Unmarried couples can get a mortgage together through nearly every lender, and federal law bars lenders from refusing you because you aren’t married.1Federal Trade Commission. Equal Credit Opportunity Act What makes mortgage loans for unmarried couples different is everything that happens around the loan: the lender treats you as two separate people, each fully responsible for the whole debt, and the legal scaffolding that protects married borrowers in a breakup doesn’t exist for you by default. You have to build it yourselves.
Each of You Owes the Entire Loan
When two people sign a mortgage promissory note, each borrower takes on joint and several liability. The lender can pursue either of you for the full balance if payments stop.2Department of Housing and Urban Development. Model Subordinate Note and Mortgage Forms If your partner walks away, defaults, or simply can’t pay, the lender doesn’t come after you for half. They come after you for everything.
Late payments and defaults land on both credit reports, no matter which partner caused the problem. A private deal between you about who pays what means nothing to the lender. If one of you covers more than the agreed share to keep the loan current, you’d have to chase your partner separately to be made whole. Married couples face the same liability structure, but they have divorce courts to divide debts and assets. You don’t, which is why the co-ownership agreement below matters so much.
How Lenders Will Judge the Two of You
Credit Scores
Lenders pull all three bureau reports for each applicant and take the middle score for each person. They then use the lower of the two middle scores as the representative score for the loan.3Fannie Mae. Determining the Credit Score for a Mortgage Loan If your middle score is 740 and your partner’s is 680, the 680 sets your interest rate and determines which loan programs are open to you, even though half the borrowing team has excellent credit.4Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. Does My Credit Score Affect My Ability To Get a Mortgage Loan or the Mortgage Rate I Pay?
Because of that math, some couples choose to put the loan in the higher-scoring partner’s name alone. The tradeoff is that only the applying partner’s income counts toward qualifying, and only that partner is on the mortgage. If you go this route, you absolutely need a co-ownership agreement that protects the non-borrowing partner’s financial stake in the home.
Debt-to-Income Ratio
When you both apply, the lender combines your gross monthly incomes and weighs that against your combined monthly debts, including the new mortgage payment. Most conventional lenders want the resulting debt-to-income ratio below 45 to 50 percent. The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau replaced the old 43 percent Qualified Mortgage ceiling with price-based thresholds, giving lenders more room to approve higher ratios.5Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. General QM Loan Definition Staying under 43 percent still tends to get you better pricing.
How You Should Hold Title
The deed to the property is a separate decision from the mortgage, and the lender doesn’t care which way you go. For unmarried couples, the two realistic options are tenancy in common and joint tenancy with right of survivorship.
Tenancy in Common
Tenancy in common lets each partner own a specific percentage, and those shares don’t have to be equal. If you put in 70 percent of the down payment and your partner put in 30 percent, you can hold title in the same proportions. When one owner dies, the deceased person’s share passes through their estate under their will or state intestacy rules, not to the surviving partner automatically. That means tenancy in common pairs naturally with estate planning: if you want your partner to inherit your share, your will needs to say so.
Joint Tenancy With Right of Survivorship
Joint tenancy gives both of you equal, undivided ownership of the whole property. If one partner dies, the other automatically takes full ownership without probate.6Justia. Joint Ownership With Right of Survivorship and Legally Transferring Property To hold up as a joint tenancy, both owners generally need to have taken their interest at the same time, through the same deed, in equal shares, and with equal rights to use the property. If any of those conditions fails, a court may treat the arrangement as a tenancy in common.
The equal-share requirement can create a gift tax wrinkle. If one partner puts up most of the money but you take equal title, the IRS may treat the excess as a gift from the paying partner to the other. For 2026, the annual gift tax exclusion is $19,000 per recipient.7Internal Revenue Service. Gifts and Inheritances Anything above that may require a gift tax return, though no tax is actually owed until you exceed the lifetime exemption of $15,000,000.8Internal Revenue Service. What’s New — Estate and Gift Tax Tenancy in common sidesteps this because each person’s share can simply match what they contributed.
Put a Co-Ownership Agreement in Writing
A co-ownership agreement is a private contract between you and your partner that covers everything the mortgage and deed don’t. Married couples have an entire body of family law to fall back on. You have only what you write down. Treat this document as non-negotiable.
At a minimum, the agreement should spell out each partner’s share of the down payment and how equity is divided if the home is sold. It should set who pays what portion of the monthly mortgage, property taxes, insurance, and repair costs, and explain how unequal contributions affect each person’s equity over time.
The most important provisions cover what happens if the relationship ends. A good agreement includes a buyout clause: how the home will be appraised, how long the buying partner has to secure financing, and what happens if neither partner can afford to buy the other out. In that case, the agreement should set a timeline for listing the home and explain how the proceeds get split after the mortgage and closing costs are paid.
What Happens Without One
Without a co-ownership agreement, either partner can file a partition action, which is a lawsuit asking a court to resolve the dispute. Courts generally either divide the property (rare for a house) or order a forced sale and split the proceeds. Forced sales often go for less than market value, and both partners lose money. A court can adjust each partner’s share based on who contributed more toward the mortgage, taxes, and upkeep, but that accounting adds legal fees and uncertainty. A co-ownership agreement drafted by a real estate attorney costs a tiny fraction of a partition lawsuit.
How Loan Programs Treat You Differently
Conventional Loans
Conventional loans backed by Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac are the most straightforward. Both partners apply, both incomes count, and credit is scored using the lowest-middle-score method above. There are no special rules tied to your relationship status. The practical ceiling is simply that the weaker applicant pulls down the terms for both of you.
FHA Loans
FHA permits co-borrowers who don’t occupy the home, but adds restrictions when they’re involved. For an unmarried couple where both of you will live in the house, the ordinary FHA rules apply: all co-borrowers must take title, sign the note, and sign the security instrument.9Department of Housing and Urban Development. What Are the Guidelines for Co-Borrowers and Co-Signers
VA Loans
VA loans are where unmarried couples hit the biggest obstacle. When a veteran applies with a non-veteran, non-spouse co-borrower, the VA guaranty covers only the veteran’s portion of the loan. The non-veteran’s half typically requires a down payment to make up for the missing guaranty, which wipes out the zero-down benefit that draws most buyers to VA loans in the first place.10U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs. VA Home Loan Guaranty Buyer’s Guide The exact down payment depends on the price and the veteran’s available entitlement. If both of you are veterans, each can use your own entitlement and the full guaranty applies.
Taxes Work Differently Than for Married Couples
Unmarried co-owners file separate returns, and a few of those differences actually favor you.
Mortgage Interest
You can deduct interest on up to $750,000 of home acquisition debt.11Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 26 USC 163 – Interest For married couples filing jointly, that limit applies to the couple as one unit. For unmarried co-owners, federal courts have held the limit applies per taxpayer, which effectively doubles the household cap to $1.5 million.12Justia. Voss v. Commissioner, No. 12-73257 (9th Cir. 2015) For most buyers this is irrelevant, but on expensive property it’s a real advantage.
To claim the deduction, you must be legally obligated on the mortgage and must actually pay the interest. Each partner deducts only what they personally paid.13Internal Revenue Service. Other Deduction Questions If you split payments from a joint account, each of you deducts half. Keep records.
Property Taxes
The same splitting rule applies to property taxes: each partner deducts the share they actually paid.13Internal Revenue Service. Other Deduction Questions State and local tax deductions, property tax included, are subject to a cap, and each partner gets their own cap, which is another small edge over joint filers. Both of you have to itemize to claim these benefits, so if your share of interest and taxes is modest, the standard deduction may be worth more.
Don’t Forget Homeowners Insurance
Standard homeowners policies cover named insureds and their family members living in the home. Because unmarried partners aren’t legally family in most states, a policy in one partner’s name may not cover the other partner’s belongings or liability. Both of you should be listed as named insureds. If your insurer won’t add a non-spouse co-owner, the unnamed partner can carry renter’s insurance to cover personal property and liability. Ask your agent to confirm coverage for both of you before closing. A gap here can leave one partner with no protection at all after a fire, theft, or injury claim.