Im a real estate agent who loves a good fixer upper! I offered to renovate a property of my fiancé’s (with no charge to him) so that he could get top dollar for it. The project was a much larger undertaking than I expected but I had the time and flexibility. I looked at it as a great learning opportunity for myself and a way to make his life less stressful. He has a very demanding job and never could’ve done it on his own.
When the renovation was completed and it came time to list the house, he wanted to sell it FSBO?! It’s a special property on a very busy street. We live in a small town where it’s very difficult to get your foot in the door selling high end real estate unless you’re from here (which I’m not) or have an opportunity like this. The sale would’ve been huge for my career. When I told him how hurt and offended I was (especially after all I had done to help him) he just got defensive and said his reason was to save money. I explained to him how much the house meant to me and how it would help my career tremendously but he didn’t seem to care. I even offered to do the deal for free leaving him with nothing but the brokerage fee but even then he wouldn’t budge.
It never dawned on me that he wouldn’t use me as the listing agent. I thought he would’ve been excited for me to list it. I’m so hurt and don’t know if I can get past this. For me, It goes far beyond the the sale of the home. It’s the principle. How could someone that loves me so much not want to see me reap the rewards of something I work so hard for? It’s been months since the house sold and I still have trouble accepting it. I’m turning to Reddit for outsiders opinions.
A little bit background information:
The property consisted 7 units. One of which was a short term rental managed by a company. The other 6 units I managed myself to save him time and money. I did this all for free because he’s my fiancé. I wanted to help him assuming he want to help me when the time came. I do well finically but he’s 7 years older than me and makes a lot more than I do given he’s had more time to establish his career then I have.
36 comments
You did the work. He acknowledged it. He should’ve let you sell it. You’re supposed to be a team. So your career experience would be an added bonus to the money you’d make TOGETHER.
He doesn’t love you. He loves what you can do. He cares more about money than people so…. do with that what you will, but it’ll never be what you want, especially if you keep making assumptions for decent behavior instead of communicating expectations.
Sounds like he doesn’t consider your partnership the same way that you do.
Seems like he is more concerned about money and gain than you and your relationship. Some might say that you should have talked about the conditions prior to sale, but in a good relationship it would be given that you get something out of it either career or profit wise.
Is there any chance you can sit him down and talk about it, or do you not want to because you know it will lead into more problems? Because that’s a sign on its own
Well I mean you did him a favor took up a lot of time, that could of gone to furthering your career, you let him know how you felt and he still chose money over it. Just keep in mind next time you do stuff because of your relationship, he would rather take the extra money then let you have credit.
I don’t think that you can move on from this. Has he even proposed any remuneration for your labour, or does he view it as just helping him out? This is a serious betrayal. I would give him the ring back with one if your business cards.
Your story is all over the place, and I can’t tell what’s going on to a sufficient degree to advise you about your relationship. You’re a trade laborer who does rennovations and also a real estate agent and also a property manager for your fiance’s real estate company?
You rennovated “a house” that is also a seven-unit property, with six units managed by you and one managed by another company?
You’re doing a lot of work for free for your fiance’s real estate company because… why, exactly?
Even not understanding what the hell is going on here, I can offer some advice. You describe yourself making a lot of assumptions, and you need to stop doing that. Don’t make assumptions about your personal relationships – you have to actually communicte your needs and boundaries, because people cannot read minds, and most people don’t grow up with identical norms and values – and *especially* don’t make assumptions about your professional relationships. For professional labor, you need to have a contract in place, and you should be getting paid for your productive labor. Unless your labor is a *gift* – which means you’re expecting literally nothing in return, which was not the case here – you need to put the terms in writing, and you should be fairly compensated. That is *especially* important when mixing the professional and personal, so that everyone has the same expectations and understanding; you just found out what can happen when that’s not the case.
I mean, you can’t really forgive someone who isn’t actually asking for your forgiveness. He hasn’t apologized and doesn’t seem to believe he’s done anything wrong.
It sounds to me like he isn’t trying to build a life and a future with you. Otherwise it wouldn’t matter if he paid you a fee from the sale, because ultimately that would be shared money once you marry and would benefit both of you since it would help your career. Also on a purely practical level, renovating the house increased its value so a reasonable person would at least pay you for that. Does he have a habit of being selfish and dismissive of you? I can’t imagine this is an isolated incident.
This man loves money more than you. You sound incredible with your skills and talents. Out there will be some who will want to be in a mutually beneficial relationship with you.
This would be a dealbreaker for me. What an asshole. He saved money by you doing all the work. You deserve way better.
You don’t forgive. It seems like he is using your time, energy, and giving nature to gain, gain, gain, without caring too much about your efforts or feelings. You move forward by realizing that you deserve a lot better than this.
You just learned to never do anything for free. You should have told him up front ‘I renovate it at cost for you but you have to sell through me.’ And gotten that in writing.
No go write off yout time, invested in the guy and the property.
Get married and then take half his stuff. Or you can just call everything off and tell his family exactly why you’re leaving him…
I understand your anger. I could NEVER marry someone after this. Can you honestly see yourself saying marrying him? He betrayed you to save money.
He used you.
Do not marry this one. On the plus side, you learned where his loyalties are before you said I do.
This is the same “partnership” you can expect from you future with him
Wait so you manage 6 units, and he doesn’t pay you???
I’d be having issues with this long before the issue of Reno / listing agent came up. Your fiancé sounds like a cheap asshole at best, manipulative and greedy at worst.
Stop doing anything related to real estate for free, let it be clear that he’s taken advantage of your good nature.
Partners should prosper together. This doesn’t sound like it. That’d a big red flag for me 🚩
Ew leave him. What a selfish human
He doesn’t want your forgiveness because he doesn’t think he’s done anything wrong. Ditch the man and find someone who hypes you up and, you know, actually seems to care about you.
He used you.
Unfortunately, you let him. You were a property manager for free. You renovated the homes for free. He is looking to cut costs. You helped him. You got $0 for all the hard work and money you saved him. You got a taste of what it’ll be like.
Don’t get married to someone this selfish.
Not many people would be able to get past being treated like this.
Yeah, he clearly is not that into you. But he was happy to take your money and time renovating.
This is a relationship deal-breaker.
I’m sorry. You’ll learn from this though and know what to look for as well as how to better protect yourself in the future.
He wanted to do him over the future, you two. Would you ever under cut your SO’s earnings potential to “save some money”.
End it. You already did him an enormous favor by doing the renovations for free …you saved him a lot of time and money, while spending your time and money, to allow for top dollar on the listing price. And then he’s gonna ice you out? Literally end it. He doesn’t care about you one bit
He’s not using you as the listing agent…but he is using you.
Present him with a bill for the renovation. If he paid for materials, present one for the labor costs.
If he balks, says you offered, let him know it was in anticipation of the listing. Since he didn’t list with you, there’s a cost.
Since money seems his primary motivation, hit him where it hurts most, in his wallet.
It sucks but, better to learn that now before you are stuck financially tied to a greedy selfish spouse.
This is so fucking short sighted by him honestly and shows that he doesn’t really care. Like, if you sold this and it boosted your career you would easily make back and then some what he’s saving by selling it himself?
Regardless, do you want to forgive someone who doesn’t want to help you out? Do you want to marry the man who doesn’t want to support you? After you helped and supported him???
Honestly, it sounds like he isn’t at all interested in helping you build your career or in being supportive of you in any way, shape, or form. He hasn’t apologized or tried to make amends.
No matter how I look at your post, it looks like he’s using you. I’d spend some time thinking about the relationship in the context of “what has he done for (me) lately” and if you want to spend any more time on someone who’s not interested in supporting your career.
Edit: You have my permission and encouragement to end the engagement and keep the ring. If he complains, explain sweetly that he never said he’d expect the ring to be returned.
He used you. You should have created a business contract about fixing and selling. He was a better businessman on that, and treated you like a free service. I wouldn’t trust that person.
As a person married to a realtor for years get used to it will happen again when the neighbors daughter gets the listing you spent weeks on
Unpopular Counterpoint to the rest of the thread: don’t mix business with your relationship. As someone who used to do a lot of marriage counseling, the amount of marriages ended by co-ownership of businesses is staggering. You shouldn’t have gotten involved with his business decision without a clear contract and expectations.
Is he an asshole? Yes, probably. Did you set yourself up for this? Yes, absolutely.
It sounds like you had a lot of expectations behind your *good deed*, but never communicated any of them with him beforehand.
IMO this really comes down to not communicating clearly and having different expectations of partnership. There was never a promise of compensation or a conversation about getting the listing upfront so you don’t have anything to “forgive him” for.
I understand feeling hurt, angry, or having resentment because from your perspective it feels like he didn’t have your back and doesn’t care about your career. But if you look at it from his perspective, he likely thinks he helped you by letting you get the experience of remodeling and managing the property.
Is this selfish on his part or is he just oblivious to your needs (and feelings)? That really depends on how often he does this type of thing.
* Does he often take advantage of your kindness?
* Has he asked you to do work projects without compensation before?
* Does he treat you like an equal in the relationship?
* Does he push his expectations onto you but ignore yours?
When we put expectations on others without communicating our needs, we can end up unintentionally breaking our own hearts.
I would probably do some deep introspection about whether or not this is the right partnership for me, take accountability for my part in things, and use this as learning lesson to communicate my needs upfront instead of making assumptions about the outcome of my actions.
He wouldn’t budge? He should be your ex-fiance.
You’re only 28. The right one is out there–and the current one isn’t the right one.
He doesn’t make more than you because he’s had more time to further his career. He makes more than you because he uses people.
He’s a narcissist. He did nothing wrong. You’re an empath looking for how to help. You reasonably assumed a fiancé would want the best for both of you. You forgot that you’re the one who cares about the partnership and he cares about how you make him look. You aren’t supposed to forgive him and stay with him. You’re supposed to forgive him, say thank you for the lesson and then leave him with zero remorse and regret. And never ever be with someone who catapults you from the air inflated pedestal that was only meant to show him in the best light. Read books on narcs. You like fixer uppers. Men are humans. They’re not fixable by anyone other than themselves. And narcissists never do anything wrong. They’re either the hero or the victim in the story. So get used to being the villain when you’re with him.
Sue him. Dump him and sue him. He deserves it. It’s probably not the first time he’s ripped someone off since he did it without blinking an eye.