Coming off a joint mortgage.

[MarciaClark]

I rang CAB yesterday and they were not able to help and advised to go to a solicitor. I am going to book an appointment but I would be interested to know if anyone else has been through a similar scenario?

DH is still named on the mortgage he has at his former marital home 10 years ago. When DH divorced his ex he was happy for her to have the house on the condition that he is removed from the mortgage and the deeds and all associated bills. The judge agreed that in court and ordered her to remove him from the mortgage etc. This was quite a few years ago now. Anyway she took him off the deeds and all of the bills but has refused to take him off of the mortgage. He doesn't pay it and hasn't paid it in 10 years. DH has no access to the house - no key etc. He rang up the bank and made enquiries as to how long it would take for him to come off of it and the bank confirmed that his ex has made no effort to take him off and that because it is a joint mortgage then they need both signatures to take him off. The bank made enquiries with her and she told them to get lost she will not take him off because it would make life difficult for him to get a mortgage in the future.
So here it is 10 years later still named on her mortgage and her still unwilling to take him off. She pays it all herself and has never defaulted on a payment and she can very much afford the remaining balance on the mortgage. It did prove difficult for us to get a mortgage together because he is still named on the other one but because we can prove he has never paid it in 10 years then we were able to eventually secure a mortgage for our house when we got married.
If one party is unwilling to take the other off despite a court order being in place does DH need to take her back to court to enforce this?

What seems ridiculous is that IF he is legally off the deeds then he should be legally off the mortgage too. Things cannot be that different in the UK to Ireland. If he has no rights to the home and really definitely is 100% off the deeds (check with land registry) then he cannot be on a mortgage unless there was underhanded dealings to begin with and she was doing him some kind of favour? It just seems madness that he is named on a loan she can pay and has been paying if he is not on the deeds. Honestly OP i think you need to look further into your husbands past and his paperwork.

As far as I know no one is saying the anyone should apply for a mortgage. We are talking about taking someone off a mortgage.

And just how do you think someone is taken off a mortgage?

Let me tell you. By the person remaining on the mortgage applying for a mortgage in their own right. If it’s to the same lender it’s called a transfer of equity application. If the lender agrees they’ll either remove the other from the mortgage account, or they’ll create a new mortgage account in the sole name of the remaining borrower. The remaining borrower might want to apply for a mortgage from a new lender. Then it is no longer a transfer of equity application.

I have neither the time or the energy to keep coming on to this thread to correct you. You are not the OP. You have no legal training. You keep getting it wrong yet post as if you are confident you are right.

Is it time to give up? You’re not helping.

What seems ridiculous is that IF he is legally off the deeds then he should be legally off the mortgage too

I don't see how that is possible. The mortgage company is in possession of the deeds and would never remove someone from them who is still liable for the mortgage. There's no law to cover that.

A mortgage is both a debt and security. Someone is liable to repay the debt. Someone offers security. They need not be the same people. It doesn’t affect the security of the mortgage if the property is transferred in to one name but the liability for the debt remains in joint names.

It doesn’t affect the security of the mortgage if the property is transferred in to one name but the liability for the debt remains in joint names

how does it not when its a debt secured on the property itself? How can someone be liable for a mortgage, secured on the house, when they have no legal interest in the house?

Sympathy here OP, we are in a similar situation. DH is on the mortgage, but hasn't paid it in years and years.

However in our case, the other party CAN'T afford the mortgage by herself; in her case her live in boyfriend has been paying it all this time. However, he gets paid cash in hand etc so his credit record is also rubbish.

Which puts us in a horrendous position. DH can't get off that mortgage, yet he will never be able to come on to a mortgage with me. We will probably never be able to buy a house.

Sympathies OP, it's so hard.

I might well be wrong. I just thought if the ex husand and the lender and the court all agree that the difficult ex wife must take the husband off the mortgage and she refuses to put pen to paper on it even under threat of contempt of court proceedings and jail the judge would have power to order that document signed. They do that with copyright if someone refuses to assign ownership when they should - at the end of the day and it is very rare - the judge has that power. Anyway happy to defer to family lawyers on it.