It's ours not mine - or is it?

[ohthiscouldgetmessy]

Help. This is more for advise than AIBU really. I have rented a house from a family member with my partner for many years, we have probably paid around 50% the current value of the house in rent. We have also spent money on a few bits that needed doing.

Now, here is the tricky bit. I am being gifted the house because we have paid so much in rent and what we have done to it. What we have done, we have done together and will have added value to the house. So essentially what we have paid in rent would have covered the initial purchase price of the property when we moved in. (Due to bad financial decisions by one party we were unable to get a joint mortgage so just continued renting).

Partner is under impression the house will be ours. It is only going to be put into my name as its my family member who owns it. Should I put the house into both our names as we have paid the same into it or would you be looking at the rental paid, expenses paid, take that away from current value and work out percentage? Or just keep it 50/50.

I think 50/50 but want other opinions.

No, I wouldn't. It's your house OP.

I think the issue is that you are conflating the payment of rent over the years [and what this amounts to] with the gift of the property. If it is the stated case that you are being given it because you have paid rent to the value of half of it, then DP may have a case to feel aggrieved - but unless you were paying rent from the outset with the prior agreement that it would ultimately be gifted to you - that it was effectively a down-payment on the property - then your DP has simply been paying rent to the family member and has no rights to the property.

If, as I gather, there was no agreement of this kind [in writing or verbally agreed], ie that you were simply enjoying a reasonable rent and secure tenancy from a family member, then the rent paid is irrelevant to the fact that they have decided now that they will gift it to you, and you specifically. Your DP will have to get over it. After all, if he rented from any other third party he would not expect to be given a share in it after any period of time, would he?

I am assuming that he has not spend huge sums on the property over and above what a long term tenant might ordinarily do with permission from the landlord - built an extension, spent a fortune on a new kitchen etc [because he understood it was not his or your house, but a rental]. If he has done so you may, morally feel, that you are obliged to refund him a portion of this money, but there is no legal obligation to do so.

If your family member chose to sell the property tomorrow and not gift it, he would have no claim to any part of the property or redress for monies spent on it. That they are gifting it makes no material difference to his position in law.

I am not sure how you navigate this with your DP, but legally he has no rights unless you marry him at some point, when the property becomes part of the marital assets. I’d tae legal advice before doing so though so you are full aware of the cost to you of doing so.

Would these posters give away half the value of a house given to them? I really doubt it. Do what secures your future.

I genuinely think if the man had due to bad credit caused the woman to miss out on buying a house then people would be saying the woman was entitled to a share. I think it’s the fact that this relationship has disadvantaged one partner, whether that’s by missing out on another opportunity or by compromising your career.

50-50 or repay him his share of structural improvements.

Ask him to get married. If he is for it then the house should be 50/50.

If he doesn’t want to get married keep it 100% yours. He doesn’t want to get married for a reason!

What stopped him from buying a property and renting it out to cover the mortgage all these years? Not OP.

It's a gift from her family to her; the fact that they have been living there is irrelevant.

I wouldn’t add him on deeds. Yes, you paid in together but you paid and renovated without knowing/assuming that the house may be left to you one day; paying rent isn’t buying equity into someone else’s house.
the relative leaving the house to you is a separate event.
another thing- say you add him to the deeds; who will the house be left to in the event one of you dies? Will all kids inherit? Yours only?

Why didn't he buy a house himself & leave Op out of the mortgage?

I'm not sure her bad credit can be blamed?

I'd look into paying him for the renovations.

Surely the answer here is that the "gift" is the 50% you haven't paid in rent, and that comes just to you. The remainder you guys have contributed to equally is then split two ways - so he gets 25%, you get 75%?

When you rent , you know you never own that house and aren’t paying towards owning it. The payments you have paid together are just rent not a claim to ownership.

Ultimately , it’s up to whoever is gifting it and it’s likely they will want the house to solely belong to the family member.

It does depend on who is getting the house, what the relationship is like etc. Remember that no matter how much you’re in love now this could always change and be messy. If it were me - as a mother with children who aren’t my husbands - if it was gifted to me , as I’m married , I would be happy for it to be both as if we split I could remain in the home and option to sell to move elsewhere . However , if it was my husband being gifted the house I would want to be part owner too as with renting you have the security to stay if you split but if we had a bad split it could put me in a situation to be homeless with my children.

I would put it in your name.

Rental payments are just that. Rental payments.

The fact they are now gifting you the property has nothing to do with the fact you were renting it for 15 years.

You need to protect yourself and your own DCs' futures.

I'm guessing he never wanted to get married ... but would now if he thought He'd get half your house? If that's even partially true, don't marry him and put the house (gift) in your name alone.

It's your house alone.

You haven't paid the mortgage. You paid rent. Don't marry this man. Keep your house as an asset for your children.

This.

Was this expectation of a gift ever verbalized or indicated in any way by the gifter or just something you had a feeling about?

And if it was a known understanding did he put his time and money in to the repairs/maintenance/upgrades on the basis that he understood the place would one day be yours plural or yours singular?

Do you have children together? Have either of you taken a hit in terms of earning potential for the care of your family unit? Is all other money shared? These are the things I'd want to know about before considering the reasonableness.

I really don't understand a lot of the responses on this thread. He is your life partner. How could you not put him on the deeds? Seriously, I wouldn't even think twice about this with my husband. Everything we have is ours together. Every pay cheque, every bonus or unexpected windfall would always be to the benefit of our family. I can imagine leaving him off house deeds ' to protect my future'. WTF, he is my future!

This is the right answer.

Is this your life partner? I don't get this yours and mine, even before I married my husband (together ten years before marrying) If I'd been gifted a house that he'd paid 50/50 rent for, and you're using the logic of having paid off half the house with your rent, then half of that was his money.

So you both should own the property if this is a man you are looking to spend your life with? Yes if you ever break up he'd stand to get some money etc but otherwise he'd be out on his arse with nothing, older and single and hard to get a mortgage. I assume you guys aren't facing a break up so then if it's for life, he should have some ownership I'd say.

As others have said if it was a gender reversal then the fellow posting would be lynched for leaving his female partner with no security by then essentially being a tenant in their house.

You partner will have to pay gift inheritance on his portion of the gift so that’s a good reason to not have his name on deeds (which I would recommend)

The impression I get from OP is that he was paying OPs relative half the rent and sinking money into repairs on the house he was under the impression they were going to be gifted. So he likely couldn’t afford to.

I’m sure if he’d had an every-person’s-in-it-for-themselves-and-fuck-the-person-you-supposedly-love attitude to life he could have protected himself financially from being screwed over, but then he and OP probably wouldn’t be together.

You're married, the OP is not.

And many people love their "life partner" without feeling the need to hand over all of their assets. A boyfriend (or even husband) is not necessarily one's "future" no matter what they say today. As we've all observed countless times.

I don't think the impression was tgere but more that who can afford rent, family AND mortgage situation

He was paying rent in their shared home. Most people can’t pay rent and a mortgage out of their wages