whether to add fiancé to deeds of house

[hilbil21]

Another thread has prompted me to post and just wondering what you guys think is for the best.

My mum passed away last year and I have inherited her house on which the mortgage is fully paid off.

My fiancé, 11 month old son and myself have moved in and fiancé is paying to decorate etc and also pays all bills as I don't work.

Am I being fair not having him on the deeds??

[QuiteLikely5]

Don't do it. Those saying sign a pre nup these can still be challenged and aren't a blanket guarantee that he won't get the house or half of it.

Watch what you say to him, he could use it against you.

Don't say it's half yours etc

If he wants half then the right way is he pays you half its value but that might complicate your relationship

[hilbil21]

I'm not in the US.

Before my mum died, her plan was to change her will so that if both she and I died the house would go to my partner (as he ds dad) so I don't think she would be horrified if he ended up with the property.

He works offshore in the oil industry, and if his job was more stable he has considered buying another property and renting it out as security but it's too dodgy at the moment.

It's a difficult one I guess!

[hilbil21]

Oh and we will definitely be getting married because I want to marry him! I'm not blinded by love by any means I'm 35 and quite aware things can go wrong xx

[Offred]

See though I would argue that if you don't want to share your house with him you don't really want to get married. Marriage is a contract to share assets and money, that's what it is.

You don't want to do that.

I think if you want to marry you need to accept that he will in all likelihood have a claim on your house. You need to decide what is more important. If you don't marry you will stand a much better chance of protecting your asset since if he made a claim they would look at common intention whereas if married they will assume the intention is to share based on the fact marriage is an agreement to share.

[hilbil21]

It's not that I don't want to share the house. I actually think what the situation is at the moment is unfair. I'm just wondering if I'm being stupid and naive not doing anything about it and was looking for advice that's all xx

[Offred]

Ok,

The simplest choices are to marry and share your house and life in the house or,

Don't marry and either see how things go expecting that he may be able to claim a part of the house based on your relationship, or

Don't marry and sign a cohabitation agreement setting out that your common intention is not to share your house if you split.

IMO

[Offred]

Adding him as an owner will mean he has a legal as well as a beneficial interest.

Beneficial interest is basically a right to benefit from the house (eg living there or getting a financial share). Legal interest gives you rights to sell the property etc

Legal co-ownership is always a joint tenancy meaning if you died he would inherit your legal share and it is unaffected by wills/intestacy.

Beneficial co-ownership can be joint (both own whole and inherit other half on death) or in common (both own defined shares and can leave share to people in a will/intestacy.

You should speak to a solicitor in any case, I'm studying land law as part of my llb this year so my grasp is tentative.

[wishiwasntme]

I had a house (mortgage free) when I first met my DH. We have 2 children together. I'm a sahm. After we'd been together about 9 years (and before we were actually married) I had his name put on the deeds of my house. My thinking was that he'd been contributing and keeping me and the children for 9 years and it was time to show him that I trusted him (previously I had the house left only to our children in our will). We've since moved anyway and now both our names are on the deeds of the new place. We've now been together 16 years in total.

[Blu]

Co-habitation does not give rights to the house , hence the warning oft repeated on MN that there is no protection or safety net for non married SAHMs. He would need to demonstrate that he had paid into the mortgage, or paid for a whole extension , or something like that.

Once you get married, personally I would leave my share of the house to your child / children, with a right to live in it til they are 18, and not leave the whole lot to my DH. 2 of my friends have seen stepmothers outlive their Dads and then leave everything to their own dds.

[Anniegetyourgun]

This is the kind of situation you can't just switch and say "if it were a man who owned the house..." The only comparison would be if it were a man who was going to be a SAHD, ie by mutual consent he was giving up his earning capacity to be the primary carer for their child. Whoever is doing that needs the security that home ownership, or part-ownership, can bring.

I did put XH on the deeds to my house when I bought it, thinking more about the likelihood of being run over by a bus than splitting, but things were a bit different - I was the main earner as well as having inherited the price of the (extremely cheap!) house - and after nearly 25 years of marriage he would have acquired rights to the equity anyway. To be fair, XH put a lot of work into making it worth more, whilst I put in the cash, so there was a reasonable amount of partnership going on there.

[Mummystar123]

i thought that a pre nup didn't hold much value with img our legal system?? Maybe I understand it wrong but I think it's an American thing really

[lcoc2015]

Think of the situation also - say you pass away and you have left him the house. He remarries and his new wife doesnt get on with your children. They need to be protected down the line.

[blindsider]

lcoc2015

Think of the situation also - say you pass away and you have left him the house. He remarries and his new wife doesnt get on with your children. They need to be protected down the line.

It is HIS CHILD AS WELL :-(

[skyeskyeskye]

OP. You do need to protect yourself in case anything happens to your relationship. I thought that me and XH would be together forever and gave him joint ownership when it should have been 2/3 to me and 1/3 to him on the deeds. However, he left just 6 years later and was instantly entitled to half the £80K equity in the house, despite the fact that the equity was all my money from the sale of my previous house that he had never contributed to.

Luckily for me, he did the correct thing morally and didn't take any money from me, but it would have been a different story if I hadn't divorced him so quickly.

I will never ever give away my house again. It doesn't matter how much you love somebody, they can walk away in an instant.

I think you should get legal advice. You may be able to put some of the house into trust for your son in order to protect him. You could leave the house to your fiance, but what happens if something then happens to him, or he remarries. His wife then gets the house and it would never go to your child. I think legal advice in order to protect all of you, would be a very wise thing to do.

[lcoc2015]

Yes blindsider but if he subsequently passes away and the stepmother inherits then it can be quite a difficult situation - one that i have personal experience off so no need for the angry caps!

[blindsider]

Icoc

Meant for emphasis rather than anger - it is just the casual way on here that some seem to infer that mothers would do anything for their children but as soon as they are out of the way the man seems to forget entirely about that he has kids and will ignore them or disinherit them . It is lazy stereotyping.

[amarmai]

op, i bet the mners who are encouraging you to feel guilty for your f living rent free in your house are not women who have ended up looking after dcc on their own. Do not put your dc and yourself in the sit that many of us have ended up in. Think of your child if you do not think enuf of yourself. Get an iron clad prenup.

[MistressDeeCee]

OH's father remarried exactly a year after the death of their mother, who he'd been married to for 40 years. He became ill 5 years after new marriage and his wife effectively isolated his sons & daughters.. he's sleeping you can't see him, that kind of thing. A lot of animosity all round I but anyway, he passed away last July. Left the property to his wife and specified 50% of property funds to be equally divided between his 3 children and 8 grandchildren. It didnt work out equally at all as wife still lives in the house, has her family from abroad living in there now, and it was discovered house had been remortgaged twice anyway + lots of home improvements done. I didnt get into the full ins & outs of it all but his children got sweet f.a. as there was nothing to inherit financially really and they do not own a share of the house.

Even if theyd wanted to challenge their stepmother (I think sister queried this) what could they have done anyway? She was their father's wife.

I really can't see how someone can protect their inherited property in some of the ways explained on MN? If you marry and live in the marital home then your partner is entitled to a share, even if not on the deeds. Im thinking of the other thread too - I can't fathom all the different explanations. Its as if some know the law but think their calculations and stipulations and what they decide is "fair" can somehow change the law to suit. It doesnt work like that at all so makes no sense to me.

Im reading skyes comment - that is the reality of it

Im 12 years until mortgage free, been with OH a few years but Ive no intention of marrying. I've no input or concern into what he leaves for his children, likewise same with me. Our relationship works well and we don't talk or wrangle about property. I own - he does not.

When I die I will leave my property to my DDs and nobody on earth is going to be able to come along and say well, you have a man now so that means you must make sure he is entitled to a share of the home you've worked hard to pay for over the years, and make sure you and DDs have a roof over your head. Or tell me that Im unfair. Id rather be unfair than a fool.

If a man idn't like my stance Id understand, but it wouldn't change a thing. Im a mum - my children come 1st and thats that.

I can't see how OP can protect her inheritance in the event anything goes wrong, I think its a risk you take in life and love

[MrEBear]

Oil industry - are you in Scotland?

Until the point of marriage it is 100% yours
Say after you marry it goes up by 10%
He would be able to claim half the 10%.

Once you marry you need his permission to sell it (I assume that works both ways, my husband couldn't make me homeless by sell the marital home.) even although I had no claim on it.

But no I wouldn't add a name to the title deeds. Unless he was paying you for his share

[RandyMagnum]

I wouldn't marry someone if they came out with not wanting me to be on the deeds of the house after marriage and having a child together, especially more so if I was the one paying to decorate the house, and paying the bills on it.

He didn't work for it, but neither did you.

So he's good enough for paying the bills, and decorating, but not good enough to share your possessions with, what's the point in getting married then, red flag from me.

[Keeptrudging]

He's benefitting from it by not having rent/mortgage. That's money he's not spending which he could use to buy his own property and rent it out. In the event of them marrying they could both protect their own properties and would both have that security.

[hilbil21]

Yes we are in Scotland. A friend suggested getting something protecting the value when we marry but giving him 50%o of any further increase in value X

[blindsider]

That would not be an unreasonable compromise. I imagine he wouldn't want any more than that most men IME don't want more than they have contributed.

It is quite interesting now that it isn't unusual for people to go into marriage already with considerable assets how jealously they are guarded when historically 'fleecing' the ex was seen as perfectly acceptable.

[Offred]

In Scotland prenups are legally binding but there is no such thing as an 'iron clad' prenup.

I still think you would be much much better if you didn't marry TBH.

[peggyundercrackers]

because you are in Scotland he could make a claim under family law section 28 - if he can show you have an economical advantage because what he paid the court will make him an award and you will need to pay it back - been there done it got the T-shirt.