Vexatious Ex. Letter before action trying to force house sale.

[OakAshSycamore]

Hi there,
My ex has instructed a solicitor who has sent a letter before action forcing sale of my house.

Background, we were together for 4 years although we never lived together or shared bank accounts. He was a considerably higher earner in comparison to me, director of a business, think high 6 figure salary, dividends, shares, very generous benefits package. I am a single mother with a disabled child, working part time and caring, as such I fall within the low income bracket.

He was very very generous with his money, insisting on paying for things and never mentioning repayment throughout our relationship. I often felt uncomfortable and pressured by this dynamic like he had the power in the relationship because I had few resources. He would say things like, by investing in you I am investing in our future. I bought a house with my divorce settlement and he offered to cover the shortfall via a financial gift, all legally drawn up with the solicitor and mortgage company.

I now see that his behaviour was what is termed as love bombing or 'white night' behaviour designed to keep me dependent to him while he wielded financial control over me. Lots of red flags became apparent at the latter part of our time together there was a lot of harassment, aggression and manipulation. I finally saw the light and ended things after a very scary incident which frightened myself and my children and I could see we were unsafe with him. He took my ending the relationship very badly and there was months of abusive messages and threats. Lots of look at what I have done for you, given you etc, I am subsidising your lifestyle type thing.

Fast forward to now, I have received a threatening letter from his solicitor forcing sale of my property (which is in my sole name) on the following basis.

Our Client also contributed a substantial amount to the purchase price. This
money was not provided by way of a gift to you but was paid on the understanding that our Client would have an interest in the property.
Our Client therefore has two potential claims under TLATA, namely through a resulting trust
(contribution to purchase price), constructive trust (intention) and can also ask the Court to
assess his rights under proprietary estoppel as he has relied on promises that the property
would be held jointly and he has acted to his detriment (in providing the lump sum and monies

I have copies of the legal gift letter that was issued by the mortgage company and witnessed by the solicitor. I am so confused by this, the financial gift for the property forms 75% of his financial claim against me. He must have omitted telling his solicitor this surely?

What is my best approach in response to this. I don't have any savings, I know that his calling card is to manipulate and intimidate.

I agree with others.

Send a photocopy of the gift letter and say you now consider this matter closed.

I would also get the original out of your house and somewhere safer. He sounds rather angry and who knows what he might try.

He actually helped pay for my divorce, it was a weird time, he seemed obsessed with my ex having a hold over me and wanted to go heavy on him so that I 'was free of him'. He was very fired up by my divorce and effectively came in with the big guns. I know that I should have fought more but looking back I was very bamboozled by him.

If the husband's solicitor's job was to be any kind of fair arbiter then I would agree with you. But that would profoundly misrepresent what the solicitor's job is.

The solicitor's job is, within the bounds of professional standards, to get as much business as possible. The conversation will go something like this:

"Your ex sent a copy of this letter. It doesn't look good for your case. What do you want me to do next?"
"Send her another letter, tell her we don't accept whatever she sent, I signed it under duress, she lied to me, it's invalid. But obviously she's worried. Which is great."

Here's why you shouldn't engage. Here's why you shouldn't send copies of anything.

At this stage all the ex can do is one of three things:

• file a case with the county court. It's going to cost him £20k to prepare that. This will never happen.
• write another "letter before action" repeating the same content. This is weak.
• go away

If you write and send documents you give an excuse for another more interesting letter. That will require more documents. And more response. And so on. You are now sucked into a process that can only result in expense and payment from you.

If he's going to go away, he's going to go away after one letter. If he's not going to go away then whatever you send him won't make any difference.

The real point here is that you don't want anything from him. Let him do all the work, not just some it.

"Dear ex husband's solicitor. Thank you for your letter of the 20th. All the claims in it are denied."

I have electronic copies from the solicitor from the time of house purchase.

From what I understand from your posts this is not an ex-husband and you were never married, this was just a relationship that never involved cohabitation or sharing of bank accounts. Is that correct? You never mention marriage or divorce from him in your posts, just that both of you were divorcing other people.

I would very strongly suggest you call your home insurance company and just check whether there is any legal cover included. I know a few people who have found that there was cover for an initial conversation about legal matters. If you do have this it could be a way to get proper legal advice on what to do next without paying out any money.

No it was just a relationship, post our divorces.

Don't get sucked into a process that can only result in a loss for you, compared to where you stand now. You already hold everything you need. Let him do all the work, if he wants. Don't help him.

This is the 2nd letter of this nature, this first one arrived in January where he was trying to get a legal charge put on my property to ensure his claim 'was protected.'
I ignored that one.

I didn't say ignore the letter. You should never ignore a letter like that. I said reply to it, saying "thank you for your letter, all the claims in it are denied." That's very very different. The first you look weak. The second makes you look strong.

Did he succeed in putting a charge on the property?

Do as a PP said. Send a letter saying all claims are denied. Dont send anything else. Don’t do any work for him by doing so, don’t argue, don’t bargain, don’t ask, don’t tell.

Just deny. If he keeps sending letters, collect them as evidence of harassment for future. Only act if he takes you to court.

Absolutely not, because I would have to agree to that and I would'nt in a million years. The irony is that my ex husband had a charge on my former property and this ex was hell bent on getting it off and that's what he is trying to recover costs for.

From what you have explained I do not think your ex has any claim on your property. But either way my advice would be the same. Let him do all the work.

He cannot force a sale without a great deal of hard legal graft, even if he has the facts. That he wasn't able to register a charge on the property is good.

If this goes anywhere, which I don't think it will, there will be many many opportunities in the future to examine and share documents, on both sides, supported by your own lawyer.

You want to feel that you have some control and there's something you can do now to head this off, or nip it in the bud. There isn't. He doesn't have control over you, and you don't have control over him. All you can do now is protect your position and make him do as much work as possible while you do as little as possible.

Op check rocket lawyer we had previously used it to get some great advice RE a very high value legal case. Also chat GPT can help to some extent with knowing where you stand. If you paste your LBA into it and explain your gift letter also it will tell you a possible outcome.

Ofcourse nothing compares to legal advice but this is what we did before instructing our solicitors. Our case is into the multi millions but found these resources helpful.

he sounds like an asshat. Goodluck 💙

So sorry that you have had to deal with this. Thanks for your advice.

I completely agree it is nonsense! I agree also that any engagement is likely to fuel his persistence, however he has a huge ego and I wouldn't put it past him to spend the 20k just for the fun of it. Even though the residual sum outside of the legal gift is less than the court fee.

Chat GPT says he would have to prove it was a loan, I don't know how he would evidence that?

How much is the residual sum? And this is the amount for which he wrote a letter confirming it's a gift?

This is the correct advice.

I’d send it back with a non molestation order

its around 20k, he's claiming this plus the amount that was legally gifted for the house purchase as one lump sum.

So the house was funded:

with a mortgage -
plus a lump sum from your divorce settlement -
plus a sum documented as a gift from this man -
plus another £20k from the same man, not documented as a gift?