When do you have to hand over the money?

[Vanillarose]

Once you've agreed a settlement, when do you actually hand over the money? After the absolute or before?

For me it’s after (absolute granted last week) as it’s part of selling the family home.

There’s no right answer, just what fits your personal situation

So anytime after the consent order? Just worried that I could pay him a lump sum and then he could come back for more if it's before the absolute.

Ideally I'd hand it over soonish so he could move out but I don't even have the nisi yet (filed the petition a few weeks ago but haven't heard back yet)

Ideally you want to do it as soon as you can to prevent what you said about them coming back for more.

In my case I still live in family home and when my purchase of new house is complete I will get the clean break as until house sale is complete we don’t have a final figure.

If I was buying xw out of her half of the family home I’d have done clean break prior to absolute. As I said it depends on your personal circumstances as if I’d done it before house sells and then buyer pulls out I’m still obligated to sell whereas at the moment she’d need a court order as kids live with me bulk of the time so my home = their home.

The order is not effective until Decree Absolute, so all timings for payments should be made from then.

You need to get the decree nisi before the Court can consider the financial order. I'm afraid at Bury, it takes about a month to issue the Petition, and about 3 months to get the decree Nisi. Then a couple of months to get the consent order done, assuming It's approved first time. Decree Absolute is currently less than a week.

If you give him money before the order and DA he can indeed change his mind and try for more.