Don't need a ring to live together? You still ought to make it legal

Marriage may just be a piece of paper, but other pieces of paper are vital for cohabiting couples

Gone are the days when you didn't live with your partner until you were married. Millions of couples in the UK choose to cohabit without tying the knot. But what a lot don't realise is that unmarried couples do not have the same property rights as those who are married, regardless of how long they have been together.

Contrary to popular belief there is no such thing as "Common Law" marriage; this was abolished by an Act of Parliament in 1753. But as the number of cohabiting couples rises, the potential for problems is increasing.

"The law is there to protect the vulnerable and this is an area crying out for reform," says Peter Watson-Lee, chairman of the Law Society's Family Committee and a solicitor at Williams Thompson, based in Christchurch, Dorset, which specialises in divorce cases.

The situation affects couples across a wide spectrum of society, as Mr Watson-Lee explains: "Same-sex couples aren't allowed to marry, so can't build up the rights [of married couples]. We're trying to persuade the Government to tackle the problem and we're arguing that any couple living together as man and wife should have [similar] rights."

The Government last week announced plans for same-sex couples to have the same rights as married partners, but for unmarried heterosexual couples the law isn't likely to change in the near future. So if you are setting up home together it is important you protect your interests. If you don't, complications might arise should one of you die or the relationship break up.

If you're buying somewhere together, you should own the property as "tenants in common" rather than "joint tenants". The law regards joint tenants as owning the property 50:50, making no distinction between partners. But tenants in common hold their own individual share of the property, which may not be equal.

Mr Watson-Lee advises signing a deed of trust, stipulating the terms under which your home ownership is registered and setting out what your respective shares are. It is common for one party to put down a larger proportion of the deposit when buying a property; it is vital that such an arrangement is stated in a legally binding document.

Another imperative for co-habiting couples is to draw up a will. Ray Boulger, senior technical manager at mortgage broker Charcol, explains: "If you're married, your share of the property would automatically go to your surviving spouse, but this wouldn't be the case for unmarried couples. Despite this," he continues, "I suspect about 80 to 90 per cent of people in this situation haven't made a will."

If you die without having made a will, your estate will be divided up according to rigid inheritance laws and the bulk of it will pass to your next of kin. If you're married this is your spouse, but if you're not it will be a member of your family. This could be distressing for your surviving partner, who would have no right to your share of the property.

Similarly, it is important to take out life assurance so that your partner will be able to afford to remain in the property if you die. Whether you are tenants in common or not, Mr Boulger says that if you have a mortgage together, you are jointly liable for the whole loan. So if either partner can't contribute to the mortgage, the other would still have to pay the full monthly repayments.

Life cover will clearly relieve the financial pressure should one partner die, but in the case of a relationship breaking up, the mortgage still has to be taken into account. Even if they are married, a couple may have to sell up if they separate and neither can afford to buy the other out and take on the full mortgage repayments.

Further complications can arise when unmarried cohabit- ing couples live in a property owned by only one partner. Recent research from Charcol found a 38 per cent rise in the number of single people buying a home. Generally, we're leaving it much later before we settle down. As a result, a lot of couples find that, when they do decide to move in together, one (or both) will already own their own prop- erty. In this case, one partner often moves into the other's home and the couple then live as if the property were co-owned, splitting the mortgage payments, bills and day-to-day living costs.

But should they then split up, the partner who had moved in would have no claim on the property. This may seem fair if the couple have been living together for only a short time before the relationship falls apart, but there have been cases of people splitting from their partners after years of cohabitation with nothing to show for it. Even if you've been contributing to the mortgage for 10 years, in the eyes of the law you still have no claim to any share of that property.

"Paying [half] the outgoings isn't sufficient to give you an interest in the house," confirms Mr Watson-Lee. "But if you add on, say, an extension so that you have invested money in the property, you then start to build up a claim." He adds that if a couple have children but then split up and the house is owned by the father, the mother may in some cases be allowed to stay on in the property until the youngest child is 18. She would then have to move out and would have no further rights. "But it's all very iffy," warns Mr Watson-Lee. It's really down to what the court decides in individual cases.

Most couples moving in together firmly believe their relationship will last for ever, and it may not be easy for one of them to broach the subject of legal protection. But unfortunately statistics show that unmarried cohabitants are more likely to split up than their married counterparts, with around half of such relationships not staying the course. And even if your relationship remains rock solid, it is still equally important to make it legally binding so that, on your death, your wishes will be carried out and you won't be leaving your partner to become a victim of the laws of intestacy.