Do I have any legal rights to this home if I made most of the payments?
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Do I have any legal rights to this home if I made most of the payments?
When our home was purchased over 5 years ago, my name could not be on the mortgage due to debt to income ratio long mostly unrelated real estate story, I have earned and paid every dollar on the home since day one. For the 1st 3 years I paid 100% of all bills, nowadays my ex-fiance helps on occasion. New Link Destination
this day, my deposits are 99% of the money put into the joint bank account used for bills.
With the title change to ex fianc, I
need to look at leaving the home before
things get violent. My ex has stated
that when the house sells, there is no
interest in sharing any of the proceeds
with me if I move out. There lies the
problem, it’s getting to the point where
I do not feel safe at home, so I am
actively seeking a place to move to with
our children.
Is there any way I can ensure that I get
at least a portion of the proceeds from
the house?
Asked on September 7, 2017 under Real Estate Law, Florida
Answers:
SJZ, Member, New York Bar / FreeAdvice Contributing Attorney
Answered 6 years ago | Contributor
If you have a written agreement with him that in exchange for making the payments that you did, you would receive a portion of the proceeds of the sale, you could enforce that agreement in court. But without a written agreement, a court would most likely treat your making these payments as something you voluntarily chose to do as a gift to or to help out your finance (a fairly common thing, actually, for one fiance to provide financial assistance to another) and/or that it the "rent" you paid in order to live there; in either event, the fact that you made the payments would not by itself entitle you to some of the proceeds of a home which you do not own. Without a written agreement, you are very unlikely to be entilted to any money from the sale.
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