Would you continue with this?

[Fairygardenpruning]

Been with DP for 11 years.

Live in a rented house with my 2 dc

DP also has 2 dc, DSS in 20's who left home recently,
DSD still lives with mum and just turned 18. DP's ex still lives in the family home. When they separated (before I met DP) DP agreed to pay the mortgage in full until the youngest turned 18 or left further education, I was aware of this and accepted this, our tenancy is in my name only as until their house is sold or exDW able to take on mortgage I wanted to have that security. I pay the rent.

I accepted this as part and parcel of the relationship with the knowledge (discussed with DP) that this year it would be over and we would have over £1000 a month more that we could then put towards our own place. However DSD has missed a lot of college due to illness, she has been really poorly and it is great that she is now well enough to attend. However she is having to restart, her illness means that she has to change her course and start again next September.

I have asked DP to clarify with his exDW what she is expecting as far as the mortgage is concerned. I presume that she is expecting us to continue paying for the next 2 years as DSD will still be at college but at current rates that will be an additional 24k going out. And all talk is that rates are only going to increase so potentially far more.

Additionally I know that exDW is in no position to buy the house or take over payments, or even half the mortgage. She has recently entered a DMP so there is no way that she can get a mortgage. They are also unable to remortgage because of this.

What would you do? I can't go back in time and change my decision to go ahead with the relationship knowing this, DP doesn't seem to see an issue but he hasn't gone without and owns a house. I don't and while we had planned that we may be able to get our own house in the next couple of years this won't happen as it stands. In fact I can't see it happening ever anymore, exDW will not be able to afford anything on her own. I seem to have facilitated this without meaning to, by my acceptance of it without ensuring that the end would be the end. This was my choice but it was made in the belief that there was an end.

The thought of paying more scares me. DP can only just manage the payment as it stands. He seems to be reluctant to discuss this with his exDW (who is a great mum but DP does all communication), he likes an easy life and is getting one. I'm not! And I am now in the position of resenting this, all conversations with DP end with him not doing anything and hoping, I presume, that I will be happy carrying on as is. I'm not!

will help with food bills when he can.

How magnanimous.

Why should you have been paying to feed a grown man.

Your food bill has been bigger because of him, yet he doesn't appear to cover his food costs.... that's money you and your kids could have benefitted from, for any no. of other things.

You have been had op. His ex must be laughing her head off. Working pt while her mortgage is paid...

How long have you been living together? Ignoring the food bills has not contributed to, just his share of the rent over the years must be quite substantial. Why has he not offered to pay you back for this with interest from the money he is investing in his property?

For ease of calculations if your rent has been 1200/month and he has lived with you for 10 years, he owes you about £72,000 plus interest. I would absolutely be expecting that the deposit is not 'ringfenced' under these circumstances.

I am incredulous that you say you have no issue with the fact that you have not been able to buy a house because you have been supporting him supporting his ex and child. You should have an issue with this, I think you have been made an absolute mug of. If you had not been providing him with accommodation all these years, him and the ex would have had to come to a different agreement and cut their cloth accordingly. Instead you stepped in to pick up the slack.

I agree with @Aprilx - if you hadn’t subsidised him they would have had to sell the house much sooner as he couldn’t have lived anywhere else rent-free and had his food subsidised. He’s taken you for a free ride there. So it is absolutely time he and his exW saw that. I would make it clear to him you want him to pay half your rent, half the food, half the bills. How he sorts that out with his exW now the kids are adults is not your problem but I would question, why is she working only part-time ffs? Why can’t dad get a job and pay her way through college like any normal person?. Starting right now you need to stand up for your own interests.

So he only pays for food when he can afford it? But you have to pay for it whether you can afford it or not and pay for him as well?

Agree with Ohsugarhoneyicetea as well.

It's a joke that his equity is going to be ring fenced for his dd etc.

You're v concerned about doing the "right" thing when it comes to his money; pity he's not concerned about doing the right thing re money towards you and your kids ...... or he wouldn't have been living rent free and not even contributing fully to household food costs in your & their home; while building up an asset for him, his ex and his child (and making sure they retain returns lifestyle in the meantime).

He's a user, yet you're still fixated on being a "good" person.

There's a huge difference between being a bitch and being assertive, shrewd, and looking out for yourself and your kids, abd not being taken advantage of.

(His ex and dd clearly don't give a fk how he does it (and if its at your expense) as long as they are completely unaffected by the typical financial consequences of separation/divorce until dd is put of extended FT education).

If you hadn't said his equiry/profit would be ring fenced, I might have advised you to stay until household is sold and his profit put into something for you both, with you recompensed for years of providing rent free accommodation and subsidised food; but it doesn't sound like that will happen. Just that your recompense will be some time in a property that reflects his equity/profit but that that money goes to his dd sooner or later. Suppose its whether that's worth staying for, as you keep on subsidising them all for 2 (?) years more, and as long as it takes for the financial settlement to go through, house sold etc.
Will it be something else then (?)

*house, not household.

You could discuss the 50% of the rent he doesn't pay is a loan he needs to pay you when the house sells. A lump sum ring fenced for you invested into a home together.

Has his dd been staying at yours for his time with her too (so there would have been more expense)?

So your kids will do without so his will benefit?

Wtf.

Wow! He knows what he’s doing doesn’t he. Basically lives for free, at your expense, while paying off his own mortgage, that you will never benefit from. Saw you coming op

"You have been had op. His ex must be laughing her head off. Working pt while her mortgage is paid..."

This.

Also, I think your DP is lying about his ex wife going into a debt management program.

Kick him out. He welshed on the deal, let him start paying rent now - see how he likes that.

You can’t change what has been done, and I can’t imagine you thought it would be like this, for so long when he moved in, but it does seem like you have been subsidising him, the real winner in all this is his ex wife who lives in a house she does not pay for and owns half of it and despite the argreement to sell I just can’t see it happening in the next two years, or even the next ten. Was this all agreed in court, or is it one of those agreements that are not legally binding and since they are divorced it will cost a lot of money to force the sale through court, money your boyfriend does not have. Has he even thought about all this. You both need to talk about a change in financials, his ex wife needs to start paying half the mortgage, and he needs to start paying half the rent.

Thank you all for your responses.

I have only recently started to see this for what it is, if I'm honest. Initially I was told that the money paid into the mortgage would end up coming back to us and would be for us all....this then changed to for his kids....this has now become maybe not at all due to her circumstances and DSD staying on at college.

I think it's been so gradual that I just didn't see where it was going, and it was only when it was confirmed that DSD was staying on for 2 years that I found myself stopping and actually thinking about this.

The comments above about how this isn't how it would have been for them if I hadn't been so foolish accommodating have really hit home.

I have been a mug, hindsight is all well and good but I can make sure it doesn't continue.

His ex needs to get a full time job. The kids don’t need looking after at this stage. I wouldn’t be happy about this.

So he has continued to pay into his investment, his house with his wife, while you have subsidies this by not charging him rent?

How old are you both? Did they divorce without a financial order? How many years is left on the mortgage

Does he have pensions?

He has used you to pay for his children's home and to give them savings whereas your children have nothing

If you had forced him to pay half - I guess his options would have been - ended the relationship with you, made the Ex sell the house or got a higher paying job so he could pay a mortgage and rent. What do you think he would have done?

I think you need to do a healthcheck on your finances, work put what is best for you - he has to start paying rent as no adult can live rent free.

have to agree , its all nice hes not wanted to jepordise the roof over his kids heads , but surely one would have thought the house could have been sold and ex wife could have bought or rented a smaller property for them all , im not sure i could live with someone for years partially subsidizing them whilst they pay for a mortgage on the house for their ex to live in for years on end whilst she works part time ,

Fair enough. I think you should cut him some slack though - it's commendable that he's supporting his kids as best he can. I mean if someone in the ex's position came on MN and asked for advice, I'm sure it would be quite different to what most people are replying to you. A single mother who's spent the last 11+ years raising children by herself (sorry, you haven't mentioned how active your DP has been with shared care of them), if her ex starts asking about kicking her and DD out to sell the house as soon as she's turned 18, despite still being in further ed due to what sounds like genuine serious illness, then wouldn't that sound pretty shitty?

In real terms it doesn't sound like you out of pocket in any way from your DP living with you - sounds like he's more than covered any excess costs that his presence may have brought into your household finances. You're no worse off, (probably better) than if you'd lived alone as a single parent this whole time. I'm assuming he's been an active step parent to your own children, helped you out with child care etc, and been a team player in the home? There's a great value there, that isn't monetary. A lot of posters on here will never acknowledge that, and automatically just start screaming 'COCKLODGER'.

So people saying he should be paying half of all your household expenses, is I think unfair on him. If only your ex had done the same sort of decent thing your current DP is, in supporting you like you DP is supporting his ex (for the benefit of the children), then maybe you'd be in stronger financial position yourself. So I think it's unfair to criticise your current DP for doing the right thing by his kids.

There's nothing you can really do in the current situation, it's not something you can directly get involved in or influence, so try not to worry about it or let it come between you. The only thing you could do is say you want to call time on the relationship because it's not playing out how you both had discussed. But that would be throwing the baby out with the bathwater (possibly a terrible phrase to be using on MN!) at this stage. Better to just grin and bear it, and do your absolute best to try and save some money of your own towards a house purchase (whether that ends up being with or without DP).

Again, I can see your frustration, and I too would want some reassurance as to just how long this 'extension' is going to be allowed to run for. I mean DD could decide to go to string out further ed for half of her 20's! I'd also be concerned about the potential for DP to welch on the agreement to get his equity out of their house at all - he could take pity on broke ex and just hand over the house to her. Equally, she could be an absolute nightmare to get out/allow the sale of the house (as it sounds likely that'll be the only option). And are they actually fully divorced with a proper financial settlement - one that defines how long DP is required to stay on the mortgage? My understanding that those types of agreement have been uncommon for quite a while now - the courts preferring to come up with a clean break agreement. Probably to avoid this very type of situation.

If they don't have their finances signed off by the court, then there could be a whole world of pain ahead. What is actually agreed about who gets what split of the equity of the house? Could be that your DP (and thus you as well) is expecting to take it all, which may be why he feels so laid back about it. But his broke ex might have other ideas. If there isn't a court ordered financial settlement and if the property isn't held as tenants in common with a deed of trust to specify what share each of them owns, she could try and claim 50% (or more).

What would he have done if you hadn't been around to house him? Would they have had to sell the house as he couldn't afford both mortgage and rent?
Does the ex pay anything to the mortgage? Why is she still only working part time?

The house split is in the financial settlement, I don't know what the split is exactly but I believe it's around 60% to her (I did know but it was some time ago and I can't remember exactly how much). I would have been better off financially without him (I have worked this out recently)....yes, I love him, love spending time with him, but we are not a unit with my kids in any meaningful sense. For a long time I would have agreed with you, that his company and what he brought to us was worth more than money. Somehow that seems to have gone. Which I suppose has left me wondering if I am prepared to continue to go on with the situation as it is.

Please do let me make one thing clear...at no point am I going to tell him he needs to get the house sold from under her. I would like to know what the plan is because it does affect me and my DC. If she is planning/ expecting/ hoping to continue with the situation as is, then I have a decision to make...stay and wait for longer, or split. The relationship isn't what it was, which is to be expected to some extent, but his complacency with the situation has made me sit back and look at it differently. That's my decision. It's not my place to say anything differently, their agreement was in place when I met him. It's up to him.

I'm so sorry you've essentially paid exDW portion of their mortgage so they can own a house together, the pair of them have properly screwed you over. Why didn't you marry so you also have a claim on the house 💐

I wouldn’t be able to put up with this. In time you will start to resent him. Better sooner than later. Look after yourself first.