Buying out a partner

[Sue F]

My friend is currently splitting up with her long term boyfriend. He wants to buy her out and she seems to be accepting a very low offer from him, I suspect in desperation. Their house is worth �190,000 and they have around �90,000 left on their mortgage. This is their third house together so I suspect that any deposit put on the house was what they made from previous property sales. He has offered her �50,000. Is this a fair amount or should she be looking for half of the valuation of their house, ie, �95,000.

[Eeeek]

Half the equity seems standard practice so i would say that 50k is fair. If she forced him to sell up and they split the equity they would end up with that each anyway.

[Hammer]

Half the valuation is not fair because he will be left with all of the debt.

If he pays her �50k, he is left with (value of house) - (mortgage outstanding) - (�50k) = �50k. She is left with �50k.

Seems fair to me. What you are not considering is that the mortgage has not yet been paid off, so he should not pay half the market value to her.