For over a decade, Breanna Lane says she sent thousands of dollars to her parents each month, believing she was paying toward owning the home where she and her family lived.
Her parents, Alan and Wendy Briggs, were under a very different impression. Realestate.com.au writes that, according to Mom and Dad, those payments were actually just rent, and there was never an agreement that the house would eventually belong to their daughter.
The dispute centers on a three-bedroom home in Swanbourne, Australia, that her parents bought for AU$1.1 million in 2014. Lane says she paid her parents AU$550,162 over roughly 11 years, equivalent to about US$394,000, as converted by XE.
When her parents moved to sell the property, Lane went to the Supreme Court of Western Australia in an effort to stop them from selling. The judge has greenlit the path to selling the property—but the fight over who is entitled to the money is not quite resolved.
Eleven Years of Payments, Two Very Different Stories
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Lane told the court that she and her husband were struggling financially in 2014. According to the Daily Mail, her parents stepped in to help them buy a home. They looked at what the couple could manage and calculated the loan, interest, and weekly repayment cost. They found that repayment would cost about AU$1,000 a week, which was about the same as the rent Lane had been paying according to Realestate.com.au.
She says the understanding was that her parents would buy the property in their names while she and her husband made routine payments of AU$4,300, about US$3,080. Lane believed the home would eventually change hands to her and her husband.
According to Realestate.com.au, Lane said she made 69 payments, totaling AU$296,700 between December 2014 and August 2020. From that point through April 2026, she then paid an additional AU$253,462. Lane claimed to have also spent thousands more on improvements, everything from electrical work to air conditioning, security, and even a fireplace.
Many of her bank transfers were labeled “mortgage,” Lane told the court. Her parents, however, said some transfers were labeled “rent,” and denied ever promising her ownership of the property.
The House Can Sell, but the Money Is Staying Put
Lane had placed a caveat on the property title. This essentially served as a formal notice asserting that she had an interest in the home, in the hopes of preventing the sale from simply proceeding around her claim. Justice Larissa Strk ordered it removed, allowing her parents to sell, according to Realestate.com.au.
That does not mean the court ruled Lane has no claim to the property. The Supreme Court of Western Australia found that she had raised an issue worth hearing, although Strk warned Lane her case was not the strongest.
Lane now has 21 days to formally pursue her claim over the property in court. If the house sells while that case is underway, the disputed portion of the sale money will be held until the court decides who is legally entitled to it.
Realestate.com.au estimates that about AU$800,000 to AU$850,000 could remain after the mortgage and other costs have been paid for. So, while Lane could not stop the sale, she has not yet lost the debate over whether at least some of that money does indeed belong to her.