Husband wants to sell my pre-marriage flat to clear debts

[rdsh]

I’m just asking somewhere objective.

I have a flat I owned before I met DH. It is let out and the income is quite good. I do rely on it to a certain extent because I don’t earn much.

DH however wants to sell it: he wants to clear some debt.

I guess I’m just wondering WWYD … I want to keep it but part of that is perhaps because it benefits me rather than the whole family?

But this is the bit that needs discussing, I think separate finances work fine, but there does need to be a level of transparency as to what each others financial situation is, he isn't subbing you right now, as you going back to work full time wouldn't make you any better off.. it sounds like the debt is spiralling his end though, it may have started off okay, but if it isn't on interest free / low interest (loans are the worst for this IMO) then you will be hemorrhaging money on interest (may be more than the income from the flat), and it can be hard to get on top of it bringing it down when it gets as big as it has.

BUT I'd be incensed if he suggested selling my flat, which was a source of income for me, while he was paying for a virtually brand new car, he should never have had that car at the financial position you are in! You both need to sit down together, go through EVERYTHING, full disclosure, every source of income, and every source of debt, and look at it together, if paying interest you need to move the debt around to get it as interest free as you can, then reign in your spending to get it down to a manageable level.

Do some research yourself rather than leave it all to him to manage, it's a joint debt, which you are both responsible for tackling. You shouldn't be buying one packet of wipes at top dollar, or buying bottled water because you forgot to bring those things out with you, you are only working two days a week, you can be way more organised than you are to stop wasting money on things you don't need.

But do NOT sell a source of income, the flat stays.

So let me get this straight.

He bought a new car 3 years ago during your first maternity leave. Recently, he wanted a new electric car, so sold the first car for a big loss and now has a Tesla on salary sacrifice that costs multiple tens of thousands. You work part time, look after the kids on the other days and struggle to pay for all the kids stuff from your part time salary and the small rental income from the flat.

Your husband says you (joint you) need to sell the flat to clear 'family' debts.

You are not the problem here. Don't sell your flat. Your husband is spunking away thousands on cars while you are made to feel guilty about picking up a packet of baby wipes while out.

Sit down with him and all the bills so you can figure out where all the money went. Despite having a high paying job (him), a well paid part time job (you) and two rental properties, he's got you in £65k of debt. He's not good at managing money; you should do it instead.

When DH and I have been in this situation in the past we simply applied for an extension to our mortgage to consolidate debts. Paid the debts off and then reigned in the spending that got us there in the first place and/or sought promotion/new jobs to increase our income.

I’d not sell the flat. It’s a useful asset (so that top up mortgage will be more attractive to lenders) and it brings in an income.

" those properties are now worth much more than they were then"

Only if you bought them in the 1990"s, and even then you might have difficulty selling because demand is way down from what it used to be, but if you bought these properties in the last few years you will have almost certainly lost money now. The only certain buy and hold strategy from the 1990"s that is sufficiently liquid to raise cash when you need it would have been the stock market.

How much debt are we talking?
Don’t sell the flat pay of the debt with the income from it, then you will still have income generated from it for the long term. If the debt is his and predates the marriage then absolutely don’t sell and if this is the case work harder to safeguard your assets (see solicitor)Work towards raising your income. Do you have a current mortgage for the house your living in? If the suggestion is to pay this off with the money from flat ring fence the money with advice from a solicitor as premarital assets as If it pays joint mortgage it becomes marital property.

Expensive option, and probably not an option now for someone with 65k debt, banks are ultra-cautious nowadays.The days of houses as cash machines are well behind us.

https://www.msn.com/en-gb/money/general/mortgage-deals-pulled-from-market-amid-threat-of-3-interest-rate-rises/ar-AA1Z47fP

Honestly OP this is like a form of financial abuse.

1. you don't know how much your DH earns
2. you don't know how much debt there actually is
3. he wants to sell your flat to cover his loans?
4. he doesn't pay anything towards the upkeep of HIS children
5. paying the mortgage doesn't automatically mean he gets out of everything else

If he's not being open financially I'd call his bluff and say you'd be better off divorced because at least you'd know where you stand financially AND have a flat to boot, plus spousal support and child care maintenance.

At the moment you have a car loon with no restraint who is psycholocially using your flat to indebt himself at your expense.

of course you're allowed to buy a book here and a pack of wipes there. That's not going to stop the wolf coming through the door. A fuck off ego Tesla and and an expensive out of control car habit is though.

It's no good standing up for him and saying it's a pile on. It's a pile on for a reason becasue some of us have been there, got the t-shirt and can smell this sort of shit behaviour a mile off, having the scars to tell the story.

Get a grip girl and grow the fuck up and grow a pair. No one is going to do this nicely for you so you'd better just start getting assertive and laying down some laws about how you'll be treated because at the moment he's treating you like a free credit card that he's going to cash in at some point.

Watch out. He's using you.

But the flat is bringing in money each month... and you're still accumulating more debt.

Sure you could sell to pay some of it off ... but then what are you going to do about the hole in your monthly take home finances it leaves?

Also your DH sounds like a financially abusive twat and especially if they're inheritance and you had pre-DH you'd have grounds for them being excluded from the pot of assets in divorce so you really don't want them to go.

I think you'd benefit from independent financial advice. An hour of honest advice about your choices and their potential impact would be worth it.

My gut reaction is that you shouldn't sell, as it's your escape route and it's a short term solution to an ongoing problem. What will happen when you've paid off your debt, you no longer have an additional source of income coming in, and no potential of selling a property again? However, that may not be financially best. It would be good to look at short and long term ramifications of:

1. Sell the flat and pay off the debts
2. Don't sell the flat, but find a way to stick to a budget and pay down the debt over a defined period of time
3. Sell the flat but invest the capital and pay the debt down over a period of time (but in larger payments than you would be able to do without selling the property).

You both really need to talk openly about money without sniping at each other. 'Look, this is where we are; let's decide together on options that work. I'm uncomfortable selling the flat, as it provides a long-term safety net for us, but what if we looked at options x,y,z?'

You also BOTH need to pay for the children's costs.

And think about long term rather than immediate needs and benefits. You can't continue working 2 days a week. You could look at getting an evening job (I appreciate all jobs are very hard to get nowadays, so I understand that may not be possible) and, depending on your skill set, it could be something done at home. Or you could plot out your finances for the next 3 years and say, for the next 12 months, things will be tight, but then both kids will be in school and I can work more hours etc, or look into the cost of upskilling, or consider DH's promotional opportunities or chances of getting a job on a higher salary elsewhere.

You know this last bit already - you both need to be better at planning and stop being frivolous with money. You forgot water? Go without, find a bubbler or do as someone else suggested, and always keep an empty bottle in your bag. Don't forget wipes. Have a 'go bag' always packed, so you know if you're in a hurry, when you pick it up it will have spare nappies (if necessary), wipes, tissues, an empty water bottle, a few muesli bars or packets of dry food that won't go off, and a book and colouring for the kids. There's no excuse for being unprepared when you know you can't afford it. Don't pick up books and just buy them - take a photo and find a cheaper option online or borrow it from the library.

Is the flat mortgage free?

Exactly this. In the event of a divorce, it because martimonial assets. Joint money. It will no longer be yours and you'll have to split it 50/50.

He needs to sell his car and reduce outgoings.

He won't give you a budget becasue he's not budgetting himself.

So he's wants to use your flat to clear debts but leave you without that income.
Will he be contributing more towards the bills after that? Will he take over what you were paying with the rental income or will he just leave you worse off?

Do not sell.
Full stop.

This is the most expensive part of having kids as one parent v likely to be constrained by the more work being cancelled out by higher nursery fees. Things will get marginally better once first DC goes to school.
You do sound a bit passive over income/expenditure.
If the debt is split between various things ie mortgage, cards, overdraft or whatever then choose the smallest one and set a goal to pay it off - it will make you feel in control.
Look at debt management plans and tailor to your circumstances. It sounds as if you or DH are bumping against v highest tax threshold if a Tesla is in his sights.
There could be capital gain tax implications if you sell the flat

I think there have been some misunderstandings along the way. My fault; the thread was moving fast at one point.

I do know how much DH earns.

My posts about the baby wipes was meant to be illustrative and explain how you can spend money without meaning to. Obviously, I don’t sit at home and say hey! I have a really good idea; I won’t take wipes with me! And I’ll forget a water bottle and while I’m at it I’ll lose a hat!’ With the best will in the world, we are human, things sometimes get forgotten or lost and I was trying to explain the day to day and how money can build up. Maybe I didn’t do a very good job explaining.

That said I do need to meal plan better for example - it’s tricky in our home as everyone has very different tastes. However, I don’t think the fault is all mine either!

OP I have the feeling that your DH is not being entirely clear and honest with you. By that I'm getting from your replies to people that you don't know the full circumstances of your whole joint financial picture. I'm not suggesting that your DH is being dishonest but until you both know absolutely everything about all your joint income and expenditure that you can't really even begin to think about clearing debt. If you do sell your property what will that do to your income on a monthly basis? WIll it make it better or worse? For example if you sell and use the money to clear some debt will it equate to the circa £400 income that you use now? Can you afford to lose that income? Have you considered other ways of reducing your debt eg Balance transfers to 0% cards? Or snowballing?
I think you both need to sit down with pen, paper, laptop and list all incomings and outgoings to begin with and go forward from that.

It’s comments like that which just make people walk away from the threads tbh @Alpacajigsaw . It’s not helpful in the slightest. I’m not wanting or needing a pile on. What posting does do is help me sort things in my own mind. I’m less vulnerable to feeling like it’s all my fault when I’ve typed it all out.

All this discussion about who is responsible for what and who is right and who is wrong is not the crux of the matter. There is a fundamental problem underlying all this.

OP you need to start behaving like an adult and your DH needs to start treating you as an adult. You need a basic agreement that marriage is a partnership and it's about teamwork, not who is responsible or who is right and who is wrong.

If you cannot talk it out and agree that you are where you are and the only priority is to get yourselves out of this mess together you won't get anywhere.

Your flat, his car yadda yadda. You risk a descending spiral.

Maybe the time has come to outside financial advice from people who are not emotionally involved and can give you sound dispassionate advice that you can both trust?

Sorry, I thought I was being fairly adult, but I’ll just hide the thread I think. I haven’t insulted anybody and I didn’t post to be insulted. Thanks for the helpful advice.

I am confused by the car loan reference. Is the car owned outright or is it on a leasing scheme? My firm offers an electric vehicle scheme via salary sacrifice but it a monthly lease scheme not a lump sum loan. Is he including potentially buying the vehicle at the end of the lease?

I think you are well within your rights to say you won’t discuss the flat until he has a full all cards on the table discussion about finances. If he is paying the equivalent of the rental income from the flat on a car each month I think you have the right to know.

You seem to be incredibly vulnerable @rdsh given your latest post.

Have you close family you can talk to? Sending support. Keep the flat. To be honest if you were my friend I'd be advising you to call support networks such as https://refuge.org.uk/

I wouldn't sell. Pull in yiyr pursestrings and pay off tve debt, you are living beyond your means!

OP, you do need to wake up and protect yourself.
Be wary of his go to is to deprive you of your premarital asset.
It's what toxic men do.
Your husband sounds toxic.
You are most definitely not a team.
I would be genuinely horrified if you were my daughter and your husband was behaving like this.

It is not normal to buy a car without prior discussion and agreement.
It only happens in toxic, controlling and abusive relationships.
Please wake up to that.

The thing is OP you could sell the flat and keep on as you are, then be in another £60K of debt in another 10 years because you are still overspending. But then it will be a lot worse because you're £500 down per month on the rent from your flat.

You need to sit down, work out essential bills and split the rest into debt repayment, savings and personal money. If you have a car each I would put the car into personal money because that will really show how much his choice for a flashy car is costing him. If it's the only car it's trickier.

Like others I suspect he is over spending far more than you are. I also think the majority of the debt is on his flashy car. Not entirely a bad idea if charging at work, but it would be good to see the figures and whether without it in the mix you could maybe pay off your joint debt quite quickly with a little budgeting together.

I would not under any circumstances sell the flat or put the money into his account. You are so vulnerable on mat leave with your joint baby and no easy access to joint funds or say in big purchases.