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.

How would you both feel if a different relative had gifted you (singular) a different house? Would do expect you to gift half of it to him? I doubt it and you certainly wouldn't feel like you had to.

Did you pay market rent or did your relative give you a discount? Possibly your dp has already had a good deal out of this.

There's something to be said for giving him a share of the value added by the work you both paid for if you split, you could take that into account now and gift him 15% or whatever of the house.

Bare in mind giving property away is basically selling some of it and may be subject to taxes.

Does the OP give the sexes of the people involved at all? They may both be women

@ohthiscouldgetmessy

If you and your partner have been in the house for many years, (so long that you have paid so much rent that it equals half of the house value,) then of COURSE it needs to be in your partner's name too. I can't believe you even need to ask.

I would be LIVID if I was your partner and your relative gifted the house, and I was pushed out and left off the deeds...Then again, I would never have spent many years living in someone's relatives house. That was never going to end well to be honest.

If my partner did this to me though, took the house as a gift (that we had been renting together for so long that we paid half its value in rent,) and they refused to allow me on the deeds, I would be walking. It would mean they clearly don't care about me, or value our relationship.

Remember if the house is to be entirely in your name you will be responsible for the upkeep of the house, buildings insurance, boiler repairs etc. You will cease to be partners in that sense in that you can’t just pay 50/50 for things like this. It will almost certainly drive a wedge between you.
How is your relationship? Do you have children? Do you see yourselves as a team?
Its a big decision to give someone half a house for free (as that’s what you would be doing).
Think carefully.

Your family member wants it to go to you then it goes to you. Not you plus bloke. If they're not bothered and you want to give away half your house then do so.

I wouldn't...

If you're married then when you split he would probably get half. But not so much if you're not.

The OP has been very careful to not mention the sex of the partner. (Or their own sex.)

It's irrelevant though. The partner needs to be on the deeds, and deserves to own 50% of the house.

@ohthiscouldgetmessy
I agree that it makes a difference if you're married or not.

Just living together, keep it in your name, if you want to be fair work out how much your dp has paid in improvements and pay them back from the rent money you'll be saving.

The rent they've paid is just that, rent.

If married, it's probably a mute point as the house would become a marital asset.

Personally if I was your relative giving you the house, I'd be giving it to you, my family member, not their partner, I'd want you to have the safety net not your partner, I wouldn't work hard to get a house and pass it on to someone who is not my family.

However, I wouldn't be happy if I was your partner as I'm sure you wouldn't be if it was the other way round.

Its not a conversation that I'd want to have with my partner.

Personally, I'd protect myself, you're being given a real gift, security for life, thats not something I'd risk in the interest of "fairness"

If I wanted to be entitled to large gifts made to my partner, I’d marry them

How do you know it's not the OP who is not wanting to get married? Why are you assuming it's their partner?

this could also be seen as deprivation of assets for your relative and have future consequences.

If the family member is giving it to you then presumably they want to put it in your name and that is definitely what you should do.
The fact that your partner paid rent is irrelevant he would have had to pay rent wherever he was and people are not usually gifted part of a house just because they have rented it previously.

I mean it’s tricky, did you have a convo before hand? If he has paid as much as you would you think about signing over a fraction of the house to him? Say 20%?

I had a mortgage for 100k and inheritance of around 500k I purchased a house, my partner has been paying the mortgage for a good few years now, it’s nearly all paid off and at the end I am 100% going to sign over the equivalent of 100k in % of the property to him as theoretically he’s paid it’s so it should go to him as that’s just my morals and how I’d want it to work if it was me who had paid lol

IMO it would seem unfair for you to own the whole property if he has paid a substantial amount towards it.

Whose bad decisions were they?

anyway here I would see that both have out in 25% each of the house and the family member is gifting the other 50% to OP so I would set it up as tenants in common with a split of 25/75 ownership

I would calculate how much they have put into in renovations and do a fair split based on that, say 70/30. The renovations will also contribute to the increasing value of the house so it's not fair to just pay them for the renovations.

It's yours only. The giver relative is only giving it to you. They may change their mind if you change their wishes.

I’d be bloody livid tbh 😂 honestly it would end the relationship if I’ve put all that in to get nothing in the end

It's yours, a gift from your family.

If you're not married then it's just your house. Think of it as though the two of you lived elsewhere paying rent and now a relative has given you a property. I'd calculate how much more than rent he put into it over the years to improve its value and give him that amount of equity or pay him back.

Did you start out paying rent knowing you would be gifted the house one day?

Has your partner been with you the whole time you have been living There?

What length of time are we talking in terms of you living in the property together and also as a couple?

Are you married?

Yes but theoretically with the amount of rent they have paid they have essentially paid for the house to this family member. So then he is singing it over to OP in her husbands head he’s paid a substantial amount of that rent so surely he should have a % of the property. Legally no but morally that’s what should be done. Imagine if it was you and you paid all that money for your husband to say nope

They’ve chosen to hang around for years in this position. If they wanted the certainty, they either needed to insist or move on. They have no rights in this scenario.

Exactly. The OP's partner is entitled to 50% of that house. Not by law sadly as they don't appear to be married. But the OP should do the decent thing and let them have 50%/put them on the deeds.

We don't know much more yet, as the OP has only posted once, and hasn't come back to the thread yet. So I'm not posting on here again, until the OP has come back and posted again.

1. Are you married (definitely don’t put it in his name if not)
2. When you were doing the works to it, was it on the expectation that you knew you would one day own the property or simply for enjoyment whilst renting?

If it was for enjoyment at the time, then I think it’s two totally different things separate things. Firstly you rented and made it nice to live in. That money is gone, a bit like the rent money is gone. And now it becomes your house alone as a gift from your relative.
Alternatively, if you expected payback in future for the investment made, then you can pay him back for his share of the investment.

It’s common for long term renters to invest to make a nice home, but at the end of the tenancy, they just have to walk away.

Either way, it’s not 50/50, especially if you aren’t married.

The fact you've paid rent is irrelevant, you'd have been doing that anyway. Whether you're married is.

Presuming you're just cohabiting, I would say it should go in your name. It's a gift from a family member.

Now if you were to get married, you could make a different decision (possibly with help of prenup) as to whether it should be included/excluded as a pre-marital asset.

But that's a conversation to be had, as it would also hinge on other assets you have and whether there are children involved.

But don't be too quick to hand over rights to essentially an early inheritance. You're partner might not do the same if things were reversed, and you have no formal safeguards outside marriage.

Personally if all rent bills expenses and work have been 50/50 I would put his name on the deeds. He has equally contributed.

Only thing with that is if things go wrong in your relationship he gets half. I eould be ok with that but its if you would be