WWYD - Marrying my partner - live in her house (and have spare money...)

[Janeymoo50]

...hmm, not sure I explained that correctly in the title. To cut a long story short

I am engaged to my GF
I moved from rented flat into her house (on which she has a mortgage) last year (I have never owned my own property)
We both work
As soon as I get paid every month I transfer money to her account towards bills (basically anything that is needed, mortgage, utilities etc)
It is accepted that I also probably spend more money on buying the household food

BUT, all in all I think we are pretty equal in what we spend on living overheads and both have our own accounts for spending what we have left over (never any issues on that).

My mum died and I recently inherited 50K. Have barely touched it.

I think that once we are married I should use a considerable amount of the 50K to pay some of the outstanding mortgage and my name be added to the deeds of the property so in effect I would half own it.

Figures are - house was about 120K, she paid cash deposit of about 40K (I think) and paid the mortgage herself until I moved in (about a year).

There is currently a number of years left on the mortgage - literally we would have to work until about 70!

By paying an amount of the mortgage off, it would mean we could possibly be mortgage free a good decade earlier (if not more).

If the mortgage was not take out in my name and is not on it anywhere, can my name be added to the deeds to show joint owership?

Thanks (sorry for the waffle).

What does your fiancee think of this idea?

I believe you can change the ownership paperwork pretty easily and cheaply.

So long as you both agree I think it's a very sound idea.

Once you are married you will have a claim on the house anyway - as she would on your inheritance so I would recommend saving lots of money in interest and paying a huge chunk of your mortgage.

You can work out what you both to be a 'fair' division of the house (50/50 or whatever, depending on current value, and total amount paid in by each of you) then draw up something which agrees that would be the split if something happened.

Have you spoken to your gf? Does it seem that you both agree about this? And yes, paying off your mortgage early can make a HUGE difference. We used to be about 200 a month extra, and ended up paying off about 15 years early.

Have you done the sums? How much will paying the mortgage off save you compared to investing it? Don't know what the answer is but you should know.
What if something were to happen and you needed access to cash? Eg the roof needed replacing
Can you get advice from an IFA?

Thanks for your replies. GF is delighted but says it is entirely my call. It would save us a fair amount in the future plus in some ways it puts me on an equal footing as opposed to it being her house, if that makes sense. I think I just fancy the idea of being mortgage free within about 6 years instead of when we hit 70. We do also save for emergencies etc, the boiler etc.

You will save loads paying the mortgage off early and any kind of savings and investments currently have pathetic returns unless you go dodgy high risk and then you could lose the lot.

I would personally keep back a few thousand for emergencies, probably about 5k. Unless you already have a decent amount, standard advice is six months income saved.Do not feel tempted to spend more on the wedding. I don't think you need to see an IFA at all as it's clear cut what's best for your situation.

Do it, sounds very sensible.

I think it sounds like a great idea if your girlfriend agrees. I think that you need to talk to the mortgage company, find out if there are any penalties for paying off a lump sum, also find out if you being on the deeds affects the mortgage, as you would have a claim on the house as well as the mortgage company having a claim. You may need to go on the mortgage, I am not sure how that works. It is very simple to change the deeds once the mortgage side is sorted out.

See a solicitor, agree who own what percentage, 50/50 or whatever, and get it drawn up so that you each own your own half and also agree on what happens if you should split up, whether the house is sold, or whether one of you buys the other one out etc and get that in writing too.