Godparent claiming beneficial Interest in my home

[Jazzyjdog]

Hello, thanks in advance for any advice/help and I’ll try be as clear as possible.

Around two years ago my wealthy godparent (also my dads then wife) came to me with a proposal of gifting me a large cash sum with the intention of me then purchasing a house for me and my dad to live in. The idea was it would be a good way of giving me an inheritance down the line without all the taxes and gives us both somewhere to live also as they had spit up. I explained as I was a first time buyer that this would cause problems down the line if me and my partner wished to buy a place of our own as we’d no longer have first time buyers privileges. I was reassured I would not be financially worse off and if a sale was made on the property the profit/large percentage would be mine to cover my loses.
2 years on and we are looking to get our own place. Godparent has now back tracked and the sum of money offered from the sale has dropped dramatically. She has proposed she keeps profit made, I keep tiny sum and my dad keeps the remainder. She is also claiming I only have legal Interest in the property (as I purchased it and my names on the land registry ) but beneficial Interest is for herself, as she gifted the money.
The cash was given to me as a gift, which will be in writing as it needed to be shown where the money came from for money laundering reasons.
i feel as if I’ve been used just so she could save money on taxes as no stamp duty on first house and no cap gains as my main residence therefore she can reap all the profit. Herself and my dad both already own 3 properties each and have a large income from these respectively.

Where do I stand with regards to who has the beneficial Interest? As my uneducated self feels as tho if the house was bought in my name, with my money (although gifted) and my name is the only name in the land title I have full right to sell and keep whatever I please not the other way round?

thanks again I hope this was clear enough.

[ostell]

Gifted equals your money

[des8]

The Beneficial interest she is claoming arises from a "resulting trust"

This comes from a presumption that the money was not intended as a gift, but you were holding the money (or share of the house) in trust for her.
This presumption, however, is easily rebutted by direct evidence that she did intend the money as a gift.

[atticus]

So trawl through letters, emails, texts, WhatsApp messages, birthday cards, in fact anything, in a search for anything that will show that the intention at the time was to make a gift as you have described. And if you find anything, keep it safe and take backup copies.

[dslippy]

Focus particularly on what was said to your solicitors on the purchase. They should have an explanation of where any money was coming from and on the basis on which it was used.