Signing house over

M

moneyhoney

Registered User
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Bit of a weird one - I'll try & keep it short.

My BF wants to buy a house. He has deposit saved & stamp duty also.

I, however, have no disposable savings......and already have a mortgage so not keen to take on another one right now.

So, what he has suggested is, he buys the house, puts all money up-front and I move in, pay a proportion of the mortgage and down the line (maybe in a year or so) - he'll sign over half his place to me, and I will do the same. I intended to rent mine out which will cover mortgage.

So, my question is - what would be fair? I know that we'd both need to engage solicitors, but what would be a fair proportion to sign over?

For example, he puts up €50k now. House price €300k. (These are just rough figs)

Would it then make sense for him to sign over half house to me, or seeing as he paid one sixth in up-front costs, sign over half of the remaining 5/6??

It's really confusing. We both want to have a plan before he actually goes ahead & buys so any help appreciated.

I know the obvious solution is for us to buy together but we don't feel ready for that.

Thanks.
 
moneyhoney said:
Bit of a weird one ...
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You said it
moneyhoney said:
... I know the obvious solution is for us to buy together but we don't feel ready for that...
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You don't feel ready to do what is obvious, but want to initiate a convoluted solution to what is obvious and simple?

I suggest you wait a while before getting involved in complex real estate transactions with potentially all sorts of nasty surprises.

Let him buy his house as the first step and see where things go from there, as apparently he wants to do that anyway.
 
Not the most helpful reply I've read here.

You'll see in my OP that I said:

moneyhoney said:
We both want to have a plan before he actually goes ahead & buys so any help appreciated.

Thanks.
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We're not entering into any "complex real estate transactions" - I am trying to help us figure out what we would do if he wanted to sign over some of his house to me. As if it was too complex, we would wait a while & buy together. He is not in any rush. He has just seen a house he likes.
 
I would suggest that you treat what you give him as rent for now if you do move in with him. However you should also take into consideration that you will have to pay income tax on the rent AND that as you are now making your home an investment property by renting it out, you are opening yourself up to potential CGT on any future sale of it. Given that, you might expect a reduced rent.

When you feel ready to make the committment, THEN put in place an agreement in relation to both properties about what would happen if you split up?
 
It does seem like a complicated real estate transaction though..

He buys a house, you move in, and then you contribute to the mortgage (is he a First time buyer by the way, and if so, have you considered if this will have any implications on his first time buyer status?), then he signs you half his property, then you sign him half your property.

I would suspect that revenue might take a fiscal interest in this type of transaction, given that you are not married.

If you do decide to proceed with something like this I would suggest
1)Drawing up a watertight legal contract via a solicitor to protect both of you in the event of something going wrong, relationship breakup etc.
2)Getting professional taxation advise

Nicola
 
moneyhoney said:
Not the most helpful reply I've read here.

You'll see in my OP that I said:



We're not entering into any "complex real estate transactions" -
I am trying to help us figure out what we would do if he wanted to sign over some of his house to me. As if it was too complex, we would wait a while & buy together. He is not in any rush. He has just seen a house he likes.
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Actually thats exactly what you are proposing to do! If you dont feel ready to buy together then neither are you ready to enter into the type of agreement suggested in your first post.

When you decide to exchange the two 50% shares you will both incur stamp duty and god knows what other taxes which will have been created by the govt. by then.

What the other poster was saying(and I agree)is that buying together is a simpler transaction than entering into an agreement where he buys, you pay part of mortgage in return for a possible exchange of 50% of two properties at some point in the future...as a solicitor my head is spinning at the number of convoluted clauses I would have to put into a contract to protect you both. It is possible to put such an agreement in place but I hazard a guess that if you went through such an agreement clause by clause neither of you would want to sign it!

If he wants to buy then he must do so without any guarantee of any input from you.. and without any quasi agreement between you which if things do not work out for you will make any break up particularly horrible.
 
People seem to have missed this part of my post:

down the line (maybe in a year or so)

I was simply looking for advice as to how these things work...not saying we're making any agreement.
 
I think moneyhoney you're not listening to the excellent advice you've been given particularly by Vanilla and Madangan who have met no doubt many unmarried couples who have tried to go down the purchasing of the house without being married bit. You only have to look at some of the messes people have posted on AAM to see that's it's not advisable. Even with all the best of intentions in the world.

If you're not ready to commit to marriage do not commit financially in any way shape or form.
 
I would question the urgency to buy now. The simplest thing to do would be for both of you to wait until you are ready and then look at buying a house together. It's not like there's a shortage of

Also, I'm fairly sure that signing over a proportion of a house to someone else would leave the assignee open to a gift tax liability, on top of everything else.
 
Bronte said:
I think moneyhoney you're not listening to the excellent advice you've been given particularly by Vanilla and Madangan who have met no doubt many unmarried couples who have tried to go down the purchasing of the house without being married bit. You only have to look at some of the messes people have posted on AAM to see that's it's not advisable. Even with all the best of intentions in the world.

If you're not ready to commit to marriage do not commit financially in any way shape or form.
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You assume we want to get married at some point - we actually don't. But we do want to have a home together. It's just not the right time for us to buy together right now for a few reasons...and what we wanted to find out was if there was scope for him to buy a place now (as he has money & some good places available) - and give me some interest in it at a later date. It would seem that there is little or no scope to do this.

Plant43 that may be best advice - wait till we want to (and can) do together.
 
moneyhoney said:
It would seem that there is little or no scope to do this.

.
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Nobody said it wasn't possible, it's just that 'in general' it's not advisable for any amount of reasons. But if you can both agree and both understand all the taxes, implications and ramifications of what you are doing then no problem. The main reason for advising against it is that most people even with the best will in the world when things go pear shaped seem to not understand what they got into in the first place. This can also apply to marriage but the legal contract here goes some way to easing some of the other issues. Best of luck in whatever you decide to do.
 
moneyhoney said:
People seem to have missed this part of my post:

down the line (maybe in a year or so)

I was simply looking for advice as to how these things work...not saying we're making any agreement.
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It appears to me that you are hoping that people on this forum will say that what you are planning is a great idea and everything will go to plan.Hopefully if you do decide to do as you plan it will, but and there is always buts you have to always remember that sometimes things dont always go to plan.

Take the good advice on here and get legal and financial advice.It will be worth it in the long run.

Best of luck
 
I want to clear up a few things as it seems (as often happens on these boards) that people have jumped to the wrong conclusions.

I came to this board looking for some advice as to how these things can be done, if at all.

I did not come looking for approval, or for anyone to say "it's a great idea".

I said in my first post: 'I know that we'd both need to engage solicitors'

I know there are pitfalls and that people do break up and that property transactions are complex. It is precisely for these reasons that I posted and looked for advice. As a first step. We don't plan to enter into any contract until after he buys his house and we decide what to do. I was looking for some info as a start so that we would know if it would be possible later on.
 
Two solicitors have already posted on this thread Moneyhoney, and given you quite useful advise, in my opinion.

Nicola
 
moneyhoney said:
I want to clear up a few things as it seems (as often happens on these boards) that people have jumped to the wrong conclusions...
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I think you need to re-read your original post before you jump to any wrong conclusions.
moneyhoney said:
... I came to this board looking for some advice as to how these things can be done, if at all.
...
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You might have had that in mind initially but that is not what you did. You wanted an answer to a specific question "How much is fair?" My "unhelpful" response to your original post was based on the rephrased question you repeated three times -
moneyhoney said:
... So, my question is - what would be fair? I know that we'd both need to engage solicitors, but what would be a fair proportion to sign over?
... Would it then make sense for him to sign over half house to me, or seeing as he paid one sixth in up-front costs, sign over half of the remaining 5/6?? ...
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My "unhelpful" response above to your original post seems amazingly consistent with the other posts you view as "unhelpful", which perhaps might pose a question for you to answer.

In future if you want a specific conclusion or recommendation from site-users, perhaps you could provide it your first post and we can copy and paste it in our responses and thus avoid being classified as "unhelpful".
 
mathepac said:
In future if you want a specific conclusion or recommendation from site-users, perhaps you could provide it your first post and we can copy and paste it in our responses and thus avoid being classified as "unhelpful".
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My first laugh of the day. Sometimes I get the original post wrong and I regret what I've said because they take it up wrong but one is only trying to be helpful after all. In truth one does not have any malicious intent to any OP.
 
Bronte said:
If you're not ready to commit to marriage do not commit financially in any way shape or form.
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As someone who bought a house with someone that I was engaged to at the time would heartily support this..it is amazing how complex and bitter things can get - very quickly!
 
I too bought a house with my partner and we have recently split. He will not sell (has given personal guarantees to the bank re: busines) and I want to sell. We are really caught in an awful stalemate quandry as he can't buy me out.
You have your house and he has his, simple.
 
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