I agree.This forum generally is better than most others when it comes to rational discourse. However, it’s dismaying to see others misconstrue what you wrote (agreeing to intra-family loan willingly only when a certain number of non-negotiables are met) and try to gainsay your point by pointing to a situation when not all of the prerequisites you mentioned are satisfied.
Please read what I highlighted above. If I were your MIL, I would never had made a loan to a child who "borrowed money from me repeatedly and never paid back a dime". That's what "you need to know your kids" means.
I do have one follow-up. Upthread you mentioned balloon payment after a number of years (5, iirc). What would happen if there isn’t a sufficiently good refi opportunity in 5 years?
We would very likely refinance the loan (using a 25 year amortization schedule - to keep them on track to pay it off in 2055 - with another 5-year balloon payment built in).
It is also possible that should an excellent refinance opportunity open up before 5 years, they might well refinance into that and take us out.
Statistics: Posted by MikeG62 — Sat Jan 03, 2026 8:11 am — Replies 57 — Views 3879