Reply to Co-owning the second home

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]The uncle is taking advantage of your DH.  Calmly, your DH should talk to him and ask why this purchase wasn’t mentioned 2 months ago?  Yes, this will probably affect your relationship with the uncle. Too bad, so sad.[/quote]

Well, I think it depends on whether OP wants to continue a relationship or not. If he values that, he should not argue, mention it to uncle and then get some legal language together to make that clear in the future and just blame his lawyer/financial planner, even if he doesn’t have one.

To me, it’s not about letting people walk all over him or not. It’s about whether he wants to have a relationship with his uncle and cousins. In that case, he will have to let some things slide. [/quote]

So it’s a relationship based on doing whatever the uncle and his family want rather than being adults and discussing non-emergency purchases in advance?[/quote]

NP here. This also seems like a relationship where OP and her DH don't do any of the work and are fine allowing the uncle and his family to do all of the necessary homeownership maintenance and admin while they still get to enjoy owning the house. Yet they want the power of veto for furniture that they decide is too expensive, yet OP admits they can afford it.

I have no idea whether the uncle's family is taking advantage of DH by requesting reimbursement for excessively expensive furniture. But DH is taking advantage of not doing anything homeownership wise 100% of the time while his adult kids love to go to this beach house every year.

These kind of power dynamics really irk me, and I have one involving the care of one of my parents' homes. My siblings are perfectly fine sitting back and not lifting a finger to help with the day to day grind, but then want to sweep in and say "yeah no, I don't like that" once in a while to exert power.  Maintaining a home is a PITA, especially if you don't live there and it is a second home. Thinking it is ok for the uncle to bear this responsibility 100% of the time is not ok. It's not. So either get more involved and actually "co-own" the home or let them buy you out. [/quote]

You can’t chide OP and her husband, they aren’t the co owners. A man with dementia is.  OP hasn’t been able to bear responsibility. I’m not sure why his son and uncle haven’t already transferred his share of the home since he isn’t capable of making the executive decisions needed for this.[/quote]

Of course I can because DH slide right into the role of his father and kept the hands off approach. And OP says they don’t want to sell because her own adult children still like going to the beach house all summer. So yes, the OP and her DH love all the benefits of “co-owning” but want none of the responsibility. They want it both ways. [/quote]

That is simply not true. DH's father finally kept the hands off approach because his brother and wife refused to allow them to have any role in the management of the home. In fact, a few years ago MiL was speaking with her insurance agent who knows both families and brought up the beach house for summer reason. The agent was surprised to know the house was co-owned as the uncle had opened an insurance policy on it and he and his wife are listed as the sole owners.

Moreover, the FiL and uncle have had a 50/50 expense split on the property for the summer months. A few years ago, DH was informed by one of the beach house neighbors that the uncle and wife were there for an additional month and had been for several summers while still billing ILs for 50% of all utilities, etc.

As I've said, DH has grossed up what he pays to reflect a management fee of sorts. And we rented out our prime home in highly coveted DC neighborhood, so we know what is the going rate for a management fee. [/quote]

Ffs, if you can own a home in “a highly coveted dc neighborhood” and can afford a manager when you rent it out, stop raging about the cost of this furniture. That your children will be sitting on.

DH can tell them he wants to discuss such expenses in the future, before they are incurred. If you feel the need to quibble over Pottery Barn prices or whatever in the future—knock yourself out.[/quote]

Reading comprehension: he did. He did this when he took over from his father roughly three years ago. "Uncle, I know you had an arrangement with my dad. Going forward, we can split the duties or you can provide an accounting of the expenses. I need to get a handle on where the money goes in order that I can budget accordingly." He has done this every summer and he JUST did when he cut the check for the annual expenses. His uncle told him X, then mailed him a receipt for a furniture purchase with a date BEFORE DH asked him for the list of expenses and the estimate for the year. The furniture had already been ordered. [/quote]

You’re so upset about this that you’re arguing with strangers, and I think you need to just dissolve the partnership ASAP.

But fwiw in our co-owned vacation house the person doing the unpaid labor of managing it makes mistakes all the time, and none of us would blink if they forgot about the furniture. I also don’t even know what he would say if we asked for an estimate in advance? There’s just an annual call for receipts and then a reconciliation. The predictable expenses are kind of divvied up already.

Can I ask one more thing, why do you say “cut the check” so much? [/quote]

LOL. At least PP is invested. That explains her emotion. You're here.... why?

And you are smoking crack, sir, if you think proper accounting translates to an 'annual call for receipts'. You don't know d*ck about management. A contract should be drawn up with a clear spending limit/authority and annual management rotates amongst all parties. If one refuses there is either a cost to opt out or a loss of privileges.

The uncle is little atmospheres out of line. So much so that I can all but guarantee he is skimming funds.[/quote]

The first year DH asked for an accounting of the expenses, he discovered that his aunt and cousins were receiving 4-digit checks. DH asked why. Uncle told him supplies. DH asked if that means we should submit receipts for our supplies. Uncle said, "that's not the same." We've bought stuff for years and never expected to receive a receipt. There's nothing rational about that.[/quote]

Tell uncle to buy you out.  This sound like a scam.  [/quote]

+1
Call the bluff. They won't want to lose their skimming gig over your fleeced DH. So I'm sure they will scream. [/quote]

TBH, DH doesn't want to sell at this time. He is not happy how his uncle handles this, but also thinks that his uncle will not be in charge for much longer. When this is either turned over to the aunt or the cousins, he has indicated that he will inform that the two families need to draw up a new process, perhaps with a mediator or lawyer (though DH is one), to move forward.

He wants an amicable arrangement for the next generation and believes the best way to do that is to have a contract signed by both families. He is nearly always glass half-full, so who knows. [/quote]

Listen to yourself. You really want to share a property (about the most intimate thing you can share!) with people in a situation where you need a mediator or lawyer to come to an arrangement about how to share it? In prior posts, you said that the aunt/cousins were some of the driving force behind the expenses. This is not a 'well, the cousins will be reasonable once the curmudgeon is out of the way' situation. Why would you take on the aggravation? [/quote]

Id just sell. This is going to get ugly.  get an appraised and sell to uncle for 1/2 that.  it sucks.  sorry.  but dragging this out years will just make it worse.  i speak from experience.  you think people will be reasonable but they wont.  it is emotional, people have diferent priorities.  life happens.  sell and move on.[/quote]

That may happen but seems like DH willing to ride it out for a bit. With the uncle out of the way, I think he is going to assert the perogative of being the only male of that generation, something that was made a lot of when he and the cousins were children.

It may not work, but think he is willing to gamble that it does. [/quote]

Wait, what? Your husband thinks he’ll be in charge because he’ll be the eldest male? What century are you all living in?
[/quote]

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