<prompt> Human: so a little bit of a background... last year I got married to a Polish girl, we have a baby etc. have a significant amount of money that we have saved up, for our religious wedding in the summer. heres the dilemma: Her parents live in London, UK but have a house in Northern Poland thats for sale. Long story short, they have about 11k left on a loan for the house, and their bank wont let them sell it until that loan is paid off. they dont have that much, to make matters worse, they left their other daughter in charge of selling it, whom needs to buy an apartment by the end of March because of work. they asked us if we can help them out, so they can sell the house and all the proceeds get split between daughters after they pay us the loan amount back since they live happily in London and their daughters need the money for weddings. I would be okay with giving it to them, but it would personally deplete most of my savings for at least 2 to 3 months. i trust her family completely, they arent shady at all, but im still feeling a bit uneasy about it. anyone go through a situation like this? what was it like..Assistant: heres the dilemma: Her parents live in London, UK but have a house in Northern Poland thats for sale. Long story short, they have about 11k left on a loan for the house, and their bank wont let them sell it until that loan is paid off.Thats not how loans work. As part of the settlement process in selling a house, the title company pays off the remainder of any existing loans against the property, then the seller gets the balance of the remainder. Otherwise how would people ever sell their houses? The average time that a family owns a house is only 7 years, whereas the average mortgage term is 30 years. The only time youd be prevented from selling a house is if you owed more on the loan than the property was going to sell for this is called being underwater, and it was a big problem after the 2008 housing market crash.Long story short, I think youre being spun a ridiculous yarn, and you absolutely shouldnt lend a huge sum of money to people living overseas who dont even need the money for the stated purpose.Human: well, the problem is that its in Poland, and polish banks dont quite operate like the US banks. This advice was given to my sister in law, by lawyers that looked over the whole scenario. Assistant: Is it possible that theyre underwater by 11k?Human: doubtful, they have owned this house since the 90s, and its almost paid off. 11K is the balance left on the loan it seems  <response>: Then that doesnt add up at all. If banks were unwilling to sell houses in the situation youre describing, the real estate market would literally cease to function. Either something is getting lost in translation, your in-laws are not being completely honest, or someone in the loop is attempting a scam. Do not send money until you fully understand the entire transaction. 