want to buy mam's house... but we're in Neg Equity

[positivenote]

HI all,
we are 4 yrs into a 30yr morgage and we are still in negative equity. we are about to have our first child and are thinking about buying out the mam-in-laws house. Its a bigger house worth about 450-500k, whereas ours , these days, is only worth about 260-270k (we bought for 352k). The mum in law is living there on her own and we are talking about signing over the house to the wife and myself... but we are unsure of what is the legal requirements involved? is there a possibility of us buying it at a reduced value than the market price and paying enough for the mam-in-law to get herself a smaller 1 bed apartment? any advice with regard to this would be great. i can post more details if needed.

 

[Mongola]

Re: want to buy mams house... but we're in Neg Equity

I believe when buying property from a family member you can get 50 000 as a tax free gift. At least it was the case a few years back. You need to look into that!

 

[Brendan Burgess]

The price you paid for your house is irrelevant now.
How much is the mortgage on your home? Let's assume it is €300k, so you have negative equity of around €40k.

Your mother can sell the house to you for any price she likes. She can make you a present of it if she wants.

Let's say she sells it to you for €200k. I would guess that the bank would prefer to have a mortgage of €240k on a house worth €450k, instead of €300k on a house worth €260k.

Tax issues
Although your mother can sell it to you at any price, the taxes must be paid on the market value. So you will pay stamp duty on €450k. The stamp duty rate is halved for sales from mother to daughter. I presume this carries over to a sale to a daughter and husband, but I don't know.

If you pay €200k for a house worth €450k, the difference of €250k will be treated as a gift and so will be subject to CAT. Your wife would be below the CAT threshold, and I assume that this would extend to you as well, but I just don't know.