Breakups suck (unless you’ve been in an abusive relationship, in which case, it’s great that you’ve gotten away – congrats!)

Perhaps the worst part, once you’ve decided to split, is dividing your assets, especially if you’re married.

Making it fair is almost impossible, especially when sentimentality is entwined with monetary value.

That’s what the guy in this story discovered when debating the land he co-owned with his ex-wife.

Read on to find out what happened.

AITA for wanting to keep my property?

Five and a half years ago, my ex-wife and I bought a property for $300.000.

It was five acres with a mobile home on it.

Our plan was to built our forever home on it, so we took the mobile home off and started prep on everything – including paying a deposit to the builder.

During all of this we ended up separating.

Let’s see how this affected their property plans.

We have two young children together and weren’t interested in dating other people. We also agreed we might potentially reconcile in the future, so I offered to keep going with the build.

We agreed that when it was finished, she could have 1 floor/suite and I could have the other floor/suite (completely closed off from each other) until our problems were resolved OR we could sell the property with the new house on it and both make a profit.

She said she couldn’t do that (live with me in the same house) and wanted to sell the property.

At the point we separated there was nothing built on the property so it was considered bare land and we still owed $240,000.

And this has left them both in a really sticky situation.

I couldn’t get a mortgage in my own name because the amount owing was higher than 50% of the assessed value of our property.

But now our property has been reassessed for 2026 from $350,000 to $460,000, which means I now could qualify for a mortgage on the property by myself.

It’s currently been up for sale for about half a year at $400,000 with no bites, and I have seen way nicer properties sell for less in our vicinity.

So I offered to buy her out by giving her $40,000 cash. I would be basically buying the property myself for $350,000, minus the $240,000 we still have to pay off and the Realtor costs split between us.

Read on to find out how his ex-wife responded to his offer.

She said that wasn’t fair to her, since all she gets its $40k and I get a whole property.

She’s not moving on it and refuses to talk about it and just argues that if I build a house on it after I buy her out for $40k, the property would be worth a lot more and she’d lose out on that value. So all she’s getting is that $40k, and I’m getting an opportunity to build this property into something way more valuable.

My point is that even if we sell it at $350,000 – which I doubt it would sell at – we’d both only get $30,000 and I’d just buy another property to do what I originally wanted to do with this property, which she obviously would not have a claim to either.

So I don’t understand why she would care about what I would do with this property after she gets the buy-out, which is basically the same as if it would be sold to someone else.

AITA?

He’s right – for his ex-wife she would actually be getting better value and a bigger cash bonus if she simply accepted this money from her ex-husband and signed over the land.

If his math is accurate, that is.

As it stands, she’s keeping them locked in turmoil with no way forward.

Let’s see what the Reddit community made of this.

This person agreed that she’d be better off taking the deal.

However, others were suspicious about the numbers.

Meanwhile, this Redditor thought that there were too many feelings involved.

It’s tough dividing assets during a breakup, and it feels like this guy thinks he’s giving his ex a fair deal.

But if she’s just seeing dollar signs when it comes to the house build, it’s understandable that she’s hesitant to agree.

They both need to get legal advice.

If you enjoyed that story, read this one about a mom who was forced to bring her three kids with her to apply for government benefits, but ended up getting the job of her dreams.