'AITA if my wife and I were to force her sister and brother-in-law to move?'

"AITA if my wife and I were to force her sister and brother-in-law to move?"

Hey there. My wife and I recently got married. We are both financially frugal people with decent paying jobs. We save our money religiously and use it to meet our financial goals, especially ones in the future for when we have kids.

My wife is DEEP in college debt. To the tune of about $200,000. She is starting her residency and we just got a bill in the mail for her private student loans. It's A LOT. Here's the saving grace. When her grandfather passed away, he gave half of his home to my wife, and her sister.

Her sister is older, and has been essentially making unilateral decisions regarding the home the moment she inherited her half. She did things like renovate a kitchen, replace appliances, take over a room downstairs to be a work from home office, claim the master bedroom, and use the frog above the garage as her own personal storage space.

She did most of this while my wife was away in college three hours away. When my wife did move in, she was not given 50% or even 20% of the home to use for herself. She was relegated to a child's bedroom and the shared upstairs bathroom.

When I met my wife, I took notice of this immediately. We discussed finances before getting married, and decided that since she would be moving out to live with me, it would be prudent for her sister to buy her out of the rest of the house's equity.

We notified her sister last June. We explicitly told her that she had the entire summer to figure out the finances. She said she would need a few months and would update us. Within two months of that conversation, they decided to buy a newish car for her husband... who had a work truck already. Sister works from home so they have a car just sitting in the garage.

It's been six months.

And now that the student loan payments are coming in, we reached out to her sister once again, and informed her that she would have to buy her out and we needed to get the process started NOW.

Her sister is now trying to encourage my wife to just have a conversation "Between the two of them" because "It's their business and not their husbands." I call BS This effects both of us just as much. My wife feels exactly the same. We are a 100% unified front on this.

I won't go into specifics, but her manner of texting has led us to consider just giving her the 30 days required by our state and then if she doesn't have her shit together by then, forcing a sale through a partition suit. If we are forced to do this, we will pursue rental income owed through exclusive use case law regarding shared homes.

Which would give us approximately $15-20,000 more in equity. That's substantial, and would essentially pay off our only car loan on top of wiping out my wife's private loans entirely. We aren't trying to uproot their lives. But we have decided that it is in the cards if they don't show some real progress towards rectifying this situation.

Here's what people had to say to OP:

LowBalance4404 wrote:

NTA and you need a good property lawyer.

OP responded:

We already have one. He's a well known civil litigation attorney in the area.

teresajs wrote:

NTA.

Your wife should just file for a partition sale at this point. Her sister could still get approved for a mortgage and buy out your wife's share as part of the partition sale negotiations.

OP responded:

Possibly. However there's a SOLID chance it doesn't happen. As they decided to have a $30-40k wedding, buy a new $20-30k car along the way. As well as her husband taking on his own student loans. Based on their income, I see a VERY solid chance that they won't be able to get a financer to lend them an additional $250,000.

TechnicalNeck7407 wrote:

NTA. You gave her plenty of chances. She is trying to manipulate or gaslight your wife by trying to get her to discuss and agree to matters without your involvement. Go to a lawyer first thing Monday morning and start forcing sale of the house.

Don’t warn your SIL, and tell your wife not to warn her either. She’s had plenty of time to address the matter and has just been dragging this out, counting on your patience.

She will absolutely not negotiate the matter in good faith. You need a lawyer to handle this moving forward. She and her husband will be given the chance to buy you out of your wife’s share. If they can’t arrange a mortgage to do that, then that is their problem. Follow the lawyer’s advice about getting the property appraised.

Don’t make any bargains on the sale price. The renovations were done without your wife’s approval and she should not be paying for those even though they improve the value of the house. It was entirely for her sister’s own risk, and if your wife benefits from it then so be it. Legally, all owners must agree to upgrades to a property.

Your SIL skipped that step. Very stupid of her. This will likely destroy your wife’s relationship with her sister and any flying monkeys her sister enlists. Tell your wife to be strong. Her sister has absolutely no respect for her, taking over the house, making unapproved renovations, and relegating you you to 20% of the house.

She isn’t treating your wife like a co-owner. You are both underwriting their extravagant lifestyle at this point. It’s toxic behavior and she is trying to isolate your wife so she can bully her into keeping the status quo.

Call a lawyer first thing Monday and get the ball rolling. Then communicate through the lawyer from there on out. Don’t answer her calls and tell your wife not to answer her calls either. Keep all text, email and FB messages for court proceedings. You want a paper trail now.

BeautifulChaosEnergy wrote:

Lawyer now. There’s no way to do this in a “friendly” way. Your SIL has made it clear she wants this house all to herself for free. Tell her she can either buy your wife out at half the current market value, or the house is put on the open market and you can split the profits. Her sister chose to play a stupid game, so she can collect on her stupid prizes.

turtle_ti wrote:

Get a lawyer, force the sale of the house.

If SIL wants to own the house 100%, they can get a mortgage to buy your half of the house from your wife at its current market value.

MennionSaysSo wrote:

NTA. Though the title is misleading you aren't forcing them to move you are asking to no longer subsidize their lifestyle