Spousal Maintenance

[FabulousUsername]

If children are A level/University age and both parents are working, would maintenance typically be part of a divorce settlement?

Assuming the man is the higher earner but the woman works part time on minimum wage, I would have thought that she would be expected to try to up her own income rather than expecting the ex to provide.. am I wrong?

I had thought that a split of assets 60/40 in the wife's favour plus an equal share of pension and a clean break otherwise would be fair, as they'd both have sufficient to buy smaller properties. Just wondering if it's possible that a woman could expect be supported by an ex husband for the next 10 years, until the pension can be taken?

I'm asking for a friend. My own divorce was a straight 50/50 split and I was advised not to of asking for ongoing contributions from my ex even though he earns more than me.. I'm concerned that friend will rack up big legal bills finding out that she has no case.

Spousal maintenance for life is rare.
Generally the spouses can be expected to try to get to some level of self sufficiency.
But it of course depends.
In long marriages, where one spouse became a SAHP and had not worked for a long time - while the other spouse is a high earner - spousal maintenance is possible. Especially if the children are fairly young. And it tends to end by the time when kids finish school.

@Gummyy get some decent legal advice - in my case I have had advice to def get a good share of the pension - prob 50% - maybe a little less as I do have a v small pot in my name. 19 years marriage, together over 20 and 20 years of pensionable income in my case.

@karma1979 sorry I didn't see this sooner - I would say ignore everything your soon to be ex says and get sound legal advice. Yiur STBExH isn't on your side anymore and he isn't the onw who decides what he wants to 'give' you. The assets are joint and can be divided in various different ways. My children were (just) adults when I filed for divorce so my situation was slightly different.

Excuse typos - jiggly train!!

My ex-husband earns over £105k p/a, I earn around £13k pa (£9.50p/h working ft).

I got no maintenance at all upon divorce. My kids were 3 and 6 when I left him.

@fabulous

If he is earning under £50k as you allude with them claiming child benefit, then the likelihood of her getting spousal is as otherwise said, extremely unlikely.

The environment now on divorces is very different to 20 years ago. Seems things have changed by case law but to give an example, a friend is receiving spousal. It is very restricted to the child's 18 birthday, and there is a huge difference in their earnings. He is 6 figures, she is £25k. But against the spousal, he still took some capital as well.

She isn't well off and is not being realistic in that the spousal is limited and in fact, she understands she got it as she used the kids as a bargaining chip and stopped him having access, something that caused a rift between us as she accepts that's why she did it. She has tried it again due to a disagreement but learnt her lesson as he was going straight to court proceedings with a 50/50 application which would also bankrupt her defending it

Oh and my ex was also successful with 50/50 so no other maintenance due either! Did the courts help protect myself or my children financially in any way? Nope. Abusive and controlling lives in a five-bed exec home with four sports cars, a hot tub and an unemployed (much younger) gf while I'm still renting at ridiculous expense 6 years post-divorce!