Land inheritance issues advice required

[alfiebest]

DH and I are looking for land to build a house. We have found a house site (1-2 acreage) that includes 10 acres that we personally don’t need.

However my mum and I are business partners in a horse business, and she has offered to buy the land portion of the site (100k of 240k) under the business to keep horses on. DH and I are not able to afford the extra land on top of the 140k site and build cost. The business (and therefore the non domestic land) would effectively be my personal inheritance but nothing is written down.

Our personal plot would have legal access from the road and would have an acre attached as our own.

Husband and I have separate finances so inheritance is something we always agreed would be ‘kept to ourselves’. We have a newborn daughter so we realise this may need to change but not sure how. We have very different attitudes to spending and are really scared to go full joint finances.

All we know is we need to set a standard and stick to it before the inheritances and other complications come through the door.

To complicate matters, husband has been worried that he’ll feel boxed in because the land is technically nothing to do with him. He thinks it would be more fulfilling to save and buy land together that can be ours as a family. Also suggested buying it slowly off my mum, but she seemed to have worries about tax implications of this.

I think he’s also worried that should a split happen he’ll have to leave as my business is on the doorstep. We’re both children of divorce so both treading carefully and trying to make things clear form the outset.

Hope we can get some ideas to make this smoother!

You need legal advice so all future scenarios would be addressed. What would happen if your Mum remarried.

You each need independent legal advice and an agreement on what happens in a range of scenarios.

So you would jointly own the business land with your mother, and half the land with your husband.

So on your mothers demise you would own 75%?

But as you are married he would still be entitled to half.

I’m sure with land price increases you’d both be able to afford a home each should you split.

Or you could make the house convertale from the outset so you both have a property and let one out for instance.

You’ve found 12 acres for £240k.
£20k/acre.
I’m confused at your costs from there on in.
The horse business is buying 10 acres at £100k, but your two acres are £140k??.

But it’s not really the horse business , it’s your mum.

Could you not just ask for a two acre slice to be sold off directly to you?