Home owning couples will have to make more specific contracts in future to sort out who owns what after a couple split when they originally shared a property. The Supreme Court sided with the ruling of a district judge on how a home is split between a couple who separated decades ago but originally purchased the home on a joint mortgage, into which the remaining woman then solely paid in. The man spend a lot of money doing it up and improving the internal decorations, fixtures and fittings. The Appeal Court overturned the district judge’s ruling and awarded the man equal value of 50:50 despite the fact that the man stopped paying the mortgage in 1993. When the woman appealed this to the Supreme Court, they found in favour of the woman owner.
This leaves couples to contractually sort out home value and improving owned homes in case they split somewhere along the line. I do not agree that this solely benefits woman, because the same ruling will equally apply if it is a man who remains in a property and the woman moves out.
I think it shows the dilemma home ownership has brought us to when we have these liberal divorce laws that recycle relationships more often. For relationship breakups rented properties are easier to manage because couples pay the rent and if they split up then it is only 1 months worth of hassle to deal with. Of course home improvements are always made by the party that spends the money if they are not the sole owner. In the case of couples, often the woman remains, but they have no automatic right, if they have no children to care for.
In today’s market not only relationship splits make home owning complicated, its also the ever increasing volatile job market with more short-term employments, that make home owning more complicated. It’s good to own but one has to consider other factors such as relationships and job durations as well. Sometimes its just better to rent.
