Vancouver Family Property Agreements Lawyers regularly deal with written family property agreements and less commonly are involved in cases involving disputed oral family agreements. Tal Wolf warns The phrase “oral family property agreements are not worth the paper they are written on” demonstrates the difficulties in trying to uphold oral family property agreements.
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Verbal agreements can be just as binding as written agreements, but only if both parties are willing to honestly acknowledge the deal. There are a number of BC cases where oral family property agreements were upheld by courts. Practically speaking, though, words tend to have no meaning in the legal system unless backed up by documentation. Vancouver Family Property Agreements Lawyers warn you to think hard before you rely on a verbal “understanding”. Sometimes you are trying to show good faith and do the right thing, but get it in writing anyways. Imagine a father who offers to pay a certain cash sum for child support each week. However, when the mother is asked if she received any child support, what if she says “no”. Courts are in the proof business, and without documentation, it may as well never have happened.
Vancouver Family Property Agreements Lawyers Call 1 877 602 9900
Our Vancouver Family Property Agreements Lawyers explain that when it comes to property division, parties are entitled to make agreements to divide family property and family debt under s. 92 of the Family Law Act (FLA). There are two classes of an agreement under the FLA. If the agreement is in writing and signed by each spouse in front of a witness, s. 93 states that the court may set it aside or replace it with an order. Otherwise, s. 95 governs, and it calls for an equal division of family property or family debt unless an equal division would be “significantly unfair”. The term “significantly” is understood to mean “more than a regular impact – something weighty, meaningful or compelling.” One of the factors governing the unfairness analysis is “the terms of any agreement between the spouses,” which includes oral agreements.
Tal Wolf, one of our experienced Vancouver Family Property Agreements Lawyers, notes that in the recently published Supreme Court case Lupien v. LeBlanc, 2019 BCSC 431, the husband said that when his wife moved into the residence, the two discussed the parties’ relative contributions to the Family Home. He said that “from day 1,” he made clear that this was his house and that he wanted to transfer the value of the house to his kids. His evidence was that the co-owner was concerned about the wife making a claim on the residence and asked to have a meeting with her before she moved in. The co-owner met with both husband and wife in the living room sometime before the wife moved into the Family Home. In the conversation between the three of them, the husband said it was clarified that wife would have “no interest whatsoever” in the Family Home and the husband would pay all the mortgage and other expenses associated with the Family Home. The wife reportedly “had no reaction” to this and “accepted right away”. She did not argue and did not indicate this was unfair. The husband said he abided by the agreement by paying all of the mortgage, tax and insurance expenses associated with the Family Home.
The wife denied that any such conversation occurred.
The husband called a number of other witnesses in support of his claim that this oral agreement existed.
Oral Agreement Challenges Explained By Vancouver Family Property Agreements Lawyers
The Court noted:
34 It is difficult in this case to determine if an oral agreement existed. There is no doubt Ms. Lupien did not contribute to the mortgage payments, property taxes, or insurance. She did, however, pay for the groceries, utilities and assisted with renovations. There is no evidence of a conversation as to what should occur should the parties separate. Rather, the witnesses called on this point affirmed an arrangement where Ms. Lupien paid for things such as groceries but did not pay for the mortgage. None of these witnesses, however, indicated that Ms. Lupien ever said to them, or stated in their presence, that she was giving up any claim to the house.
35 From his testimony, Mr. Peterson’s concern appeared to be whether he would be getting any rent proceeds from Ms. Lupien as he was, at the time, the part owner of the property. It was in that context that a conversation took place, the full details of which he was not clear on in his evidence. The one aspect of the conversation that he did recall was Mr. LeBlanc saying that he would pay everything associated with the cost of the home – “Melanie” would not have an interest and the house would go to the kids. Mr. Peterson noted that Ms. Lupien had no reaction to this statement, did not protest, and just nodded her head.
36 As noted in Doell at para. 71, an agreement under s. 95(2)(b) of the FLA has to be clearly established by the evidence. The evidence in this case does not clearly establish the existence of an agreement. As noted, Ms. Lupien denies the agreement. Her conduct in paying for groceries, utilities and assisting with renovations also belies a clear understanding that she had no interest in the home. Throughout the relationship, she expressed concerns about maintaining her interest in the property from the perspective of a potential claim from Mr. LeBlanc’s wife, to whom he was still married, although separated. This was the nature of her concern.
37 I therefore find there was no oral agreement and as such, s. 95(2)(b) has no application.
Oral Family Contracts Can Be Enforced
Finally, our top-rated* Vancouver Family Property Agreements Lawyers want you to understand that despite popular belief, oral contracts are enforceable if proven. However, having to prove and rely on them to enforce our rights is a terrible situation to be, at best. If your fight is going to come down to “he said” / “she said”, the judge will not be friendly to your cause and for all intents and purposes, you should assume that whatever understanding you had with your spouse will be ignored.
Trying to save money at the start and not paying a lawyer to properly paper the deal can come back to bite you with much higher legal fees and a much poorer result down the road when you try to enforce what you say the unwritten deal was.
Make the smart play from the start and call our Vancouver Family Property Agreements Lawyers today at 1 877 602 9900
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