What legal options when one party refuses to engage

moneyhoney

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2 people bought a house together - both on deeds & mortgage. One person (call him John) paid the deposit, put considerable money into the house and has been paying the mortgage. John is resident in the house & the other person (Mary) has moved out.

Mary has said (verbally) that she would waive her rights to the house. John offered Mary money & she refused it. John has received mortgage approval to take over the mortgage.

However, despite the forms being drawn up, Mary is refusing to engage. She has not retained a solicitor and she is basically ignoring contact.

What can John do? Does he need to go to court? To complicate matters, John is having a baby next year and needs to get this sorted so that Mary does not have any claim on what will become a family home.
 
There are invariably difficulties in this type of scenario. In the absence of any co-operation from Mary, John will need to get advice from his solicitor. Currently Mary is legally the joint owner of the property and cannot be forced to sell or transfer the property to John. There is very little that John can do without Mary's co-operation other than sue her for the amount of mortgage contributions that should have increased his interest in the property.
If there are any solicitor posters out there it would be interesting to get a legal opinion on the position and whether any other action is possible!
 
I was in this position and I consulted a solicitor to see what my options were. He said I could take her to court to force her off the house but it would be costly. Even if they are refusing to engage they can't ignore a court summons (well they can but it's a criminal offence).
From memory I think a figure of 15-20k was what he estimated his fees plus the barrister fees would cost me to pursue this route. Also if you lose her fees could be awarded against you as well.
If you don't care about your credit rating then you could try stop paying the mortgage and when the bank rings you, give them her phone number and tell them to contact her if they want the money. A few phone calls from the bank and she might start paying attention sharpish. She won't want her credit rating ruined either. Unless you have the cash for a court case, it's basically the only power you have over her (the ability to ruin her credit rating by stopping paying the mortgage). Eventually the bank will take you both to court if mortgage remains unpaid so you can threaten her with that as well.
 
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