AIBU to consider regular payments from DP (my kids dad) as child maintenance - even though we're still together?

[mummatoots]

DP and I are still together, but keep separate finances. (He is a financial mess.)

The house we live in is owned (and mortgaged) solely by me.

We have two young children together.

He pays me £500 per month - and with this I pay for everything related to housing, and also clothes, classes, haircuts, etc - anything else the kids need.

He tends to do supermarket shopping as well as this.

Would you class this as effectively child maintenance, albeit in an informal arrangement?

Or, in your view, can you only receive child maintenance if separated?

I ask because I'm looking at moving house, and if I do class this as informal child maintenance (easily evidenced with a few months payments on bank statements,) it is counted within affordability calculations, so helps my application. It's a real payment which I receive regularly from my kids dad towards their living costs, so I'm not making anything up and I think it should count - but I'm not sure if I'm correct in classing it as such, and suddenly have doubts re: mortgage fraud etc!

I've checked the CMS calculator, and if we were to separate and I were to have the kids full time, with his salary I'd be due £532 per month.

Interested in the mumsnet verdict.

Go for it and secure yours and your kids financial future

Prove that?

There have been plenty of threads like that and the response is always, “why do you think you should get it live there for free, of course you need to contribute to bills and your living costs.”

From whom you are separated. You are not separated. It isn’t child maintenance. It’s his contribution to the household. It’s your own fault it’s such a small amount that it’s actually less than child maintenance would be because you’re allowed yourself to get into this situation. Doesn’t mean you can call it child maintenance, it’s not. It’s his rent/bills/contribution to the kids. It should be much higher.

You’re also ignoring everyone telling you that you have to declare him on the application as living there. Or where you planning to leave him off it?

I think you know you're trying to pull as fast one- or else why ask?

The bottom line is you want to include his £500 a month to increase the loan you're applying for.

You've decided it's ok to call it CM.

CM is a legally defined contribution.
This is not CM.

He's paying you £500 a month for living in your house and some of it goes towards the children.
You could spend it on gin and fags- who knows you're not?
The fact you've decided it's for the children is just your word.
You may have proof of the money coming in but you don't have proof of how you spend it.

Why are you relying on a man who is useless with money and has a poor credit rating ?

And what does he do if you split up?

He's getting nothing from all of this - no security like a tenant and no assets like a share in the house.

There have also been a lot of thread like 'You're a fool because if you split up you have no rights to the property and you don't even have the protection of being a tenant with a clause giving you reasonable notice to move out.'

If you live together your joint income would be taken into account.

If his income is being counted towards the mortgage then no, as it would be being counted twice. If he's not going to be in the mortgage because he's financially irresponsible then technically you probably could count it, as it is income, but can you actually rely on it? I'm pretty sure maintenance doesn't have to be court mandated to count, plenty of people have informal arrangements, court mandates are a last resort when an arrangement can't be made, or isn't stuck to.

Have you thought what happens if he becomes ill and is unable to work and needs benefits? CSA would be £7.50 a week for 2 children.Just a thought life can throw you all sorts.I wouldn’t take this money as a given.I would apply without considering this amount for my own peace of mind.

I've recently had to go into all this as I have an adult child living at home paying rent and needed to remortgage. His rent does NOT count as my income and he had to sign a declaration waiving his rights to the property.

The £500 he is paying is his (measly) contribution to living costs. The fact you spend it on your children is irrelevant and to claim it as such would be blatantly working the system to suit. I'd be very careful op and either take legal advice or at the very least declare that you have another adult living in your home and get them to waive their claim against the property or you'll be royally screwed.

I know you say you keep separate finances, but intrigued to know how you came up with this £500 figure. Is that really all he has left after IVA repayments & basic living costs? I hope he's not enjoying a large disposable income whilst you're footing the family bills!

People give the weirdest advice on here.

I'd absolutely count it as child maintenance. It isn't fraud - you're evidencing extra income and there's no issue with including his contribution which can be court-mandated if needed in the future. Mortgage forms aren't detailed enough for this to sit elsewhere so you're making it more straight-forward this way.

Wait, you're saying that the court can mandate that a spouse pay money to the other spouse for child support? I have never heard of that - only child support once separate/divorced (which doesn't apply here).

This is a very bizarre way of living with your partner.

Just increase what he's paying towards bills, if he's earning 40k and only has £500 left over then clearly he's doing something behind your back like a secret gambling problem or drugs or he's lying about what's left over.

I think it will differ between mortgage providers

I have the same problem although for different reasons, ie I live with DH and we share costs but house and mortgage are in my name. In our case it's to do with his country of residence being technically not the Uk.

Some providers seemed to take into account that DH pays half of bills/childcare, others treated me as having sole financial responsibility for kids, and one even wanted to count DH as a financially dependent adult.

I think you need to get on the phone to a human at the mortgage provider and if you are turned down, try other providers. My affordability calculation seemed hugely different between providers.

When we first bought our house my credit was shaky and may have impacted our mortgage application (it didn't in the end). We were advised NOT to do what you are attempting. The broker said we can't - the mortgage application asks specific questions about adults living in the house and their income.

It was really simple for us: no. You can't do that. Ask a broker before potentially committing fraud and go from there.

Could you class it as rent, would that help your application? Could you draw up an official rent agreement with him? He should be paying more than £500 imo - if he’d have to pay £532 for the kids if you separated and all his living costs too. He’s got a good deal with you (#cocklodger)

Also some posters on here are being really harsh to you. You are supporting your kids in the best way you can despite financially useless DP; assuming he is their dad it is not as simple as "kick him out because he's not paying enough"! Because he's a person you and they love, not a lodger!

You are not being dishonest- just trying to work out where your non standard arrangements fit in the system.

Good luck.

No it's a mad idea. He should be contributing properly to the household expenses. All adults should be IMHO.

Wow - he contributes £500 for his "rent" and to pay for his dc?

When his CMS would by £532 if he didnt live there???

Christ, you've been taken for a ride so far down the river you cannot see what is normal?
He needs to pay "rent", share of bills etc AND money for the dc

It’s not child maintenance if he lives there, it’s his living costs/share of the children’s. Whether you spend it solely on the children or not is irrelevant really. I don’t know how mortgage applications work but is it not possible to say “my income includes £500 a month from my partner who lives with me towards his living costs and our children’s”?

It is dishonest according to the mortgage application though - you can't pretend an adult with an income isn't also living in the house

Presumably the place you’re getting a mortgage from won’t know that he’s living there and will assume you’re a single parent as it’s only you applying for the mortgage? So they’d expect you to have CM. I don’t see anything wrong with this personally. If it gets queried down the line you can say you were separating them reconciled.

No, you can’t count it as money in as he lives with you. You open up a can of worms and they would be looking at his financials too.

Of course it's not child maintaince. It's a parent paying into the account in which the bills are paid

I have a very similar set up and remortgaged in the past couple of months. DP has his own house but we live in mine with our DCs. No shared finances at all.
The money he transfers me every month is half the cost of utilities. My broker said it doesn’t count as income but it did reduce my outgoings and therefore affordability of the mortgage.
As a PP said, you have to declare any other adults living in the property being mortgaged and they have to sign to agree they have no claim on the property and understand the risk of you not paying the mortgage. So if the application is a close-call they might question it.