Say Paddy has a house worth €200k and a mortgage of €170k when Anne moves in. He makes the full mortgage repayments. She has some oral agreement with him to pay him rent equal to half the mortgage payments. After 10 years, they split. She could claim she has ownership of the house. So he should do up an actual tenancy agreement with her and specify that it gives her no share of the ownership of the house. Not very romantic, but would save a lot of fighting later.
Opting-Out
To avoid the Act, cohabitants must act positively and opt out, by way of a cohabitant’s agreement.
This is a legal agreement which allows couples regulate their finances, themselves. Items such
as property, debts, bank accounts, custody and access of children amongst others may be
addressed in such agreements. If couples do not opt-out, they very likely could find themselves
the subject of court proceedings under the Act.
On a final note, whilst it is imperative for couples to draw up an agreement in order to avoid the
Act, it is open to the courts, in “exceptional circumstances” to set aside such an agreement ,
where its enforceability would cause serious injustice.
Say, Johnny owns a house mortgage free and Mary moves in and they live together for 5 years and then she moves out. She would have no claim on the house.
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