Buying an ex out of a property

[HmmmmmmInteresting]

Does anybody have any experience of buying an ex out of a jointly owned (with mortgage) property? I have done the online calculators and am as sure as I can be that I would qualify for the mortgage on my own. I have enough savings to pay ex his half of the equity.

What I don't know is if the bank would allow ex's name to simply be removed from the mortgage and to allow me to carry on paying without having remortgage. Ive read conflicting things online, so am getting a bit nervous because we will have substantial penalty fees if we repay this mortgage, and also it's such a good mortgage rate that I'd be gutted to lose it. It's portable to other properties, so surely they wouldn't insist I've got to end it.

My second question, if anyone can help is how much the legal fees for this process is likely to cost.

Thirdly, how long could this take? I've got all my proof of income ready and ex is willing to sign whatever he needs to sign asap. I'm imagining a couple of weeks due to it hopefully just being ex signing a piece of paper to say he's happy to be taken off the deeds on receipt of his money. But could it take as long as a mortgage application? 🙈

Your best bet is to ask your mortgage lender rather than here if you can keep the mortgage terms as they are.They will need to contact a solicitor to transfer the deeds over - this took 6 months for me, but only because their crap solicitors sat on it, lied about it being sorted, then went bust so another one needed to take over and start from scratch. I needed to remortgage, so that could also have taken longer.

You would have to remortgage. The mortgage company need to agree it as a single applicant.

Yes, you will need to remortgage. The lender will vet and approve you as a single borrower. You will need legal help, eg to change the deeds over. I did it when I divorced my ex. Apologies, can’t remember costs but I am sure it will take longer than a few weeks - mine did anyway, and Covid may impact too.

I did this. It was quite simple.conversation with same mortgage provider. No early repayment fee. Deeds transferred as part of divorce thru solicitor. Can't have cost much. Entire divorce cost three k as not contested.

I bought out my ex . Didn’t need to remortgage just removed him from the mortgage after they agreed I had met affordability criteria . This was a few years ago so may be different now .

When I did it two years ago, my lender insisted I had to remortgage. However this surprised my mortgage broker, so it could be different depending who you are with.

In England, the legal bit for the conveyancer to do is called a transfer of equity. It was a similar price to the fees for a normal house purchase.

One thing to be aware of is whether you are liable to pay stamp duty. None of the conveyancers I approached seemed to be 100% certain. However I now know you definitely don't need to pay it if the transfer of equity comes about as a result of divorce proceedings. But there are probably more legal subtleties to it than that. It was surprisingly difficult to find out about this.

This process might differ outside of England.

I didn't have to pay early redemption fees when I did this, although I think it was technically a remortgage as I had to go through all the affordability criteria and got a new term for length of mortgage and a new fixed rate initial period. The mortgage provider had a set charge for doing this, think it was £95, but then solicitors fees to handle the legalities of it, title deeds, transfer of cash to ex etc, was about £700. I think it took about 3 months to finalise everything.

Where you married?
If not then I think stamp duty could be payable.
The process takes a few months to get started while there is still a stamp duty holiday

So get started

You also need solicitors both of you

It's crucial to know if you are married op. If you are then he maybe entitled to half those savings you plan to buy him out with. Unless he has an equal amount.

Just done this.
Started before Christmas, still ongoing. Due to conveyancer being slack as and "forgetting" my file.
Took a bit of juggling and it comes down to affordability. Had to pay a chunk of the mortgage to allow me to proceed.

We're not married.

Hopefully can get it done before the stamp duty holiday ends because we've only been here two years and paid £5k in stamp duty. I'd hate to pay again.

I have already emailed my mortgage lender, but with the bank holidays it will be ages before they reply, hence me asking here

God, @Livandme, that's so annoying....I thought it would take about two weeks if there's no need to remortgage!

Thanks @suggestionsplease1

@TartanCurtains I really hope they don't make me remortgage. I've got really good mortgage deals with them
@Babyiwantabump I hope this is the same for me...I've checked I meet the affordability criteria and it seems I do

Thank you so much everyone who has replied, I'm sorry I can't name check everyone. But I've taken every bit of your advice on board.

@ThatsAllFolks did you have to remortgage?

@Babyiwantabump

I bought out my ex . Didn’t need to remortgage just removed him from the mortgage after they agreed I had met affordability criteria . This was a few years ago so may be different now .

I'm praying this is my situation!

I've just checked and stamp duty is payable on the mortgage amount up to £250k until September because of the sdlt holiday, so hopefully it will be completed before then.

I need to get cracking!

@HmmmmmmInteresting

I've just checked and stamp duty is payable on the mortgage amount up to £250k until September because of the sdlt holiday, so hopefully it will be completed before then.

not payable