How to pay him back

[Equityhelp]

I bought a house in my name 6 months ago, DP at the time gifted me the full deposit (£50,000 - inheritance money). He was unable to get a mortgage at the time so the plan was I would remortgage in 5 years with his name on when my term ends.

We have broken up, I am happy to pay him back but I don’t know how. I can afford the mortgage and bills alone but not much more. If I remortgage now at current rates I couldn’t afford it, plus taking money out would increase the mortgage. What can I do?

I think that repaying across a period of time with no interest is a pretty reasonable offer if the breakup is his fault and you have no legal obligation to repay.

so in your position I would try and see what I could do (rent a room, rent garage, driveway, couple of bar work shifts etc). Ideally I’d try and work out to be able to give 833 per month (5 years) as that fits the original term discussed.

But in his position any reasonable monthly amount which you stick to I would be grateful for given that I had no legal recompense.

You wouldn't have been able to get the house without him so you'll just have to accept you're back to where you were.

You are not with him so of course you no longer get the financial benefits of being with him

sell the house and give him back his Inheritance

to keep it becaue you don’t want to be worse off financially is awful

Yeah it's a bit shit that you're not paying him back right now but frankly so is him causing a break up then making demands - when he knows that will mean you having to sell the house. He's an adult and he got himself into this situation.

From your notes of being at a low point and absolutely not wanting him back I'm going to hazard a guess he has cheated on you, and/or been significantly abusive. Therefore I can appreciate you not wanting to be futher down as a result of this.

I would first say to him that legally he gifted it to you and you are under no legal obligation to pay him back. He knows that you are not in a position to pay it back so any pushing is just adding to your stress.

Then I would consider what you really want.

1. You could just refuse to pay it back. He will likely strop but legally there is nothing he can do.
2. You could look to selling the house. Be very clear that he will be meeting at least half the sales costs, and if he didn't contribute at the time half the purchase fees. You should NOT be in a lesser financial position because of this house purchase than you were before.
3. You could look at other repayment offers. I'd be careful here about putting things in writing as that is an admission of debt that could see him taking you to court. There will be some wordings you can use to make it clear that you do not accept liability but will attempt to make a similar gift or something - take some proper advice before doing this. I'd be careful what you offer. Make sure you are comfortable with the offer and that if something (such as a lodger agreement) doesn't work out you are not in a position of difficulty. If need be make the monthly offer light, but retain extra cash to pay a lump sum when you can etc.

My final point would be to think carefully about whether £50k is the right figure. Get an estate agent to value and ask their fees... 1.5-3% of sale price is not unusual. He should be covering this as he's forcing the sale. There are also solicitors fees both with the 'sale' or new agreement and the original purchase. Don't let him bully you into coughing up £50k when he would not be able to realise that full £50k if you had jointly owned the property to begin with. House purchases are expensive - and 6 months costs against equity gain will be massive!

I’d add up any original solicitor fees/ survey costs plus costs of selling plus early repayment fee on mortgage.

Unless I have missed it...at no point here has the op mentioned how her ex wants his £50k returned, has he asked for the lump sum to be returned, or will he be prepared to accept instalments?
Why was this not discussed at the time of the 'gifting' and surely legal advice would have been given by your solicitor at the time of property purchase?

I think you have had good advice here OP, but to summarise how I see your position:

1. He gifted you the deposit. This was very stupid of him legally. Morally, it is good you intend to repay the £50k, however him putting himself in a precarious legal position means you have more options than normal.
2. If he had a legal claim to the £50k, you would have to repay ASAP on his terms - that is: he would be within rights to say a payment plan would take too long and you must find the money immediately. If this meant selling the house was your only option to raise the money, then you would have to do so.
3. However, as his claim to the money is more a moral one, in my opinion, it means you have more comeback to offer payment alternatives. And if the rent vs mortgage situation is what you say, I would not want to put myself in a bad situation by selling. However, it does mean you need to find a way to earn £50k to essentially keep your lifestyle.
4. I would look at turning the house into a type of house share, considering that the more tenants you have, the quicker you will have early the money and paid him off and he will be out of your life. I would try and get 2 tenants (so £400 x 2 per month) plus the £150 you can pay, plus I would get ANY weekend or night job I could (£100/week?). Let’s face it, with lots of tenants in your home, you don’t want to be there too! That’s £16,600/year which is £49,800 in 3 years.
5. Remember, you want him out of your life quickly too. You don’t want to be paying an ex money for too long. That’s how things go (even more) sour, and quickly. The night/weekend work might not appeal to you, but paying him off and having tenants for longer will annoy you even more. Circle 3 years on the calendar, dive in and work hard and in 3 years time you’ll be in a great place financially and with some good home equity in place - which is all yours.
6. Finally, I would get this sent to him in a solicitors letter, probably with a reminder that litigation in expensive and time consuming and that he can accept this offer now, or waste months of time and money in Court, when it would be simpler to accept it and have the money back soon.

I don't understand why he was not on the deeds even if he could not be on the mortgage. He paid in £50k he should have been on the deeds.
Sorry OP but it sounds awfully like you were quick to split with him once his 50k had enabled the house purchase. Otherwise if you were so certain you were staying together as to be happy accepting 50k, why was this house purchase not made jointly and his name put on the deeds even if he could not be on the mortgage.
Sounds like you did a great job protecting yourself financially here and enabling your house purchase leaving him high and dry!
Imagine this were reversed and a woman was describing paying £50k into a house but the male partner not agreeing to put her on the deeds.....

I agree. I have asked the OP if he is on the deeds because you don’t need to be on the mortgage to be on the deeds. This is important because cannot say he has no legal claim on the house without knowing who is on the deeds. If he did get legal advice, as the OP said, then surely he would have been advised to be on the deeds.

And I think it's totally inappropriate to suggest paying him back in instalments over 5 years. Modest monthly sums do not compare to a huge chunk of capital, as OP well knows - she could not have bought the house without the chunk of capital. If this man is not on the deeds he has quite frankly been scammed and should be considering taking legal action as the whole transaction could have been mishandled if he was incorrectly advised.

From a legal standpoint, it isn’t as simple as “he signed to say it was a gift so has no entitlement to anything back.” He signed to reassure the mortgage lender that OP was not also going to be making monthly payments on a loan.

Nobody of average financial standing gives their girlfriend their £50,000 inheritance to buy a house without some expectation of benefit for themselves i.e. because they had an agreement that they would live in the house and eventually benefit from any value increase or become a co-owner. So he already has the basis of a claim of proprietary estoppel. A reasonable assumption can be made that no person would invest in a property like this if there was never any understanding they would see a return. Any solicitor will advise him to pursue it along these grounds. There’s clear legal precedent in identical situations.

tbf, he’s not in a position legally to demand anything.

it’s good that @Equityhelp wants to pay him back, but but she’s under no legal obligation to do so

@Equityhelp work out what you can realistically afford, offer that and stick to it. I wouldn’t want a lodger in my home, so if you’re the same, don’t have one either. Don’t feel pressured into anything

he could potentially have the ability to place a charge on the property so that he has to be paid his money as second in line to mortgage company.

If it's his fault entirely that you're separating I don't think you should sell up. Whatever he's done, he knew the risk he was taking.
I think your lodger suggestion is a good one. Pay him £500 a month. He can wait for it.

Given the original plan was to remortgage in 5 years to give him his 50k back and his poor credit meant he couldn't be on the mortgage I think a repayment plan over 5 years or fewer is totally reasonable OP.

Legally you don't have to give him anything and he can't get a mortgage even if you could magic up 50k. It takes time for someone to rebuild a credit history so it would be years before he could own a house anyway.

I like PPs suggestions of lodgers. I know it's not ideal to have to share the house but it would only be for a relatively short time. Think of the long game. In 5 years you'll have an additional 50k equity on top of what you have paid yourself which is a really good position to be in.

How would be place a charge? Would that be something I could suggest he does or does it reflect bad on me when I remortgage?

I want to be in this house about 10 years.

I‘ m struggling to read all of the comments because I am so overwhelmed by how my life has changed so quickly, this time last week we were talking about getting married, we have been together for 11 years, he owned our last house but ended up getting it repossessed when he lost his job, I couldn’t afford the mortgage repayments but paid as much as I could towards which bought us a little more time. I had also paid all of the bills. My mum thinks I shouldn’t repay the full amount because of my contribution to his previous house being lost but I’m not sure I agree with that because I would have been paying that elsewhere anyway.

He signed all of the forms to say he had been advised legal advice but he never took it. And no he isn’t on the deeds or anything because that stopped me qualifying for a lot of mortgages.

Your last house - did you pay any of the deposit on that?
What has he been paying since you've lived in this house?
What did you in between the last house being repossessed and you buying this one?

Sell the house and purchase something you can afford , you wouldn’t of got the house because you mustn’t of had savings towards one I know your low op but you can’t expect him to wait 5 years for his money, I know it’s not your fault but if the roles were reversed would you want to wait ? House prices have been soaring so maybe there will be money left over for a deposit else where .

@Equityhelp talk to your lender about this. Otherwise offer ex a £50000 share in the house so he gets his money when you move or something. Is the house worth more than the mortgage? If so by how much?

I used my savings to keep us afloat when he lost his job. I had £8000 saved and then when that ran out I topped up with my wage for about 8 months before it got repossessed. My mum is suggesting I pay him back £40,000 through getting a lodger but if I can do the charge someone has suggested instead I would prefer that.

The house is worth £190,000 so I’ve got a £140,000 mortgage.

I cannot believe how completely stupid this man has been. Christ - what the hell was he thinking?

He bought it a couple of months before we met. He hasn’t been paying anything, the plan was I would pay the first £50k of mortgage because I could afford it alone. Then we would have an even share, but remortgage in 5 years so both names were on it.

We rented for a year before buying it which we paid 50/50 towards and then we saw this house that was perfect for us so decided to go for it.

Don't sell it. Ask him what he'd like:

• a 25% share in the house.
• 450 a month until the debt it's paid off

I'd pay him the 450 a month and then the remainder when you remortgage.

He can't expect you to pull 50,000 out of thin air.

🤦 he was so stupid. Nobody should ever do such a thing.

Legally he's fucked I think.

Yes, taking on lodgers in order to be able to make a regular payment is workable.

Once you start making payments could he go to court using the payments as evidence that once you split you decided to pay him back and then force a sale?