Unmarried couple – Respondent purchasing property for personal use prior to relationship – No express declaration of beneficial interests – Parties keeping finances separate – Adjudicator refusing to enter restriction on title – Whether appellant proving common intention that beneficial shares should be other than equal – Application dismissed
In 1991, the respondent purchased a property with the aid of a gift from his parents and a mortgage advance. At the time of the purchase, he was not in a relationship with the appellant but intended to live on his own with no intention or expectation that the property would be a family home for himself, the appellant and her children.
The respondent subsequently formed a relationship with the appellant but they did not live together as husband and wife. After the property was purchased, the respondent paid the mortgage repayments from his own resources save for a short period of approximately 12 months when they were paid from a joint account into which both parties made deposits.
Between 1991 and 1999, the appellant organised and paid for works to be carried out on the property, but the respondent repaid the outstanding balances on two loans that she had taken out to pay for those works when he remortgaged the property in 1991. The appellant also accepted a cheque that the respondent said was in full satisfaction of her claims to any interest in the property; however, the appellant subsequently applied to enter a restriction on the title to protect her alleged interest.
The deputy adjudicator to HM Land Registry concluded that, having regard to all the evidence, he was not satisfied that the appellant had discharged the burden of proving that she held a beneficial interest in the property. Her application was therefore dismissed. She applied for permission to appeal.
Held: The application was dismissed.
A beneficial interest could be acquired by reason of conduct subsequent to the acquisition of the property in question, but the court would be slow, in the absence of an express agreement, to infer from conduct alone that the parties had intended to vary the beneficial interests at the time of acquisition: James v Thomas [2007] EWCA Civ 1212 and Morris v Morris [2008] EWCA Civ 257 considered.
When a property was transferred into the name of one person, the onus was on the person who claimed a beneficial interest to show that both parties had intended that their beneficial interest should be different from the legal interest. The court had to ascertain the parties’ shared intentions, actual, inferred or imputed, with respect to the property in the light of their conduct in respect of that property. It sought a result that reflected what the parties intended and could not abandon that search in favour of the result that it considered fair. A roving inquiry about the parties’ conduct together was inappropriate: Stack v Dowden [2007] UKHL 17; [2007] 2 WLR 831 applied.
In the instant case, the deputy adjudicator had carried out the appropriate exercise having identified the correct principles. Given his findings of fact, he had been entitled to conclude that, at the time of acquisition of the property, the respondent had been the sole beneficial owner. At the very least, his conclusion was one that it was open to him to reach.
The appellant and the respondent both appeared in person.
Eileen O’Grady, barrister
