Buying With Family

Two separate homes, or one home shared: which suits your family

This is the decision that sets everything else. Two households buying into the same multiplex building can either buy two separate homes, each with its own title and its own mortgage, or buy one home together with both names on a single title. The paperwork, the tax treatment, the mortgage and the ease of getting out later all follow from that one choice.

In our experience families default to sharing because it feels like the natural expression of doing something together. It usually is not the better structure. A multiplex is already divided into separate homes, which means you can live in the same building, share a garden, eat together every Sunday, and still each own a home outright.

The short version

  • Two separate homes in one building gives each household its own title, mortgage, tax bill and exit.
  • One shared title means one mortgage that everybody is fully liable for and decisions that require agreement.
  • Sharing a title makes sense when only one home suits and neither household can buy it alone.
  • Selling is the difference that bites hardest: a separate home can be sold without anyone's permission.
  • Whichever you choose, decide it before you make an offer, because changing later means a new transfer and new costs.

What two separate homes actually looks like

You buy home one, your parents buy home two, both in the same building. Each purchase is an ordinary purchase. Each home has its own title registered at the land title office, its own mortgage assessed against that household's income, its own property tax bill and its own share of the strata.

Day to day you are neighbours who happen to be related. You share the building's common areas the way any owners do, through the strata. If one household needs to move, they list their home and sell it. The other household carries on.

The financial independence is the point. If your parents' circumstances change, their home is theirs to deal with. If your income drops, your mortgage is your problem to solve. Neither household's difficulty becomes the other's legal liability, which is a kindness that is hard to appreciate until you need it.

The main constraint is availability. There have to be two homes in the building that suit two different households, and in a four home building that is not always the case. The other constraint is qualifying: each household must be able to carry its own mortgage on its own income.

What one shared home actually looks like

One title, both names, one mortgage. Under British Columbia's Property Law Act a transfer of land to two or more people is treated as a tenancy in common unless a contrary intention appears in the instrument, so unless you say otherwise you will each hold a distinct share.

Sharing works when the households want to share. A parent moving in with an adult child's family, where everybody eats in the same kitchen and the arrangement is genuinely one household in one home, is a good fit. It is also the right answer when only one home in the building works for you and neither household can buy it alone.

What you take on is joint decision making. Selling needs agreement. Refinancing needs agreement. If one side stops contributing, the mortgage is still due and the lender can pursue either of you for all of it. These are manageable problems with a proper agreement in place, and they are serious problems without one.

  • Everyone on the mortgage is liable for the whole loan, not a share of it
  • A sale needs agreement from all owners, or a court application
  • One household's missed payment appears on the other's credit record
  • The first-time buyer reliefs are assessed on every buyer, so one prior owner can remove them
  • A co-ownership agreement is essential, and needs to be signed before completion

A test worth running before you decide

Ask each household to answer three questions separately, in writing, and then compare the answers. It takes an evening and it prevents most of the trouble we see.

First: if you had to move in three years, for a job or for health, what would you want to be able to do? If the answer is sell without asking anybody, that points to separate homes. Second: whose name is going on what, and does everybody agree that is fair? Write the numbers down. Third: if one household could not pay its share for six months, what should happen? An honest answer to that question is the single most useful thing a family can produce before buying.

If the three answers line up easily, either structure will work and you can pick on price and availability. If they do not, you have found the disagreement early, which is exactly when it is cheap to resolve.

The middle option nobody mentions

There is a third structure worth knowing about, which is two separate homes where one household lends the other some of the deposit.

This keeps the clean structure of separate titles and separate mortgages, while still letting the family with more capital help the family with less. The loan is documented, it is repayable on terms you agree, and it can be secured against the borrowing household's home if both sides want that protection.

It has to be handled properly with your lender, because a loan is a debt and it affects what the borrowing household can qualify for. Some lenders will not accept a borrowed deposit at all, and others will accept it only on terms. Ask that question early, and never describe a loan as a gift on a lender's form, because that is a false statement on a credit application.

In our view this middle route is underused. It gets families most of the benefit of pooling money without any of the entanglement of a shared title, and it can be unwound simply by repaying the loan.

It also leaves each household's tax position intact. Because the first-time buyer reliefs are assessed against every buyer on a purchase, keeping the parent off the title keeps the children's eligibility where it was, which on a home near the threshold can be worth more than the interest on any loan between you.

The one thing to be careful about is documenting it at the time. A loan agreed verbally and repaid over years, with no paperwork, turns into an argument about whether it was ever a loan at all. Write it down when the money moves, while everybody remembers the same version.

What each route costs to set up

Two purchases cost more at the start than one. There are two sets of legal fees, two title registrations, two property transfer tax calculations and two mortgage arrangements. A family looking only at the closing costs will conclude that sharing is cheaper, and on day one it is.

The comparison that matters runs over the whole time you own the homes. A shared title carries costs that arrive later: the legal work of a co-ownership agreement, the eventual cost of a buyout when one household moves, and the possibility of a court application if the households cannot agree. It also affects tax relief, because the first-time buyer exemptions are assessed against every buyer on a purchase rather than against the household as a whole.

So the honest summary is that separate homes cost more now and usually less over time, and shared title costs less now and can cost a great deal later. Which is better for your family depends on whether the later scenarios are likely, and the household that says they will never move is the one to be most careful about.

There is one more cost that never appears on a closing statement, which is the time and goodwill a shared title consumes. Every refinancing, every insurance renewal and every decision about a repair needs two households to agree. None of those conversations is difficult on its own. Over twenty years they add up, and they land unevenly on whichever household is better organised.

  • Two purchases: two sets of legal fees, two registrations, two tax calculations
  • One purchase: one set of closing costs, plus a co-ownership agreement
  • Later costs of sharing: buyouts, refinancing, and disagreements
  • Tax relief is assessed per buyer, which can favour separate purchases
  • Ask your lawyer to price both routes before you decide on the cheaper looking one

Questions buyers ask

For most families, two separate homes in the same building is the better structure, because each household keeps its own title, its own mortgage and the ability to sell without anyone's agreement. Sharing one title is the right answer when the households genuinely want to live as one home, or when only one home in the building suits and neither could buy it alone.
Where a building has homes that suit both households and both are available, buying two is an ordinary pair of purchases and nothing in law prevents relatives buying neighbouring homes. The practical limits are availability, since a small multiplex may only have four homes, and qualifying, since each household must carry its own mortgage on its own income.
If only one household can qualify, sharing a single title with a joint mortgage is one answer, and a documented loan between the households toward a deposit is another that keeps the titles separate. Which works depends on your lender's rules, so ask before you make an offer rather than after your financing condition is running.
Two purchases mean two sets of legal fees, two title registrations and two property transfer tax calculations rather than one, so the transaction costs are higher. Set that against what a shared title costs later if one household wants out, and against the tax reliefs that are assessed per buyer, before deciding the cheaper looking option is actually cheaper.
Combining two homes in a strata building is not a decision an owner can take alone, because it affects the strata plan and the common property, and it needs the strata corporation's involvement under the Strata Property Act. Treat it as unlikely rather than as a plan, and buy homes that work as they are.
Sharing a title means sharing ownership of one home rather than of a building, so the space you each occupy is a matter of agreement between you rather than of separate legal rights. If what you actually want is your own front door, own kitchen and own home, then two separate homes in one building is the structure that gives you that.
Settle it before you make offers, not after, and write it down. The usual deciding factors are stairs, outdoor space and parking, in that order. A household with someone who does not manage stairs easily should take the ground floor home, and that constraint should be treated as fixed rather than as a preference to be negotiated later.
Whether a home in a multiplex can be rented out is governed by the strata bylaws for that building, which are a public document you can read before buying. If either household might want to let their home at some point, check the bylaws on that specific question first, because a restriction is much easier to discover now than to change afterwards.
One household lends the other part of the deposit, both keep separate titles and separate mortgages, and the loan is documented with terms for repayment. It gives families the benefit of pooled capital without a shared title. Tell your lender it is a loan, because a debt affects what the borrowing household can qualify for and describing it as a gift would be a false statement.
Decide it before you make an offer. The structure changes what you can afford, which homes suit, what your lender will approve and how the transfer is drawn, so a family that shops first and structures later usually ends up redoing work. An evening spent answering the three questions on this page saves weeks.
Moving from a shared title to separate ownership means a new transfer, new legal fees and potentially property transfer tax on the change, so it is possible and it is not cheap. That expense is the practical reason to get the structure right at the outset rather than treating it as something you can adjust once everybody has settled in.
Your lawyer needs to know who is buying, in what shares, where the money is coming from, whether any of it is a loan between you, and what you want to happen if one household wants out. Bring the answers to the first meeting. Every one of those points has to be settled before a transfer can be drawn correctly.

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Where these numbers come from

Every figure on this page comes from the body that issues it. Rules and rates change, so each entry says when we checked it.

  1. Property Law Act, RSBC 1996, c. 377, section 11 (Tenancy in common). BC Laws, Queen's Printer for British Columbia. Accessed 29 August 2026.
  2. Strata Property Act, SBC 1998, c. 43. BC Laws, Queen's Printer for British Columbia. Accessed 29 August 2026.
  3. First Time Home Buyers' Program. Province of British Columbia. Thresholds effective 1 April 2024, accessed 29 August 2026.

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