To feel protective of my house

[ThisMintHouse]

Early 40s F. Getting married next year to wonderful, kind and generous man also early 40s. We have a child each from previous relationships and an ours baby now 1yo.
I bought a house 7 years ago and have just over 100k left on the mortgage. I've paid off about 50k. He's interested in contributing and making it our home. I'm feeling a bit scared about this as my home is a haven and I don't want to lose it. However, I also want to respect and trust my relationship. He doesn't have any property but he has a decent job and good earning potential.

YANBU: A house is a majorly important asset. Protect what was yours before the marriage.

YABU: Marriage includes combining assets and trusting one another. Jump in and trust in the process.

No it's not odd at all. Clearly, she'd be happy to share her child with him should they ever break up. That doesn't mean she wants to lose her house too.

Double standards are on a high again.

Get legal advice and protect this property for yourself and your children. 40-42% of marriages end in divorce. If you find yourself on the wrong side of that statistic one day, atleast make sure it doesn't also end in financial insecurity. I am in your position - own my own property, have a child, with a long-term partner who doesn't have his own place. I do not plan to marry, and if we buy property together it will be a new one with clear legal arrangements in place to ensure our contribution and respective children's inheritance is protected.

If the relationship doesn’t feel stable enough to understand joining a life and joint assets they were not stable enough to bring a child into it. I don’t think the OP is wrong at all to be questioning whether this man is worth the risk of losing half her assets, but I do think it’s unbelievable a house has caused more hesitation than a child. Shared custody is not something to consider lightly!

Get a prenup or Deed of Trust. It's not unreasonable to protect your asset. Going forward share what you both bring to marriage but what you have paid before you marry is yours alone.

Your responses are making it blindingly obvious you’re going to go ahead and hand him half the house regardless.
Forgot all the cutesy “open trust” stuff.
He brings literally nothing material to this arrangement except his word that he will do this that and the other in the future.
Forgive my cynicism, but from an outsider’s perspective it’s a joke that he has no savings and yet feels entitled to half of your assets!
You asked our opinions and are now defending how lovely he is and what a great job he has, so clearly he has you convinced.
I’m out of this thread because it’s frustrating to read but good luck!

Not really, he doesn’t have any assets.

I would like to enter the marriage with positive intentions and with trust.

Enter it with a Deed of Trust then! 😄

You seem to be walking into a situation where, if you split up, all your hard work to provide for yourself and your children will evaporate.

Thanks everyone for your input! I do find this hard to deal with but I'm going to seek legal guidance on this and greatly appreciate all of your advice. I can see that I need help with this.

Ok so in a slightly similar situation to you and here’s what we are doing. Selling both our mortgaged properties and putting our equity together to go towards a shared home. My equity is more than his. We are going to buy as tenants in common and ring fence our own equity as a percentage. If we split up we agree to get our own percentage back plus half of any further equity. If one of us dies the percentage will go to our child (we both have dc) and the rest to the partner with a lifetime agreement to stay in the property. This also protects the other persons equity should one of us need to go into care too.

Is there some way to ring fence the amount you have paid (plus interest on that part) and then rest would be 50/50.

@LondonLady15 are you married? If so, what kind of agreement have you signed? It’s my understanding that once married most, if not all, other agreements more or less goes out the window.

Yes you ring fence your percentage of ownership as part of the tenants in common agreement. This ownership is not cancelled by marriage. However any inheritance after may be affected. We aren’t married but if we do marry we will likely agree a pre/post nup to reclarify our intentions in the case of divorce.

you really need legal advice as to what’s best

What would be best to do:

Try to protect 100% of the house and keep it as mine.

Ring fence the equity I already have and continue on paying half of the mortgage from here on it.

Get him to pay in a sum that would allow him to enter into it on an equal footing paying half the mortgage from here on in.

Basically, I do want to marry but I'd like to avoid a future situation where it doesn't work out and I've got only half.

Ah yes, that would work if you are talking about inheritance. If they divorce though it doesn’t matter if they are tenants in common as the house will be considered a marital asset and divided as such.

@ThisMintHouse I think the only way to do it for him to buy into the house so that you are equal owners. You might still lose the house if you can’t buy him back if you divorce down the line but at least you won’t have given half the house away.

Prenups and postnups are not legally binding in the UK.

But she has two children to protect now. The one from the previous relationship and the one she has with him!
I am happily married and earn much as my spouse. We didn’t have any children before we got married and our arrangement was to ring fence our individual assets and anything combined was fair game!
please get legal advise

If you take any option rather than protecting 100%, you will end up with half. However, him paying back 50% of what you already invested plus 50% of the remaining mortgage will at least make sure you are actually left with the 50%.

How does getting married benefit you? There is plenty at stake if things end badly, and I can’t see why it’s worth the risk. I say this from my own experience.

Obviously marriage offers financial security for the lower earner and protects the spouse who puts career plans on hold etc to look after children…… but none of that seems to apply here.

Make sure you keep your house in your name and get legal advice to protect yourself. Do not rely on a promise or words. If he truly loves you, he will respect your position and agree to this.

Resent your place out and buy one together.

Why would you want 2 properties?

I’d keep the house in my name and ring fence it. And offer to support him paying towards his own property by not taking any « rent » on the house. The idea being if divorce happens in the future you might be in a position to say you keep your property, I keep mine.

Why would you want to run two separate houses! It's a waste of money and a waste of a home sat unused. That's not a committed relationship. I had a friend once whose partner wouldn't sell his house and commit fully to her, she had a shit house that she couldn't better because he wouldn't commit to selling both houses and getting a joint mortgage and it was a bad relationship as a result and everytime they had a row, he slink off back to his own house!

In your situation, I wouldn’t get married. There’s no benefit to it whatsoever for you.