What would be fair financial split?

[NeedSleepNow]

I do have an appointment with a solicitor next week so will be getting legal advice but I just wanted some advice on what might be a fair split.

STBXH and I had no real assets other than the house

Equity in house - 200k
Pensions - both roughly worth £50k
Debts (credit cards and student loan) - me £12k him £4k
Assets (savings/car) - me £4k him £3k

We have three children aged 6-13 who all live with me. They stay with him one night every other weekend.

I left a very good career and took a break to raise the children, now working in a low paid part time job with little while for progression (I am currently retraining but it will take a good few years before I am able to switch to working in that field). He earns £40k per year, I earn £10k per year.

I'm currently in the former family home with the children, he is moving in with his new partner and her son.

He wants to just split the house 50/50. I'm my situation would you see that as fair and accept that? It has been 2 years since we split and I want to move and get my own house now (he comes over to the house a lot still as it is legally part his as he frequently reminds me) so I am tempted to just agree and get the house sold.

My problem is that I will struggle to get a mortgage as my income is low and I really struggle month to month to cover everything. I have three children to house. He on the other hand is moving in with his new partner so now has two decent incomes to pay for housing and he will be delighted that he will now have to pay less maintenance as she has a son who will be living with them.

I think a 60/40 split of the house might be fairer as I need to house the children but I don't know what a solicitor or court would suggest.

My divorce and settlement took about 9 months and that was a complex case as a business involved. I got awarded a third of his pension too.

There is a home based admin officer apprenticeship at the CPS advertised through Civil Service Jobs live at the moment - the salary is over 20 K and they are looking to appoint 4 staff.

This is not good advice. Your experience was very different to the OP's and happened a long time ago. The attitude of courts to weaker financial parties has hardened especially since the financial crisis. You can actually see from your short analogy that the court messed up badly with an outcome that made your ex-husband's business fail and presumably impacted on your child maintenance as a result. It also ruined the relationship between your son and his father, which surely you agree was a poor outcome?

It is worth mentioning also that self employment can be a bit of a red flag to a court as the self employed can more easily avoid their legal obligations. This won't apply to the OP's case.

This post proves my point that a marriage certificate means nothing.

sorry OP what a scumbags you were married to

I'm not sure I follow? Had it not been for the marriage certificate the OP could be left with next to nothing. Divorce has to be fair to both parties and thus consider the needs of both. Considering only the needs of the weaker financial party would not be good law.

@Beacon2000 my son refused to see his Dad because his Dad used taking him to sports club as time to see OW. He used to stay at watch him. Nothing to do with settlement. His business failed because he became an alcoholic again nothing to do with settlement but his OE dumped him and I wouldn't take him back so he became depressed. He brought it on himself.

That's quite a different story to your original post and also introduces a number of factors that differentiates your case from the OPs. I stand by what I said, that your advice is unsuitable to the OPs circumstances.

It is actually the fact that your ex was self employed and the OPs is employed that I think will particularly differentiate the outcome. Another key factor is time. When you divorced just after White v White, courts had a tendency to be over generous to the weaker financial party. Post the financial crisis, judges are less willing to predict that a higher earner will carry on earning well and like to achieve a clean break and a more equal asset split.

Court is also a much worse idea since you got divorce as judges are more likely to penalise people for not engaging with ADR compared to when you were divorced.

@Beacon2000 we were both company directors of a ltd company and I also worked as a teacher so had my own income. I offered exh 50-50 but he refused he wanted me to have our house with 4 years mortgage left on it, and he wanted to keep our business worth over 6 times more than our house. The judge said no, as I had 50 percent shares and had basically done all ordering, H&S, staff wages, invoicing, chasing up invoices, banking presentation for loan in past and VAT as well as dealing with customers. He should have accepted 50 percent which I offered in the first place. He chose to go to court. In the first instance I didn't ask for pension share but he pissed me off so much dragging me to court I told my solicitor to get everything she could for me. I know 2 other couples who have been to court more recently and both got a lot better settlement than negotiations were suggesting.

Yes and you have given advice based on your unique circumstances on other threads too. You need to understand this for the benefit of the OP. Your situation and hers are very different. Different incomes, different employment, difference of nearly two decades of ever developing law... and I can't comment on your friends because I don't know their situations but at £20-30k a pop for a final hearing it's not necessarily worth the difference for a lot of people.

Please stop suggesting the OP can get the world on a plate and leave it to the professionals before you end up costing the poor woman time, money and emotional energy.

Wait a while before doing maintenance. If he has been living with new partner for 6 months her income is also taken in to account sometimes. He can share housing costs with him.

The OP's ex-husband earns £40k. Living with a new partner won't make a blind bit of difference to the maintenance he pays. He will pay child maintenance. This is nowhere near a spousal maintenance case.

My understanding is that it will bring his maintenance down once they move in together as she has a child, I don't think her income plays any part in the calculations.

Sorry, yes, if the partner has a child then the CM paid might drop but not by more than around 10% of the total maintenance figure in your case.

Before making a final decision, I really would suggest you consider everything you need to on this helpguide/list. You want it to be as fair as possible for you. https://iamlip.com/his-money-her-money-our-money-who-do-marital-money-and-assets-belong-to/ the rest of the website might be helpful though too if money is tight xx

Thank you, I will have a good look at the website after work today.

@Rainbowqueeen I've been told this before, but my solicitor disagreed.