tenant not paying rent

[cozican]

my partners father lives in my partners house, rent free. he has no tenancy agreement. the house was signed over to my partner, and his father was allowed to live there until he dies, but my partner lost his job, due to an accident at work, and is now disabled, and unable to work again.the house is due to be repossessed, the father wont leave, we need to get rent for the property to pay mortgage, can we sublet some of the rooms, as its a 3 bed house? his father is saying he has the right to live in peace, if we dont get him to pay rent, which would be �650.00 a month. or sub let the other rooms, we will lose the house. we can not evict him, as he is old, the bank doesnt want to evict him, they would rather wait, and charge us interest, which means losing all the equity in the house, which is about �100.000 we cant sell it, as he wont leave the property, we have tried to sell to a buy to rent company, 3 times, but the father wont sign a tenancy agreement.
we have already consulted a solicitor, which cost us over �1200 for nothing. we need to find a way to get some rent to cover the mortgage. any idea's anyone???

[Twenty20]

It depends how tough you want to be? You can evict him if you wanted - I assume there is nothing in writing to allow him to live there rent free?

Morally though, what was said to him when he was allowed to live there? Who's house was it originally? Did no one foresee that you would have mortgage payments to make with no income in rent?

If you wanted to look after him, isnt it possible to offer him somewhere else, cheaper to live whereby you could sell the house and realise the equity?

[cozican]

hi twenty20. the house was partly his fathers, and partly his and his sisters, she signed over her share, and so did the father, so my partner could get a mortgage to clear debts. nobody knew that he would have an accident which would leave him disabled, before the accident it was easy to pay the mortgage. my partner gave his mum and father 60% of the mortgage when they first bought the house anyway, but it wasnt in writing. because he could pay the mortgage, it seemed simple to leave his father in the house rent free,for the rest of his natural life. but now that he has stopped getting wages from his job, and defaulted on the mortgage, the house is going to be repossessed, unless we can find a way round this. we dont want the father to have to leave, but if he refuses to co-operate, the house will go to the bank anyway. as he wont talk to us, or do domething about the situation, we have no alternative but to let the bank take the house back. we cant sell it, we cant rent it, what else can we do? we stand to lose about �100,000 because of this situation

[cozican]

on the subject of morals, we have tried to keep him in the house, rent free, by trying to sell to a buy to rent company, but the father wont sign a tenancy agreement, so we cant pay the mortgage, and use the equity to pay the rent for the father. he has lied to the police, accused 2 surveyors of harrassment, and generally been obstructive, so what else can we do.

[Ethel]

Is there any way you could work extra hours or change jobs to make more money?

Are you and your partner living in the house as well?

[cozican]

my partner lives with me and our children. and unfortunately, due to his accident, he is now mentally and physically disabled, and i am his full time carer, so i cant get a job to pay the mortgage.

[bednobs]

i think you'll just have to not pay the mortgage and then let the halifax take it from there and deal with it or better still, talk to them You will lose the equity but i dont think there is any other way round it. if a solicitor is unable to find a way round things then there probably isnt a way. Unfortunately you are in the position that due to unforseen circumstances you cant honour the promise you made that the dad could live there forever. If you look at it from his point of view, the house was made over to your partner by the father on the proviso he could life there rent free for the rest of his life, so its not surprising he is being arsey about it

[tufty7]

why not ask the father to contribute to it whilst you work things out , It is very unfortunate for you all to be made to make descisions like this, its a no win situation,
Just a thought , there are people out there who would buy the house at a discount and take him as a sitting tenant , especially if he is old and still allow him to live there , if he will not see sense he will have to face the consciquences of a bank reposession and that would be cutting his nose off to spite his face...I hope you manage to work something out and you cope with what life has unfortunately dealt you , best of luck ,

[Trotbot]

Can you offer to share the equity with him if you sell it - then at least the Halifax don't get it.

[cozican]

thanks tufty7, i didnt know that there were companies that take sitting tenants, we will try them, the only problem i can see is that, he doesnt pay rent, so they might not be interested, but will give it ago. with reference to bednobs post, my partner didnt know that he would be nearly crushed to death, and disabled by the age of 40, we honoured his fathers wishes up until then, weve tried everything to protect him in the house, but as tufty7 stated, he is cutting off his nose to spite his face, nobody wants to make their family homeless by choice, thats why we are trying to find constructive help here.
with reference to trotbot, he wont even talk to us, let alone accept any deals, its not about money for him, hes got enough to live on, he just wants to stay in the house. which unfortunatly isnt going to happen if he keeps ignoring us, and his solicitors advice.