Joint mortgage: you're each liable for all of it

What does joint mortgage liability mean?

If you’re both on the mortgage, the lender can ask either of you for the whole payment, whatever you agree between yourselves. Here’s what that means if one of you can’t pay.

The legal phrase is “joint and several” liability. Joint means you owe the debt together. Several means each of you can be asked for all of it. Citizens Advice says you may be responsible for the whole of a debt in joint names, and that if you’re both named on the mortgage, you’re both responsible for the payments, including any arrears, even if one of you moves out.

So if your monthly payment is £1,400 and you’ve agreed to pay £700 each, the lender doesn’t see two debts of £700. It sees one payment of £1,400 that isn’t made in full until both halves arrive. If one half is missing, the account is in arrears for both of you.

This is the same for married and unmarried couples. What’s different for unmarried couples is what happens to the home itself if you split up, which depends on how you own it and what you wrote down. This guide is about the mortgage side: what you each owe the lender, and what you can agree between you.

Question	To the lender	Between the two of you
Who owes the monthly payment?	Both of you, all of it	Whatever split you agree
Who owes any arrears?	Both of you, all of it	Whatever you agree about who catches up
Does moving out end it?	No	Only if you agree something
Who can change it?	Only the lender	You both, in writing

What happens if one of you stops paying?

Usually nothing dramatic happens straight away, and it’s rarely about bad faith. Most of the time it’s illness, a lost job, a baby, or a gap between contracts. Sometimes it’s a break-up.

What does happen is this:

1. The payment falls short. If the full amount doesn’t reach the lender, the account is in arrears. It doesn’t matter whose half is missing.
2. The lender gets in touch. Citizens Advice says your lender will contact you if you owe them money, and not to ignore them. Contact can go to either or both of you.
3. The other partner can cover the gap. Many couples simply do this for a few months. To the lender, that just means the payment was made.
4. If nobody covers it, arrears build up and the missed payments can be reported on your credit files.

The fairest thing is to tell each other early, before a payment is missed, and to tell the lender early too. If you get certain benefits, such as Universal Credit, GOV.UK says you may be able to get a Support for Mortgage Interest loan towards the interest, which you repay when you sell or transfer the home.

If you’ve separated and your ex has stopped paying their share, contact your lender early rather than waiting: Citizens Advice says not to ignore your lender, and the FCA’s rules say lenders must try to agree a way for you to repay. Keep a record of what you each pay from now on: it can matter later. Our guide to what happens to the house if you split up covers the wider picture.

What can the lender do about arrears?

Mortgage lenders are regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA), and its rules on arrears, in the part of its handbook called MCOB 13, say they must deal fairly with you. In short, under MCOB 13.3 a lender must:

• tell you that free debt advice is available
• make reasonable efforts to agree a way for you to repay, over a reasonable time
• agree to a request to change the payment date or how you pay, unless it has a good reason not to
• consider options such as extending the term, changing the type of mortgage or putting off some payments
• give you information about what any arrangement means, including for your credit file
• not take action to repossess unless all other reasonable attempts to sort things out have failed

There’s also a court protocol for mortgage arrears. It says starting a possession claim should be a last resort, and that the lender should consider holding off if, for example, you’ve applied for Support for Mortgage Interest, you need time to get free debt advice, or you’re taking reasonable steps to sell.

If it did come to a sale and the home sold for less than you owe, Citizens Advice says you’d have to pay the difference, called a shortfall. Because the debt is joint, the lender could ask either of you for it. Citizens Advice also says it’s usually better to sell yourselves through an estate agent than to wait for the lender to sell, because a lender’s sale is likely to raise much less.

None of this is likely for a couple who talk to each other and to their lender early. It’s here so you know where the floor is, and why agreeing a plan between you matters.

How does a joint mortgage affect your credit files?

In two ways.

Missed payments show on both files. A joint mortgage is a joint account, so if payments are missed, both of you can be affected. Experian says that missed or late payments on a joint account could lower both your credit scores. Experian says a late payment stays on your report for six years, though lenders pay more attention to recent history, so its effect lessens as it gets older. If there was a good reason, such as illness or redundancy, Experian lets you add a notice of correction of up to 200 words to explain.

A joint mortgage links your files. Applying for credit together creates a “financial association”. Experian and Equifax both say that living together, or even marrying, doesn’t create one on its own: it’s the joint credit that does. Equifax says lenders could look at a financial associate’s record even when you apply for credit on your own.

How to remove a financial association. Once you no longer share any credit, you can ask the credit reference agencies (Experian, Equifax and TransUnion) to remove the link. This is called a disassociation, and you may need to show that your financial connection has ended. While you still share a mortgage, it’s harder. Experian says it may be able to break the link if you’ve lived apart for more than six months and closed all other shared finances, such as joint bank accounts.

What if one of you wants to come off the mortgage?

Moving out doesn’t take you off a joint mortgage: Citizens Advice says you both stay responsible for the payments, including any arrears, even if one of you moves out. A break-up or an agreement between you doesn’t change it either. To come off it, the lender has to agree, and Citizens Advice says it will usually check that the one who stays can afford the whole mortgage by themselves.

The usual options are:

Option	What it means	What to know
Sell the home	The mortgage is paid off from the sale	Ends the joint mortgage for both of you
One of you takes the mortgage on alone	The lender releases the other, or the one who stays remortgages	Citizens Advice says the lender will usually check they can afford the whole mortgage by themselves
Both stay on the mortgage for now	You agree who pays until you sell or one of you takes over	You both stay liable to the lender, so put the plan in writing

If one of you takes over, there are usually two separate steps, and a conveyancer usually handles both:

• The mortgage: the lender agrees to take one name off, or the one who stays takes out a new mortgage in their own name and pays off the joint one.
• The deeds: HM Land Registry is told who owns the home now, using a transfer form (usually a TR1). This is often called a transfer of equity.

In England, Stamp Duty can apply when one of you takes over, if the total is over the Stamp Duty threshold. GOV.UK says that when unmarried partners transfer a share, any payment counts for Stamp Duty, and so does the share of the mortgage the one who stays takes on. Married couples and civil partners who transfer a share as part of a divorce or dissolution agreement or court order don’t pay it, but unmarried couples don’t get that exemption. In Wales it’s Land Transaction Tax instead, with its own rules. Your conveyancer can work it out.

If you can’t agree whether to sell, either of you can ask a court to decide what happens to the home under section 14 of the Trusts of Land and Appointment of Trustees Act 1996. That’s slow and expensive, which is one more reason to agree a plan while things are calm.

How does it work with real numbers?

Alex and Jordan aren’t married. They buy a £300,000 home in joint names. Alex puts in a £40,000 deposit and Jordan £10,000, and they take a £250,000 joint mortgage. They agree, and write down, that their deposits come back first when they sell.

Our assumptions: the mortgage costs £1,400 a month (the real figure depends on your rate and term), and they split it by what they earn, 60% and 40%. So Alex pays £840 a month and Jordan £560.

Then Jordan is off work for four months and can’t pay. Here’s what each choice means for that time:

For those four months	What the lender sees	Alex pays	Jordan pays
Alex covers Jordan’s share	Every payment made in full	£5,600	£0
Nobody covers it	£2,240 of arrears on a joint account, on both credit files	£3,360	£0

The lender is owed £5,600 over the four months whatever Alex and Jordan agreed. If Alex covers it, Alex has paid £2,240 of Jordan’s share (£560 × 4). Covering it keeps both their credit files clear, so it’s usually the better choice for both of them, as long as they agree how Alex gets the extra back.

Years later they sell for £330,000 with £230,000 of the mortgage left, so £100,000 is left over. We’re leaving out selling costs to keep it simple.

Alex and Jordan's £100,000, depending on what they agreed

What they agreed	Alex gets	Jordan gets
Nothing written down	£50,000	£50,000
Deposits back first, nothing about the four months	£65,000	£35,000
Deposits back first, and covered payments paid back	£67,240	£32,760

How the rows work:

• Nothing written down: in joint names with nothing recorded, the starting point is half each, and a court would need evidence they both intended something different. Neither the deposits nor the four months are dealt with.
• Deposits back first: Alex gets £40,000 and Jordan £10,000, which leaves £50,000, split £25,000 each. Alex gets £65,000 and Jordan £35,000. The £2,240 Alex covered isn’t mentioned, so it isn’t paid back.
• And covered payments paid back: Jordan never caught up, so the £2,240 comes out of Jordan’s money: Alex gets £67,240 and Jordan £32,760. If Jordan had paid it back while they were still together, the sale would be split as in the row above.

Illustration only. Try your own deposit numbers in the deposit split calculator, and see how to split a monthly payment equally or by what you earn in the rent split calculator: the same sums work for a mortgage payment.

How does a couples agreement handle missed payments?

A couples agreement (also called a cohabitation agreement or a house buying agreement) can’t change what the lender can ask for. The lender isn’t part of it. What it can do is set out, in money terms, what happens between the two of you, so a hard few months doesn’t turn into an argument.

CoHabit’s draft agreement does this in two places:

• It says what the lender can do. It records that if you’re both named on the mortgage, you’re both responsible to the lender for the payments, including any arrears, whatever you agree between yourselves.
• It says what you’ll do if one of you stops paying. If either of you can’t pay your part of the mortgage or bills, you tell the other as soon as you can and agree a plan. If the other covers the missed payments, that amount is paid back to them, either when you agree or out of the money the one who missed them gets when the home is sold, or when one of you stays and pays the other.

That’s money wording: it’s about paying back an amount, not about changing who owns the home. The draft also says that paying more or less of the mortgage than you agreed doesn’t change how you share the money from the home, unless you both agree otherwise in writing. Our guide to one partner paying more of the mortgage covers that side.

The written agreement isn’t on sale yet. Courts can take an agreement like this into account if you disagree later. See how your agreement counts.

It’s also worth agreeing a few things the clause leaves to you:

• How long one of you can cover the other before you talk again.
• Whether a career break counts differently, for example parental leave, where you might agree nothing is paid back.
• What happens if you split up and one of you stops paying while the home is being sold.

What happens to the mortgage and the home if one of you dies is a separate question, and it depends partly on how you own the home: see our guide to what happens if one of you dies and our guide to joint tenants or tenants in common.

What should you do next?

1. Check whose names are on the mortgage. If you’re both on it, you’re each liable for all of it until the lender says otherwise.
2. Agree how you split the monthly payment, and what happens if one of you earns less for a while. Start free, together: the conversation asks how you’ll split the mortgage, what happens if one of you earns less for a while, and who stays if you split up, side by side, and your answers stay on your device.
3. Agree what happens if one of you can’t pay: tell each other early, and whether covered payments are paid back.
4. Write it down and keep bank records of who pays what, especially any payments one of you covers for the other.
5. Talk to your lender early if a payment might be missed. Ask about options such as a payment plan or a temporary change.
6. Get free debt advice from Citizens Advice or MoneyHelper if you’re already behind.
7. Get legal advice if you’re separating, one of you wants to come off the mortgage, large sums are involved, or either of you feels under pressure. A solicitor for each of you, or a mediator, can help.