Partner wants to force me to sell house

[moonstone6]

Has anyone who is not married had experience of being taken to court to try and force a sale to your house? We have a jointly owned house. He wants to sell now and split the proceeds but we have a low interest fixed rate mortgage that ends in July 25 so I want to wait till then as we'll have more equity and be penalised 18k for leaving our mortgage early. He earns more than me so selling now works for him. We've had mediation and every thing I offer as an alternative to living arrangements - mainly different nesting options he just objects to so making it pointless.

This thread is maddening.

There is no way the ERC is £18k unless you have a £1m type mortgage. Call the bank and ask.

Seems unlikely that you will be able to port the mortgage, as it would require you to change borrower and title at the same time. Worth asking, but unlikely.

I think you really need to let go of the perceived unfairness of all of this and work at making the best of the situation you have.

we are on a 1.69% mortgage so if i now buy another property at 5% current interest rates i'm losing that money that would have been paid off as I'm having to pay more interest.

because he's a total bastard!

you are right about this but you wouldn't lose as much...but actually i've suggested i go and live with my mum 1 week; he goes and lives with his 1 week. so no costs. i've offered doing it mon-fri as well because he complained he wouldnt' be able to go out socialising as his mum lives not near a city. but anything i offer, he just objects to. he doesn't want to find any other way.

16 months with parents a long way from his life is a big ask though. Rent must be cheap near you if it would be less than 18k to run another home for 16 months.

sorry can't be bothered to read all of your comments about the ERC - i don't know how it's calculated!!! TBH.

BUT IT IS 18K; pretty sure it reduces each month as per what people say. and yes must be based on the mortgage balance.

i'm not stupid - it is definitely 18k as I have online mortgage access and have checked it multiple times. he's not feeding me inaccurate information. he's a bastard but i'm cleverer than him in lots of ways.

but anything i offer, he just objects to. he doesn't want to find any other way.

He may well be a bastard, but you're as inflexible - you don't want to sell the house.

Re your argument and increased interest rates - it absolutely is true that you'd probably have less, and pay more once you move - this is the problem with most break ups. It's shit, I understand that, but it's also a fact of life.

Your £18000 ERC fee can't be right, I agree with other posters. And overall, the way you're looking at the equity split is not right including from the perspective of increased interest rates if you buy a new house. I am not sure you really understand how home ownership and mortgages work.

how have you interpreted that she lives far away? i didn't' say that. our parents live in opposite directions but takes the same time to get to!

BUT IT IS 18K; pretty sure it reduces each month as per what people say. and yes must be based on the mortgage balance.

So your current mortgage is very very high? In which case, surely the value of the house is also very high? And if you've owned it for a while, it would have increased, adding to your equity?

here's the bloody proof then if you don't believe me!!! this is taken from my online account.

You can't be bothered to read the comments, but you haven't bothered to actually figure out what is really happening here either? I honestly don't understand this.

What is the difference between what you could sell the house for and what you have to pay back to the bank (including this excessive £18k ERC)? That's the most important number in this situation.

How long have you had the mortgage? That does seem like a very high fee but as you've got a low interest rate, I guess that is why.

So you owe, roughly, £360,000 still on the house? Plus the £18k to pay back the fee so that's £378k to get out of the mortgage? What do you think you could get for your house now? Assuming you've had this mortgage for a least a few years, has the house increased in value? And if so, would that help to offset this cost?

I would think that a very low equity amount, worsened by the fact that you're paying the ERC, would make selling tricky as neither of you would get much equity out to buy a new place?

yes finally someone who is making sense regarding the numbers... sorry i should have just told you but i was kind of trying not to give the financial details out! we've had the fixed rate for 5 years; lived in the house for 6 years this summer (ported another fixed rate mortgage at the time)

the house is worth 750k i'd say but low house prices atm may mean we get less.

however, i did phone the bank today and you can solely port the mortgage so good news - everyone is a winner; he gets what he wants in selling the house; and i get what i want which is not to lose the low interest mortgage or pay the ERC.

so thank you to all those that suggested this as it's made me feel loads better and I have no idea why i didn't think of it (and no one i've spoken to/he's spoken to has thought of it either! doh!)

So pleased you have a solution and get to keep the deal. Make the arrangements directly with the bank and get him to sign off as a condition for putting house on market. Don't discuss intricacies. He can sort his own mortgage going forward and eventually realize his mistake.

Well, I'm glad that's been clarified. It's also clear that there's a LOT more equity than the £20k each that you were talking about in your earlier posts which is partly where a lot of the confusion and pushback came from.

So yes, even if you did have to pay the ERC, you'd still come out with between £300-£350k in hard cold cash, split between you, which is pretty substantial. Albeit you'd be unlikely to be able to buy a similarly priced house with that deposit and on that income.

Hooray! Good luck to you OP. Life will be much brighter soon.

I hope he doesn’t also want to port the mortgage to a new property 🫣. Be one of those ‘say nothing’ situations if he isn’t aware.

This. it's very commonly known that the rules around married couples are different. your choice.
It sounds awful for you kids, for their wellbeing you need to sell the house and get your own separate places. I'm not supporting you or your partner more, you just need to prioritize the kids.

I thought that's what you said when you mentioned he can't socialise cos his mum is not near a city. I thought you meant she lives in a different place to your home.

Yeah only one of us can do it but it has to be worked out fairly… no idea how but need to phone the porting experts to find out.

Sorry I think confusion on the way I phrased it. I didn’t mean I would only get 20k equity! I meant I would lose 20k equity because of losing the low interest.

anyway no matter!

Re porting the mortgage
My lender would allow splitting it if we both wanted to, up to the total of the o/s amount. Other party has to agree if either of us want to port more than 50%.
Worth checking other conditions. I have to satisfy the affordability for how much I want to port. Also, for the particular product we have, porting only allowed with simultaneous completion on purchase and sale. Other products with same lender allow 3 months between.

OP I’m in a very similar situation although luckily he has moved out.

I accept that I cannot stay in the family home when the fixed period runs out as it is not affordable for me. We are currently selling the family home.

Have you spoken with the mortgage company? I am porting 50% of the mortgage for my new home and this means we do not have to pay the penalty and I can have the same low interest rate until the original fixed period ends in 2025.

Our penalty would have been over £10,000 also. OP one of my main concerns about staying until the fixed period ran out was, what happens if the property doesn’t sell? If you ended up on the variable rate, that would be awful and very tough financially if you’re on 1.69% now.

Try and focus on the good - if you port the mortgage at the same rate - you’ll soon have your OWN little home, free from ex and a completely clean break.

I really hope you can do this for your own sanity, good luck!

Id be seeing a different solicitor if you want any more legal advice, this one does sound like they know what they're doing.