San Diego woman refuses to add her boyfriend of 2 years to the deed of a house she bought entirely by herself, 3 weeks after he moved in, and he threatens to move out

Author image for Etai Eshet
Etai Eshet • Editor
Apr 17, 2026 10:30 AM EDT

Three weeks. That is how long it took for a perfectly good living arrangement to turn into a property negotiation.

The deal was already solid before any of this came up. Below market rent in San Diego to live with his girlfriend in a house she owns. That is not a sketchy landlord situation. That is one of the better deals available in a city where rent is genuinely painful and most people would take it without blinking. He took it too, right up until he was inside the house and realized his name was not attached to it.

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  • AITA for refusing to add my boyfriend to my house deed after his lease ended?

    I (34F) own a house in San Diego that I bought 5 years ago. Put down $80k that I saved myself, been paying the mortgage ever
    via Former_Raspberry3277
  • since. My boyfriend (36M) and I have been together for 2 years and his lease just ended last month.
    via Former_Raspberry3277
  • We'd been talking about him moving in with me for a while and I was excited about it. The plan was he'd pay me rent to cover part of the
    via Former_Raspberry3277
  • mortgage and utilities. We agreed on $1400/month which is less than he was paying at his apartment.
    via Former_Raspberry3277
  • He moved in three weeks ago and things were fine until last weekend. He said he wanted to talk about the house situation.
    via Former_Raspberry3277
  • He told me it doesn't feel right paying me rent when we're building a life together and that if he's
    via Former_Raspberry3277
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  • contributing to the mortgage he should have ownership stake in the house.
    via Former_Raspberry3277
  • I said no. This is MY house that I bought before we even met. He said that's exactly the
    via Former_Raspberry3277
  • problem, I still think of it as mine instead of ours. He thinks I should add him to the deed or at
    via Former_Raspberry3277
  • least sign something that says if we break up he gets back what he's paid in.
    via Former_Raspberry3277

  • The timeline here is doing a lot of work. Two years of dating, three weeks of cohabitation, and suddenly there is a sit-down conversation about deed ownership. Not a long-term plan discussed gradually over time. A conversation. Three weeks in. Before he has even learned which light switch does what.

  • I told him that's not how rent works and he got upset. He said his friends think it's sketchy that I'm
    via Former_Raspberry3277
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  • profiting off him and treating him like a tenant instead of a partner. He brought up that we've talked about getting
    via Former_Raspberry3277

  • The logic that contributing to a mortgage means building equity sounds reasonable until you push on it for about ten seconds. Renters across the country have been paying toward landlords' mortgages for decades and nobody argues they deserve a cut of the building. The eighty thousand dollar down payment was saved entirely before this relationship existed. The five years of mortgage payments were made entirely alone. Three weeks of below-market contributions are not the same category of thing and everyone in this situation knows that.

     

  • engaged and said if I'm serious about a future with him I should be willing to share the house.
    via Former_Raspberry3277

  • The part that deserves the most attention is the engagement angle coming up mid-negotiation. If the relationship is serious enough to justify adding him to the deed, it should also be serious enough to survive her saying no. The fact that those two things got tied together this quickly is not a sign of someone thinking seriously about a future. It is a sign of someone who just moved in and is already working the leverage.

  • I said absolutely not. If we get married we can talk about it but right now this is my asset and I'm not
    via Former_Raspberry3277
  • putting his name on anything. He called me controlling and said I'm holding the house over his head.
    via Former_Raspberry3277
  • Now he's saying maybe he should just move back out if I don't trust him enough to share ownership. My sister says
    via Former_Raspberry3277
  • I'm being unreasonable and that 2 years is long enough to know if you want to build equity
    via Former_Raspberry3277

  • Her sister thinks two years is long enough to start building equity together. Her best friend thinks he is trying to get half her house for the cost of a few months of discounted rent. One of them is doing better math than the other.

  • together. My best friend says he's trying to manipulate me into giving him half my house.
    via Former_Raspberry3277
  • bharoche I'm an attorney who sees this all the time. Sell half the house to him at market value and have a co- ownership agreement OR simply don't put him on title.
    via Former_Raspberry3277
  • If he complains, let him rent another place where he can complain that he's paying his landlord's mortgage and therefore should be added to the landlord's deed.
    via Former_Raspberry3277
  • I repeat: absolutely don't gift him ownership in the home.
    via Former_Raspberry3277
  • Countrycruiser2000 That's a husband request and he's currently on the boyfriend plan.
    via Former_Raspberry3277
  • Max375623875 ΝΤΑ How much of his landlords apartment did he own? I'm sure he was paying the mortgage there.
    via Former_Raspberry3277
  • He'll receive the benefit of that money if he marries you. If he doesn't, then he just got cheap rent.
    via Former_Raspberry3277

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Dating-Relationships boyfriend living together homeowner advice red flags red flag dating
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