Critique my divorce financial order request

[Audioslaw]

This is going to be long as I will try and set out all of the relevant information needed to discuss 'fairness'.

Getting divorced. I have applied myself paying the full £593 as he refused to pay half. Using the new no fault process that came in in April so have not needed to state 'reasons'.

Met 2014, started cohabiting 2017 with myself and my ds from a previous relationship moving into his house that he had bought with a mortgage himself in his sole name. Ds is now 11. I have no other DC. He has no DC at all. We share no children.

Married 2018.

Split up boxing day 2020 with myself and Ds then moving out to a rented flat in early 2021. Been here ever since.

Me.

35. Work full time earning 26k. Secure employment. Get a little bit of UC of £400 and my rent is £850. Receive a small amount of CM from Ds dad per month. £82 child benefit

My only asset of over £500 is a car worth £3500 and I have £900 in savings (it was £600 more than this but had to use it for the court application fee)

Earning potential is top 40k in realistic terms but it will take me another 7 years to reach that, so I'd be 42 by then. I will always be full time.

I have little pension as between 2011 and 2020 I worked part time at this point so only have two years of full time pension contributions to speak of.

If I am to buy a house I'd need a 25 yr mortgage so need to do it this year.

When I started cohabiting with him in 2017 I had a pot of £16k that I was planning to use as my own deposit. At this exact time I was viewing 2 bed terraces and had mortgage in principles enabling me to buy one of these houses alone at the time. This would have covered a 10% deposit and all fees AT THE TIME. where we live has risen hugely in the last 7 years and the same houses are at least 100k more now.

This 16k got spent on joint expenses, our wedding, honeymoon and house improvements during the time we lived together.

Him

Nearly 50 years old.

Earns £45k rising a small amount each year and this raise is performance based. Secure employment. Has a small bonus each year but not guaranteed. Should he lose this job he would easily get another at a similar level (managerial - private sector)

House which would sell quickly for 310k in its current state, of this £260k would be retained after clearing the 40k mortgage left. There may be a few thousand early exit mortgage fee as it was fixed until 2025. No other properties.

He has between 10-20k in shares / share save investments stocks but I am unsure of exact amounts or where
D
Has a very large pension. Not sure exactly what the pot is worth but it would be a comfortable retirement if he continues to work full time for 10 more years at least until age 60. More if works later on in life.

Based on my finances, I can get a mortgage of about £104k. The very cheapest 2 bed property I could get within 5 miles of Ds school would be 240k.

I am thinking of proposing a request for a lump sum of £130k which equates to 50% of the house equity and then if I saved myself for a bit longer the remaining 6k and then a few more thousand to cover moving costs and fees etc, I SHOULD be able to get on the property ladder before my 36th bday. It would be really tight but just about doable. Of course this is at today's prices though so doesn't account for any big rises.

This would leave him with the other £130k to buy his own 2 bed place or of course he could stay in the current place and remortgage in order to release equity to me to use as a down payment. He is not tied to any particular area of our city as much as I am. He has no dependents or outgoings.

I do not intend to ask for any share of his pension as he is older than me, I have an extra 15 years to pay into mine than him to build it up. I also do not want any of the shares etc. The only thing I need is the ability to buy a house for myself and ds to live in to get away from precarious and expensive renting and to secure our future.

What do you think?

Am I being too 'grabby'? Hate that word. unrealistic as a short marriage? Too lenient as it should start at 50/50 as I have a child to house and he doesn't?

Obviously as you'll see from me stating my income I don't have money for expensive solicitors etc. I am hoping we can sort out an agreement in mediation.

Really appreciate anyone's thoughts on navigating this and setting it out as my life is just so unaffordable paying this huge rent each month not to mention rising costs of everything and knowing I could be asked to leave at any time.

No one with assets would consider getting married if that was the case.

£16k would be fair. But nil would also be fair. If I was your ex I would be seeking a solicitor to protect my assets. I’m sorry but marriage of a few years and no children does not mean the other partner is responsible for your housing.

you have the potential to earn a decent salary. It is your responsibility to do so and sort out your pension? Why have you paid so little into a pension?

Thank you for proving my point.

Career changer so my age is not related to my salary band

But I haven’t, I’m happily married and have no problem with women whereas you seem to be doing real,harm to the OP by lying to her about what the law will give her, based on some weird issue you have with men.

@Ohsugarhoneyicetea is completely misinformed so please don’t listen to them on matters of the law. Get a meeting with a decent solicitor - will cost about £250 but you should then know what is reasonable and what’s not

And you spend your spare time hanging out on the mumsnet divorce board. Yeah totally normal and believable for happily married men 😂

As I said OP a fair calculation would be deduct the original deposit from the £260k, add your £16k investment, and then x by 0.7 (5/7ths) - you should get half of that.

Well you go in in the understanding that everything belongs to the two of you but not for a short marriage and unfortunately, what is a short marriage is quite a nebulous concept. I have seen people claiming it was a short marriage after 15 years together, which is a big cheeky but it happens.

I strongly suggest you have a good rummage in the legal matters topic, there are a couple of solicitors there who have been answering a lot of these kind of questions for years.

And no, there is nothing wrong with asking, you have to start somewhere so you have done the right thing 🙂

Bear in mind as well that a lot of people here do not have a clue about divorce process and put well intentioned comments that have nothing to do with how the things are in real life, so honestly, read as much as you can and then contact the solicitor, I don’t know what is the going rate these days but back in my times it equated to £3 a minute so it is better to do as much of the legwork yourself as “leaving things with the solicitor “ can easily escalate into the £10,000s or you running out of money before the critical “battle”.

www.affordablejustice.co.uk/ for womes by women, however i have not used them

I get why you've started from that point OP, you lost the opportunity to buy a house when you moved in, you chose what you thought was a future of the two of you eventually owning a home together, you invested your savings and income in the house, gave up that security, but the law doesn't work like that.

I'd write down the financial facts on a timeline. then post in legal. Just the facts, and hopefully one of the lawyers that post there can give you a more accurate idea what might be reasonable to ask for. Whether you do or not get an answer there I'd then take this list to a lawyer and pay for a short consult to get an idea of whats reasonable. The more information and proof you can source the better. The timeline needs to include things like :
house purchase date and value
date you moved in, mortgage value at that time,
rough amounts you contributed to various improvements and when
Payments made towards mortgage amounts
& dates
value of furniture and white goods etc that he retained in the family home
Value of home and remaining mortgage when you moved out
date you moved out and so on

But the £260k is the equity, not the increase in value - there's only that much equity because DH made huge overpayments. Surely it would be more fair to establish the actual increase in value over the term of the cohabitation and divide that by two?

So, say the actual increase in value is £150k, deduct the original deposit from the £150k, add the £16k investment, and then x by 0.7 (5/7ths) - she might get half of that.

Unless we're missing something, there's no salary band which goes from £25k to £40k - you'd need to successfully change band?

Something is literally not adding up here - in 2017 you had savings of £16k to use as a deposit and to cover fees, and by only working part time you had mortgage offers enabling you to buy a 2 bed terraced house for £140k-ish, but now, working full time, you wouldn’t be able to get a mortgage and house prices have increased by £100k in five years? Can you give us an idea of the area you live in, as that sounds quite unusual?

What also doesn't add up is how two people on very average wages have managed to over pay a mortgage in such a short space of time. Where has the extra money come from?

The original deposit put in was over 50k so the mortgage taken out was under £110k. During the first five year fix which was v low interest we managed to overpay (more than double each month) to reduce it massively. Then in 2020 fixed again for 5 years but this was the total remaining mortgage so it's fully paid off summer 2025 with nothing left to pay.

It's outing who I work for but it's not NHS but still public sector. The increment rises are guaranteed but can't be quicker than that timescale and 40k is the very top.

Also in 2017 that mortgage offer wasn't me working part time at that point, I was full time then income wise but also had scholarship income and child maintenance that my offer was built on. I only went part time from 2017-2020. Then back to full time as I career changed

I guess that 50k deposit was your husband's? Did you put any into it? Also did you contribute to any mortgage payments (regular or overpayments? ) or just to bills?

Yes the 50k was only his for the house. I only had my own 16k but he'd already bought the house and was 2 years into the 5 yr fix when me and Ds moved in.

I just used to pay him £895 per month from my acc into his. We never had a joint account

How much would it have cost you to rent or pay mortgage and bills on a two bed for you and your child? More than £895?

Yes it would have been more than £895. Prior to moving in to his our rent alone was £650 pcm for the flat rent. I did qualify for tax credits help then from the gov that helped with my costs. Obviously as soon as we moved in I didn't get any of this anymore.

Your pre-separation relationship is (on the face of it) too short to entitle you to any share of the equity or your husband’s pension.

Sadly, worst case you could walk away with nothing (if a court deems your £16,000 and the money you spent on the bills and mortgage is merely your contribution to ‘necessary living expenses’).

There is a possible lifeline. A good solicitor might be able to argue additional provision should be made to support your son as a ‘child of the family’. It’s an odd (but perfectly legal) concept that under certain conditions requires a married person to support a step child.

Thus is why you must get legal advice pls!

"I have little pension as between 2011 and 2020 I worked part time at this point so only have two years of full time pension contributions to speak of."
So did you work full time or part time?

OP, you we t into the marriage with £16k.

During the marriage you've spent the £16k and you've contributed £895 a month toward the mortgage repayments- so assuming you married in January and separated in December - approx £32k. Most of that expense is normal living costs that's why people are suggesting that settlement of c. £25k is appropriate.

If your DS sees his dad or you receive maintenance it's unlikely a court will order him to pay for his stepchild.

Out of interest, why are you leaving him? Would you have done so if you knew you'd be unlikely to get £100k?

Sorry OP but your living costs are your issue not your soon to be ex husband. If he paid for most of everything and solely had the mortgage as well as him not being your sons father and you not being together very long I can't see you getting what you seem to expect out of him nor should he have to pay that. Perhaps 25 percent of the house sale would be reasonable but not 50. Your posts seem greedy and shameful.

My Ex partners mother also went through similar but from the perspective of your husband and her ex husband who she was married to for 4 years and not the father of her children got 15 percent of the house sale costs after going through court.