AIBU to think that this divorce settlement might be overturned?

[Flossyfloof]

My friend went through a nasty divorce about ten years ago and was allowed to stay in the house with her two daughters. I am not sure of all the details but essentially when the split happened her husband stayed in the house and for that time he didn't pay the mortgage so she picked u the arrears when she moved back in. He didn't pay maintenance for the children (2 girls) for a long while but was eventually forced to by the courts.
As part of the settlement she was allowed to stay in the house but the agreement was that when the children had finished their education she would pay the husband a percentage of the equity from the house, at the value it is now, not the value it was then.
Not sure if this is relevant but the husband has had limited contact with their older daughter but none with the younger, since they split up. The child's choice and actually he hasn't had any contact with his older daughter for several months now.
Obviously, the price of the house has gone up considerably since then. She has had a small conservatory put in herself so this will make a difference as well. She has been paying the mortgage all this time, he didn't pay for his daughters for five years, until she took him to court to get the money,
She signed this agreement ten years ago and her ex husband now wants his money.
I am not a solicitor but it does seem to me that the initial agreement was flawed. She has been paying the mortgage, has improved the house, has kept the roof over her daughters' heads for all this time and now he has been round and said he wants his share of the equity. The younger daughter is still in sixth form. This agreement was definitely ratified by the courts.
AIBU to think that the agreement was unfair and that she might be in with a chance of overturning it?
both the children still live with her and if she has to give him the money I think she will have to sell the house and move into a small flat or something and the kids will have to fend for themselves. She does work full time but doesn't earn a great deal so I think she will struggle to raise the money she needs mortgage wise.
I have told her that this original agreement seems wrong to me but I don't want to give her false hope of overturning it and she can't afford to go to a solicitor to represent her.
I also wonder, if the worst comes to the worst and she has to repay the money, if she could give him a small lump sum - I think she could scrape together about £4,000 and pay him, say £100 a month thereafter.
Any suggestions/advice very welcome, thanks!

Once the order is made by the courts that is that, and the fact that she now regrets it is neither here nor there.

If he is in arrears with CM she may be able to deduct that from his share, but the base figure will be the share agreed.

As for pension rights: unless the husband's solicitor was grossly incompetent there will be a clause in the consent order dismissing all claims for maintenance, all claims for pension sharing, all claims for a lump sum, and all claims by the survivor when one of them dies.

Just imagine if she had won the lottery and wanted to sell early and he had said "in that case I want more than the agreed share" - he would not get much sympathy, would he? The whole point of orders like this is that neither party has to worry about how the other is making out in life. He has been entitled to assume ever since the order was made that once the children were done with education he would be entitled to the started percentage of the equity. He still is.

It's odd, in fact, that matrimonial claims are the only ones which adults cannot settle without getting the approval of the court. You can settle a personal injury claim (and the imbalance of power between a claimant and an insurance company is greater than that between any spouses) without the approval of the court and without legal advice. All the more reason why orders such as this should be sacrosanct.

I would link this to your friend and ask her to post.

collaborate

If the conservatory cost £20k and it's increased the value of the house by say £10k she'd get back that £10k before the balance is split in accordance with the terms of the order.

That depends on the terms of the order.

The order should have also made clear that she'd get back the capital she's paid off the mortgage between the date of the order and the eventual sale.

Perhaps it did. But perhaps it did not. That will have been a matter of negotiation at the time. If this is a common-form Mesher order the house will be sold and he will get his percentage of the proceeds net of the mortgage, possibly less any arrears of CM there may be.

I would have thought a good first step would be for your friend to calculate what the costs are that could/should be set off against the amount he is due. Mortgage/lack of payment for children etc., and take that information - together with the legal agreement - to a good solicitor.

I am a solicitor but not a family one and I doubt anyone could advise without knowing what the order actually says. It sounds like. Mesher order though in which case it's standard and won't be overturned. Never heard of the non-resident party accepting payment in instalments. Your friend's choices are to sell or get a mortgage but she will have known since the date of the order that this was coming. I can't see the unfairness myself, particularly not if she can deduct the conservatory costs, but that will all be in the order.
Is he up to date on maintenance for the girls now?

I haven't done family law for some years, but I have come across this sort of case. You don't have to like your clients - just as well, you commonly think that they and their exes deserved each other - and the ones who excite least sympathy are the ones who want to get out of the order they signed when it ceases to work in their favour.

Tell her to sell or get a mortgage he has waited already and provided at least in part a home for his children v much doubt you know all the details but the court did.

Your friend's choices are to sell or get a mortgage but she will have known since the date of the order that this was coming. I can't see the unfairness myself

I agree.

Now there are solicitor's on the thread.

If you discovered years later, your ex lied in proceedings, is there any point going back to court?

Much too broad a question.

It has to be a thundering great lie; it has to have had a material impact on the result; you have to be sure you can prove that it was a lie and the ex knew it was; and you have to have acted promptly when you found out.

Then you might get something out of it.

See a solicitor. Don;t rely on Google, MN, or any other website.

So if he said he and next wife had no money, then suddenly they have £100's of K worth, he isn't paying spousal maintenance for disabled ex family and he and employerwife won't pay csa, would that be enough?

She also was said to have no money yet bought a house not disclosed. He said he was out of work, no savings just debt, said she was working yet she says in blogs she gave up work. Csa said they claimed no benefits they had no savings and just state maternity benefit servicing a £250k mortgage. Yes I would have got a lot more.

I don't want to get my hopes up and spend money I don't have on a solicitor to find out its a waste of time.

How old are the children? Sounds to me like you'd be better off with the CSA trying to get maintenance sorted.
Going back to court is hugely expensive and so unlikely to get you anywhere. No one here is going to advise you to do that especially without knowing the details. I'm not sure what his new wife's circumstances have to do with anything?

The court ordered if he couldn't pay my spousal maintenance he gave up work, she had to, so they pretended they had no money between them. I am disabled with disabled children.

howtorebuild You cannot get good advice without going to a solicitor with the whole story and all the documents you have. If you don't want to do that you are going to have to let it go.

But I will say this: If you've known all about it and done nothing for a substantial time, and I can't define substantial, you will get nowhere.

I haven't known a long time. I had help recently, I have evidence of this, I couldn't work how their business worked, now I know what they did an accountant helped me using companies house documents.

You need professional legal advice, and you won't get it here or anywhere else online.

Anyone in this position ought to see a solicitor, and expect to pay for it too. You're not going to get the substantive advice you need in the free half hour that some solicitors offer, since it's basically just a marketing tool and a way for them to ascertain if it's worth them taking your case on anyway. I understand this will be cost prohibitive for some people, but that's how it is.