Has anyone gotten married, or a new partner, after claiming the CIL exemption but before the 3 year post completion period, and then added the partner to the property title so you could get a joint mortgage?

I asked my council CIL team if I could do this and they said if my partner was added to the title in order for us to get a joint mortgage, regardless of % ownership they'd have and myself still living there, they would consider it a sale and disqualifying event for the CIL exemption.

They said any change whatsoever to title ownership would disqualify the exemption. This also covers divorce + death. If myself and my partner started as joint owners before the exemption, but got divorced, exemption gone - even if one of us continued living there but the other moved out. And if I died, my partner better remember to inform the council within 14 days otherwise they'll start racking up fines on top of the full CIL being due as I'd both be no longer living there and there would be a change in the property title.

I've tried to find some case law on this but came up with nothing, and I can't imagine there would be no cases if this was applied everywhere. So is my council especially harsh, but technically correct, or are they incorrectly interpreting what constitutes a sale of the property?

I think there’s a least one case of that been reported here on ‘t ‘ub.

There's no discretion with the CIL Exemption, so I doubt there's any value in looking there.

Where you should be looking is more towards the mortgage side. A Joint Borrower Sole Proprietor (JBSP) scheme is commonly used where someone is financially supporting another. It's a specific type of mortgage often used where parents are helping kids out, or, in your situation, where you are navigating CIL Exemption or pursuing Tax Planning advantages. It allows someone to be financially responsible for a debt without having to change the title deeds, which is almost always required for a standard joint mortgage.

Best to speak to a mortgage advisor and a legal representative, and also important for your partner/wife to understand the implications from their perspective, at least for the period of the CIL Exemption where they would not be named on the deeds but would still have a financial obligation.

>>> There's no discretion with the CIL Exemption

Of course there is - just because your LPA has the legal right to screw you over, it doesn’t mean they have the moral right to screw you over.

At the very least they could pro-rate but it wouldn’t be unthinkable for our ‘public servants’ to … serve the public.

Edited 1 minute ago1 min by Alan Ambrose