Spoke to FCA and Fraud Action already, both brilliant and gave help.

Although I'm shocked, I'm being calm with my husband and intend to talk about how we go forward, and pay back his family (I've been advised we're unlikely to get much money back). I'm trying to keep it together but the red flags were so clearly all over these companies, it's actually worried me so much that he is a liability for our financial safety (we have young children).

AIBU to tell him I want to house transferred into just my name? Obviously there's a huge trust issue in that he was doing all of this investing without telling me, but it's husband judgement I'm most concerned about. I'm going to talk to Citizens Advice tomorrow to ask about how this is done.

Advice appreciated as while I am being sensitive to the fact that he has absolutely been scammed, his judgement makes me feel unsettled.

@shoppingshamed no it doesn't cone under FCA so while they have been incredibly helpful with support, he needs to contact action fraud and trading standards. Apparently none of these investments have yet actually run away with his money and are currently paying bits of the money too him. I am very concerned that the minute he now stops responding to them/sending money/asking for it all back (if he can), that's when I think the payments will suddenly stop.

@AngelinaFibres that sounds incredibly similar to what he's done, but he used a business account not personal.

Was it attached to a limited company. That may save you financially but will probably destroy your family relationships.
My exhusband was convinced that it wasn't his fault and fought it in court. He represented himself very badly. He lost. The other sides costs and court costs were added to his debt. He didn't make any attempt to pay the debt so papers were served which added extra costs. His wife then divorced him and fought the sale of the house. The debt started at 150,000 which he could have paid by remortgaging their mortgage free house. It ended up at 308,000. The house, cars ,horse,lifestyle all went .His second marriage ended and his 3 children have nothing to do with him

I agree about using the rage to get things done, and also that you're unlikely to know the full extent of this yet

You didn't say if he had the FCA on speakerphone (?) but the grasping at straws is to be expected - anything rather than accept he's created a potential disaster and it's this which could present ongoing risk

His family - who did know he was "investing" for them - sound a bit gullible TBH. I can't imagine handing over money without knowing exactly where it was going, but then I guess it's easy to be drawn in when faced with someone doing the Billy Big Balls act without actually knowing what they're doing

I also can't imagine him "investing" tens of thousands for the wider family and not putting your own joint money in the pot, so wondered how you're getting on with your own credit checks (which I hope you'll do yourself rather than leaving it to him)

@Sunnydaysaregreat I am sorry you are going through this.

One thing you can do for free is to update the Land Register for your property and put your email address as one of the three permitted addresses. That way you get an email if anyone tries to put charges etc. against the property. https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/updating-registered-owners-contact-address

You can also register for property alerts. It’s basically the same but belt and braces. https://www.gov.uk/guidance/property-alert

CAB do far more than this, and have access to experts in most fields.

@Sunnydaysaregreat Have you actually got credit reports yet for both yourself and your husband? Can be done online and access granted almost instantly. That really is the first place to start. You need to know just HOW bad the problem is before you can start trying to sort things out

As others have said the 'family' money borrowed may not be repayable by your husband ( legally at least). It rather depends whether they gave him the money to invest for them, or whether he simply borrowed the money from them to invest himself. They may be culpable too, if they simply did it because he recommended it, and didn't check for themselves, or whether he borrowed it to invest for himself and was going to pay it back. If the latter, then yes, he does need to pay it back one way or another

So sorry you are going through all this angst

I would run a credit report (Experian and the like) on both your names. It seems so unlikely he's been fine til now then just decided to get involved in this bizarre scheme that to anyone with half a brain screams "AVOID".

Given the creditors are his family I think they are going to have to take it up with him. I'd be very surprised if they took you to court to get their money back.

I'd still leave him though.

I actually think this sounds more like GAMBLING than "investing" and that there's probably a bigger conversation to have. He has gambled your family finances, secretly.

Cool blur I think you need to read reply from Walterfence. That’s what I’ve been told too.
As other posters also point out this would otherwise be a huge loophole.
Not sure about future debt.

I expect you are right with this.

But they could dry up earlier if there are other victims because if they start asking for their money back that could also cause the scammers to run off (or they pay back the first people who ask for their money back with your DHs money but then there's none left when it's his turn).

It's not a pyramid scheme! It's a different type of scam! OF COURSE the minute OP's DH asks for his money back, they'll disappear. Or give him months of delaying tactics.

OP, I'm so sorry that you turned out to have married an idiot. You now have to protect yourself and your DCs. Your "D"H will clearly think he can fix all this.

@Geebray you are right, he does seem to think by having talked to the relevant bodies today (FCA, Action Fraud etc) he has a clue about what's going on. He even seemed somewhat calmed about the fact these bodies have said none of the companies YET have broken their contract and he is clinging to that and acting like he's got some control/knows what's going on. I am pretty certain I need some space from him and have him out of the house for a while at least. I feel sick about it.

I disagree massively. If my husband put my children safety at such a high risk I’d want to do the same thing

this isn’t just a forgot to pay for a parking ticket. This is tens of thousands of pounds and putting a house at risk!!!

just a warning ActionFraud do more collating info on scams and often don’t provide a great deal of advice outside of general advice and rarely carry out any investigation. Police will bounce you back to ActionFraud. Secure as many funds as you can that your husband can’t touch.

Im sorry you are going through this.
Ive read the thread and see you are worried he could fall victim again the future.
i need to tell you that scammers sell details of people they have successfully made money from on the dark web. They call it the gullible list.
its really likely he will be targeted again and by more than one.

Oh gosh. All those huge returns on your money are always dcams

you rarely get rich quick….

Absolutely. An elderly Uncle was scammed in a very similar way. He is continuing spammed by these lucrative investment opportunities.

@Sunnydaysaregreat can I ask if you've run a credit check yet, to see what's what on your records?

It really is worthwhile, and doesn't even have to be just in times of crisis - an annual "MOT" can be wise anyway, to make sure everything's as it should be

And I'm glad that you've found your anger

I definitely feel you on wanting to put the house into only your name. My ex fell for a scam where he thought one of his favourite actors was offering him a job writing scripts for his show - he didn't see anything odd in the fact that the actor was handling it all himself, was asking for iTunes cards, or that the hiring process consisted of offering jobs to randos on Facebook Messenger after two minutes of chat, and wouldn't have any of it when I tried to tell him that this was a scammer. At one point the scammer was asking for a lot of money to recover some non-existent package in Thailand, more than he had easy access to, and I had to talk him down before he asked his parents for a loan (I don't think they would have given him it).

I found myself thinking, what if we'd had joint finances and my money would have allowed him enough to make the payment? I didn't feel I could ever be confident about having joint finances with him. Let's just say that while there was more to it, the scam was the beginning of the end.

Not unreasonable. I work in finance and it’s a sad fact that people who’ve been scammed once often get targeted more and are in danger of falling for it more than once.

No big deal getting the house in the name of OP. Since he is married to OP, the husband has residential rights even up to the day that any future divorce is made final, IF that ever happens,. And IF that happened, he would get half in any case, which is his legal entitlement In adfition, if OP died while still married, the husband gets it all anyway.

@MrsDuskTilldawn Thanks, that's what I'm now worried about, that it's going to happen again. No I have all the information and he's invested in 4 different companies, all with the sane red flags, all in very quick succession so they must've been linked, he's obviously very vulnerable to their tactics. I think this is why I've made my decision to separate. I'm not going to throw it on him now as it's obviously not a great time in our house wt the moment, but he also made a really bad decision a few years ago (emotional affair) and I have realised I can't live life always looking over my shoulder. It's weird, somehow this has made me feel crystal clear we need to divorce - it definitely feels like this mistake has been way more chilling/scary to me than his emotional affair did. Perhaps because I know there's no going back now, I can't risk him costing our family debt or potentially losing our home if he was ever scammed again.

I can't tell you enough how helpful this has been - just venting and offloading has been such a help because I haven't talked to anyone apart from advice services. Thank you all.

I'm glad that you've made your decision and that you've found venting useful.

Personally I don't think there's ever a good time to divorce but I can imagine that you want to get as much information on your joint finances as you can before putting in your petition.