Partners ex and universal credit

[Mumtotwoboys121]

Hi all
I have two children with my partner. He has an ex wife who he has two older children with and they own a house together.
Shes had a new partner living there since they split (6 years ago) and she had a baby soon after.
I have looked into universal credit and we would be entitled , but now I’ve just found out potentially we wouldn’t be because he owns the house with his ex and she isn’t a lone parent, but his kids live there.
there’s no plans to sell the house until the youngest is 18 which is 9 years away.
is there any way around this?

Can she buy him out? If they've both moved on and are in settled relationships, and are financially stable, keeping the house as a joint asset seems very backwards to me to be honest.

Unfortunately not in a position to buy him out 😢 it’s just frustrating as I would understand not being accepted for UC if he owned a house with an ex and no children, but I didn’t think it would be an issue if kids were involved.

It doesn’t matter that she isn’t a lone parent . The important fact for your UC claim. They are no longer together and live separately. The fact he owns a house is the main issue.

I think you need to have strong words with your partner. He needs to tell his ex to sell or buy him out. It’s ridiculous that he is happy to let you and your children suffer financially so that his ex and her new partner can live in a house he’s not planning to sell.

I thought it was the done thing to provide a roof over your kids heads when people seperate? 🤯

Not at the detriment of you and your kids.

That is why a clean break on divorce is preferred.

By that I don’t mean the benefits, I mean people’s finances are not joined together preventing them from moving on.

Very true.
Anyway regardless of that, he’s tried. She won’t budge. She thinks the world owes her. They can’t afford to buy him out or move to another property and we can’t afford legal advice to try and figure out what’s best
thank you 🙏🏻

Have you actually applied for the UC? As I understand it the home ownership can be disregarded in some circumstances

She is a lone parent to his children though? She isn’t a lone parent to her new child. So I think it’s okay? It means - as a couple you can’t claim rent if you own something together but have two houses.

Also it would only affect your eligibility for a housing payment not UC generally. It isn’t worth the relationship costs or legal costs for what you’d get!

I have a feeling it can be disregarded if there are children living in the home.

Seems it may just be if ex partner is a lone parent that it can be disregarded. Own Other Property - Entitledto

It’s the done thing for EACH parent to take responsibility for doing so. Selling the house and giving her the equity would be what usually happens.

But he’s housing his ex literally at your expense (in lost UC).

So the problem is her partner. So either HE helps the ex to buy the OP’s partner out. Or he cannot live there.

Maybe he should announce he’s moving back in…

We are in the process of applying now x

Didn’t think of it like that! It’s so confusing x

He is actually paying (in the sense that he’s foregoing income) to house his exes partner at this point.

To the detriment of his youngest children.

His ex has had 6 years. She’s got a live in partner.

This is a ridiculous situation.

Looking at the regs it looks like the disregard will not apply as her partner is living there. Here's a link to the relevant regs so you can see if there's any disregard criteria there that you hit:- www.legislation.gov.uk/uksi/2013/376/schedule/10

From experience of applying for a disregard they go through everything so if you don't meet the specific criteria then you don't get the disregard. It is probably time to have a conversation about the house- either releasing your partner's equity, being bought out or selling and dividing it.

Your partner presumably agreed to this in the financial settlement when he divorced his ex.

Thank you all
Very messy situation I agree 🙈 she’s very toxic and if we try and push a sale she will make sure the kids are told that he doesn’t give two hoots about them.
He has tried before and she won’t because it will benefit us.
I didn’t think we’d be allowed to disregard but thought I’d ask!

Presumably even if her partner did get the equity from the house that could put them over the capital limit for UC anyway so they still wouldn't get any until it had dropped below 16k.

The capital from the sale could be disregarded for six months by a decision maker (DM) if the intention is to use the money from the sale of a previous property to buy a new one. That six months can be extended by DM though that's not a guarantee. Further info for that- sch 10, paras 13-15 Universal Credit Regulations 2013/376

He needs to take her to court to force a sale. She's in a relationship with another man now so he'll probably win, especially as your house needs to rely on universal credit and his ex probably won't be able to afford the mortgage when the fix renews anyway.

Thank you all. He just doesn’t want her telling their daughter that we want to make her homeless. But deep down he knows we could push for a sale. He’s gonna book an appoint with citizens advice/ a solicitor in the next couple of weeks to see where we go from here.