Page 6 | What is a fair contribution when moving into a partner's mortgage-free flat?

Numberwang66 · 2026-05-12T18:00:47+00:00

Hi all. I'm moving in with my boyfriend in June. We both live in London. He is incredibly fortunate to own his flat and has no mortgage. Just bills and a very hefty service charge that crops up every 4 months or so. We are due to have a conversation about rent/payment. How much do you think is an acceptable monthly rate? He floated the idea of a rental payment, plus splitting bills. I initially agreed to this, but after a bit more thought I am now unsure as he doesn't have a mortgage to pay. He is a super lovely and communicative guy so I'm not stressed about the upcoming conversation but any advice would be super welcome. Thank you!

Thatsthebottomline · 14/05/2026 19:13

AtBeaverGoat · 14/05/2026 16:25

Then you should be spitting feathers as clearly the woman is taking financial advantage of her BF .

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Look, he should be in a position where he can comfortably pay everything, whichbhe most definitely should. Perhaps he xan contribute to trust fund so that his partner never had to worry about money

Get it all legal that she gets half of everything should any split happen (it'll be his fault anyway) and see if he can increase his hours as work to say, 60 hours a week ?

Sounds a perfect arrangement.

thesealion · 14/05/2026 19:58

AtBeaverGoat · 14/05/2026 07:50

The woman must be paying rent to live wherever she is living now , even a small flat is probably £1/k a monthly, so she will probably save over £12k a year on rent, probably more , the boyfriend doesn’t have a mortgage so that’s irrelevant

how is that fair? - yes of course she should contribute more or else she is just freeloading from him

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She is paying rent to a landlord who rents out properties as a business. She has rights. A partner is not a landlord, and she has no rights to his property. There is absolutely no justifiable reason to charge her rent and I’d say the same if the genders were reversed. Just because paying rent as a system exists in other contexts doesn’t mean it’s applicable all the time.

thesealion · 14/05/2026 20:04

GrandmasCat · 14/05/2026 15:08

I totally agree with you, things should be like that in an ideal world, which we are far from reaching as yet. In theory we should be equals, she should be contributing financially as the man, and all men would have in their calendars that at least every second year they will be getting out of work on time to go and buy materials to make little Johnny a costume for world book day and spend the night putting the outfit together.

But until we get to that world, she shouldn’t be entering into a romantic partnership that disadvantages her in the long run as, if she grew up, as most women, in a household where mum was carrying most of the mental load, she will soon start to take more responsibility for that mental load, the shopping list, the house chores and child rearing if children arrive. Meanwhile the man, who would be fully responsible for not much at home, will be finding a nice time consuming and expensive hobby to do on evenings/weekends to kill his “free time”, he may even start complaining that she is pulling him back as she doesn’t have the time or the means to enjoy as many nice things as he can or supporting the woman into relinquishing her financial independence by sacrificing her career/income as “it is not worth working when the nursery fees are so expensive”.

And that’s how we feminists (and not feminists) screw ourselves up.

Edited

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I don’t think she should pay rent but only because there’s no mortgage. This is utter bollocks. No woman is forced to do any of those things and societal expectations are easily ignored. My mum ran about like a slave doing all the chores and mental load while my dad didn’t lift a finger. I did NOT follow in their footsteps, I’m a lazy fucker when it comes to physical and mental chores and expect 50% as the bare minimum from my partner. I recognised the problem with that dynamic even as a kid and knew I’d never fall into that trap. It’s absolutely not a given that women will end up in this situation if they advocate for themselves and don’t stay in relationships with useless men who don’t do any life admin.

AtBeaverGoat · 14/05/2026 20:27

thesealion · 14/05/2026 19:58

She is paying rent to a landlord who rents out properties as a business. She has rights. A partner is not a landlord, and she has no rights to his property. There is absolutely no justifiable reason to charge her rent and I’d say the same if the genders were reversed. Just because paying rent as a system exists in other contexts doesn’t mean it’s applicable all the time.

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So is she paying for all the fancy foreign holidays now with all her extra money

AtBeaverGoat · 14/05/2026 20:28

Thatsthebottomline · 14/05/2026 19:13

Look, he should be in a position where he can comfortably pay everything, whichbhe most definitely should. Perhaps he xan contribute to trust fund so that his partner never had to worry about money

Get it all legal that she gets half of everything should any split happen (it'll be his fault anyway) and see if he can increase his hours as work to say, 60 hours a week ?

Sounds a perfect arrangement.

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utter bollocks

GrandmasCat · 14/05/2026 20:30

thesealion · 14/05/2026 20:04

I don’t think she should pay rent but only because there’s no mortgage. This is utter bollocks. No woman is forced to do any of those things and societal expectations are easily ignored. My mum ran about like a slave doing all the chores and mental load while my dad didn’t lift a finger. I did NOT follow in their footsteps, I’m a lazy fucker when it comes to physical and mental chores and expect 50% as the bare minimum from my partner. I recognised the problem with that dynamic even as a kid and knew I’d never fall into that trap. It’s absolutely not a given that women will end up in this situation if they advocate for themselves and don’t stay in relationships with useless men who don’t do any life admin.

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The fact that you and me have escaped from being subservient to our men, doesn’t mean that most women do. Most women sleep walk into it so slowly they do not realise it is happening, pretty much like boiling frogs.

You may have married an equal and split chores accordingly, but once you take time off to take care of a baby during maternity leave, that balance goes to hell and each partner becomes a “specialist” such as women becoming the primary carers of the children and ensuring the home is ticking by and the men providing the main income, which take us back to the finances, we cannot judge the women’s contribution to the home in money terms only, when most women are contributing so much in kind.

thesealion · 14/05/2026 21:01

GrandmasCat · 14/05/2026 20:30

The fact that you and me have escaped from being subservient to our men, doesn’t mean that most women do. Most women sleep walk into it so slowly they do not realise it is happening, pretty much like boiling frogs.

You may have married an equal and split chores accordingly, but once you take time off to take care of a baby during maternity leave, that balance goes to hell and each partner becomes a “specialist” such as women becoming the primary carers of the children and ensuring the home is ticking by and the men providing the main income, which take us back to the finances, we cannot judge the women’s contribution to the home in money terms only, when most women are contributing so much in kind.

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No I can’t get on board with this. Women should contribute equally financially to the home they live in (as should men, who should also contribute equally to everything else). Women shouldn’t pay less purely because of…what? An avoidable risk that they’ll become a skivvy? The patriarchy? No rent should be paid here because OP does not own and has no rights to the flat and there is no mortgage expense. Any person of any gender, moving in with a home owning, mortgage-free partner of any gender, should not be paying rent! But all other costs (and duties) should be equally divided.

SonyaLoosemore · 14/05/2026 21:07

BeRoseSloth · 12/05/2026 19:41

But she’ll be making money from him by no longer having to pay rent.

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Yes, I can't see why that is better than him making money . OP can pay something rxtra on top of food and utilities. It will probably be much less than what she would have paid on rent and he will have more income. Win-win.

NorthEastNancy · 14/05/2026 21:07

Pay xxx amount into a joint account that needs double signatures to withdraw from instead of rent.

Agree that if you split you share it 50:50. If you stay together use it towards a wedding/ holiday etc

GrandmasCat · 14/05/2026 21:11

thesealion · 14/05/2026 21:01

No I can’t get on board with this. Women should contribute equally financially to the home they live in (as should men, who should also contribute equally to everything else). Women shouldn’t pay less purely because of…what? An avoidable risk that they’ll become a skivvy? The patriarchy? No rent should be paid here because OP does not own and has no rights to the flat and there is no mortgage expense. Any person of any gender, moving in with a home owning, mortgage-free partner of any gender, should not be paying rent! But all other costs (and duties) should be equally divided.

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I guess we will need to agree to disagree.

GrandmasCat · 14/05/2026 21:15

thesealion · 14/05/2026 21:01

No I can’t get on board with this. Women should contribute equally financially to the home they live in (as should men, who should also contribute equally to everything else). Women shouldn’t pay less purely because of…what? An avoidable risk that they’ll become a skivvy? The patriarchy? No rent should be paid here because OP does not own and has no rights to the flat and there is no mortgage expense. Any person of any gender, moving in with a home owning, mortgage-free partner of any gender, should not be paying rent! But all other costs (and duties) should be equally divided.

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Correction: if you see my first and second posts you’ll see we’re in agreement.

I said all the costs by half including costs of repair and maintenance and the £0 he is paying in rent and mortgage.

m00rfarm · 14/05/2026 21:17

Youshould pay half the service charge in my view. And is there still a single person discount for council tax? (don't live in the UK)

thesealion · 14/05/2026 21:17

GrandmasCat · 14/05/2026 21:15

Correction: if you see my first and second posts you’ll see we’re in agreement.

I said all the costs by half including costs of repair and maintenance and the £0 he is paying in rent and mortgage.

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We do agree on that!

It sounded like you were saying women should always pay less on account of being women, but if you agree that they should split equally then I misinterpreted that.

FedUpandFiftyNine · 15/05/2026 16:42

NorthEastNancy · 14/05/2026 21:07

Pay xxx amount into a joint account that needs double signatures to withdraw from instead of rent.

Agree that if you split you share it 50:50. If you stay together use it towards a wedding/ holiday etc

Some arrangement like this would be a sensible option. Perhaps 50-60% of the rent you are saving. And then pay half the bills too.

You should both benefit from the arrangement.