Now I aint saying she's a golddigger...

[FeelingGoodAsHelll]

Hello all

My title is exactly how I am being made to feel right now.

Me and my husband are currently separating - we aren't legally separated just yet - we need to agree on minute of agreement which will be issued hopefully soon - his solicitor is drawing them up.

We bought out house 2 years before getting married. My STBXH paid the deposit (around 25k). I had just finished uni at that point and was in a trainee role.. so my salary was peanuts for a while. His parents gifted £5k to US (no paperwork, nothing) a few years back and paid towards some of our wedding too. Again, it was to US, no paperwork.

My STBXH, as he earns x4 my salary, decided to overpay the mortgage every month, as he could afford to, and wanted to reduce our mortgage quickly etc. I didnt overpay as I had a lower salary and couldnt afford to. The mortgage / bill split was probably 70/30 (me paying 30, I didnt decide this split, he put everyhthing into a spreadsheet which worked out what we should both pay, his idea).

We verbally made an agreement that I could keep something (I wont say what as it will be very outing) if I dont touch his pension & savings account. He also wanted me to give back his deposit, which I intially agreed but house prices are high so I said no that I wanted the house split 50/50 as per title deeds. He agreed. He then came over a few days ago and told me that he wanted me to agree to not touch anything in his personal bank account (I said I wouldnt, why would I?!). He then said that he wanted x, y, z item from the house added to this "list". I started to get annoyed as this list is getting bigger and bigger and all I wanted was one thing.

Anyway, he said he would buy me out, and pay me half the house, he told me the figure he could afford. Home report came back below this figure (by quite a bit). He now tells me he can't afford it, despite telling me the bank has agreed to lend him the money. He then asked if I would decrease my share. I asked by how much. He then said he wanted all overpayments, his deposit, and all monetary gifts his mum and dad deducted from my share. I told him that we should just sell the house if he can't afford to buy me out, he is reluctant to do this.

I Told him he was taking the piss and that he wont be happy until I walk away with nothing. He profoundly apologised, said he would move money around to get the funds (So he can afford it). I then picked a solicitor who told me that my verbal agreement was rubbish and that she wanted to see all bank accounts, savings, pensions to see what I am legally entitled to. I disagreed but she was quite adamant. I gave my STBXH the heads up about this to which he said, "if you or your solicitor ask any questions, or try and take my pension or savings, the fighting gloves will come on and mud will be thrown... youll walk away with a lot less than 50%, you'll regret it".

In the meantime, he keeps telling me to put offers on properties so I can move out asap but I can't as I don't know what my deposit will be. He keeps telling me to get a mortgage in principle, which I have but they are really low as I am putting down the worst case scenario, i.e. if I do end up with nothing. He told me that he won't give me my share of the money until I give my keys back to him (if he buys me out). I offered to move into my dads, so I can get this money and move on, but asked if I could keep bigger furniture in our house (my dads house is tiny) until I move in my own house, he said no, once I move out, I cant come back. I feel like he is pressuring me. My solicitor said he is bullying me and I should call bluff on the thing he has promised that I can have if I dont touch x, y, z.

I only want 50/50 split on house and the promised thing. However, I feel he is being unfair and pressuring me.

AIBU??

This split was mutal!!

I dont work from home, sadly.
I would have to take a days holiday.
I might text back and ask the time, ask my dad to be present - I dont know, this is all getting silly now

I dont understand how it is opportunist or golddigging to recieve half the value of the house (when mortgage is taken off) when we agreed this when we moved in. How is that opportunist?! We literally agreed to it!!

Don't reply except to say you prefer to communicate via solicitor from this point forward.

Take her advice, she knows what she's doing.

You really need to grey rock and go through the solicitors.
At least you have in writing he only sees the dog as a bargaining piece.

You are thinking purely about financial assets in terms of what’s fair historically.

even where there are no children, the Op has clearly stated she’s contributed more to keep that house clean. Evidence is that in most households the woman, or predominantly stay at home man ( eg the low wage or unwaged partner) picks up the lion share or domestic duties, emotional labour, counsellor, etc. how much has the unwaged/ low wage contributed to creating an environment that’s allowed the partner to earn a bigger salary, and with it tuck aside a bigger pension.

you can bet your bottom dollar that if the Op had been in a higher earning/demanding career as well the husband would not have the lifestyle he has. It is extremely difficult to hold down 2 highfliers household unless you start to buy in domestic services. High flying jobs demand long hours, travel potentially and a lot of head space outside of working hours, including the stress that comes with it.

what is that worth financially? The domestic cleaner, laundry, ironing, PA, counsellor etc etc - if he was paying for that, including a pension for that employee, he’d not be as well off

That is why the law doesn’t want to start Nit-picking over who contributed what . How do you place a value on these ?

when my settlement was agreed, I didn’t nitpick over the fact that my ex had not worked for last 17 years of our marriage and I was only breadwinner . Ok, for some of that he was ill, but at times he could and should have got work. Yes, at times I resented that he couldn’t or wouldn’t contribute his share ….but that’s what marriage is. I was also aware that if he’d not been cooking dinner every night, collecting kids from school, I’d not have been able to do the job I did and earn wage I did. His contributions weren’t massive in terms of time or effort ( I was still doing lion share of domestic and child care) but they were significant to our wealth and assets at point we divorced. Yes, it was painful to accept for me when I realised that I’d continue to have to “support” him in effect by the asset split , especially asi was divorcing him due to his unreasonable behaviour …but once I realised that’s how law works, and no amount of anger, battles or expensive solicitors would change that much in terms of “ fair settlement”, I accepted it and got on with it.

It really isn’t. What you both earned while married belongs to both of you. If you were a greedy person you’d want half of everything. You are legally entitled to it. There will be people here that will criticize you, but I think you know in your heart that you are being beyond fair.

He’s not a nice person if he’s only coming to see the dog in order to scare you and JT certainly seems like the case. I think he’s sitting on a pot of gold and is afraid you’ll find out. Your priorities (you dog, him money) tell the story here.

You have a right to split the value of the home so that you can move forward to a new stable home.

He also sounds angry about the split, despite previously saying otherwise.

And the fact it’s a short marriage? Have you even googled the cases which define a short marriage?

Take the excellent advice some of the posters here have given you and don't react directly to your "D"H. Forward the text to your solicitor in an email instead, and ask her to respond on your behalf. The only (polite) response you need to make to your husband is to say your solicitor will be dealing with this.

Give yourself a little mental space between the pair of you (I know it's hard) but you've engaged an expert to deal with this for you so do let them work on your behalf. They will be much more difficult for him to intimate than you may be. Good luck OP. 🌹

But I have legal document stating I own half of the value of the house?!

It seems to me that he is definitely hiding something.
Threatening and misdirecting you; it's a form of bullying, to get you to accept probably less than you're entitled to.
I'd now stop communicating with him as much as is possible. Leave it all in the hands of your solicitor. She sounds pretty sharp.
If he doesn't stop bullying you, you could always tell him if he doesn't agree to X you will be going after his pension, too.
You're far better off away from this man, that's for sure. Best wishes for the future.

I would give him the bloody dog and leave everything else in the hands of your solicitors and tell then to go for broke, hes a bully and him and his money orientated family are enjoying twisting the knife, how dare you split up with their precious diddums. I bet he throws the dog in aswell at the end of it.

Are you in Scotland OP? I ask because you mention a Home Report, which is a Scottish thing.

Another good reason to listen to your solicitor and not people on this thread is that the vast majority will be advising from the perspective of English matrimonial and property law.

I think if you're tenants in common if unmarried it's be a 50/50 split unless he ringfenced anything....

Leave it up to your solicitor now.

OP,
Being honest you shouldn’t have half you should have 30% of the equity that is left once you have excluded his parental gifts and the deposit. You would never have been able to buy the house if he hadn’t provided 100% of the deposit as you presumably couldn’t raise any deposit yourself. Without him your housing choice would have been to rent.
So you would presumably have rented and therefore had no assets. You should consider yourself very lucky to have a small lump sum after this divorce because it would be fair. I think 100% of the deposit, mortgage overpayments and his parents gifts coming from his side means that you know you are not morally entitled to 50%. You might be able to win it with a solicitor but you would have unfairly gained.
I know you are saying that he agreed 50% when you bought the house but you must know that that is not fair. Don’t you have a capacity to honestly judge what you know you are entitled to rather than what you can get?

I agree definitely hiding something and being a bully if he wants to be sneaky I would tell him that too

Are you living in the same house OP?

On the basis of the last message I'd avoid letting him have any access to the dog whatsoever.

This is not the action of a reasonable man.

No, he chose to move out. Yet complains about his parents home. I have told him repeatedly to move back and we will power through this mess and sort everytthing out. He claims he can't be around me. He also claims to miss our dog and is upset, when I ask if he would like to see her, as I dont own her 100%, he gets angry. He has accused me of not moving on when I've offered these things. So I have told him to stop complaining to me.

He is coming from an emotional place then.

He doesnt have any right to see the dog. Dogs are treated like property, not like children.

Just stop engaging with him, no matter what he messages about and let him know that you are doing it all through the solicitor now.

Even with kids, you don't have to grant visitation without a court order.

Why not just text, No that doesnt work for me. From now on I won't be responding to these messages; I think its best we leave it to our solicitors to draw up an agreement.

You’re def entitled to some of his pension/ savings too if married plus division of house and other assets. Best to go with the legal advice and follow as it does sound as though he’s trying to rip you off

Legally yes your entitled to half of everything of his , you arnt happy so wanted to spilt, morally though why would you even want to take extra or not just a fair share he paid the deposit the overpayments etc, you don’t have kids etc the house report valued it lower ? I think he’s being a dick but he’s probably terrified you will take him to the cleaners legally you can you can do as you like but just come up with a number for the price of if the house and your share as it were you wouldn’t of relistically had as much equity etc if it weren’t for him, and some parts of your post do sound money grabbing tbh.

If you're concerned about him taking things out of the house that you may want, then you need to do a video inventory of the house so there will be proof if things go missing. I was told that NOTHING was to be removed without joint agreement, and then to get a statement signed by both that it was agreed to. My ex took some of my prized LPs and there was nothing I could do about it as he said they were his.

It's always a good idea to do anyway, for homeowner's insurance.

Belongings and furnishings are also part of the settlement process. I don't know the UK laws, but where I am belongings owned prior to are your sole and separate property. Belongings purchased after the marriage are joint property, even if bought with one's sole income. I'm not sure where items 'gifted' individually (ie birthday gifts, etc) fall into this.

iirc OP's H insisted on buying a more expensive house than she wanted to go for. When she explained she'd rather buy something mroe affordable, he overrode her by saying he would stump up more deposit. He also chose the 70/30 split himself, by voluntarily overpaying each month.

Had he not been around, maybe OP would have bought something more affordable just for herself. There's no need to paint her a pauper, on no evidence.

And her parents also put money into the marriage/house, so both OP & her H have benefited from cash injections. OP now needs to take sufficient equity to ensure she can rehouse herself after the final settlement.

I have told him repeatedly to move back and we will power through this mess and sort everytthing out.

Why on earth would he want to move back/you want him to move back? You've broken up, and it doesn't sound like you're ever going to be friends again after this.

Honestly, OP, living with a new ex sounds hell to me - if you're both living apart currently, that's not something I'd want to change!

Are you secretly hoping to reconcile?

If she is in Scotland, as I suspect, she won't even know what "tenants in common" means. Confusingly, it's actually called "joint tenants" in Scotland, and "joint tenancy" means something different in England!