Dad seeking opinions on CMS and custody payments

[DryRiser]

I'm an ex-DH seeking input on custody costs etc, so you can go to town on me if i'm AIBU. 😂
I earn £100k pa, and my 3x DS will live with 50% of the time. Via the CMS calc we have worked out I should have to pay £613 pcm (which i'm happy with), and i'll also cover all their costs when they're with me, and likely the majority of shared costs (school trips, new trainers etc)

All of this I'm okay with, and I want the best for my kids, I just want some opinions if i'm under or over selling my contributions?

Context: ex-DW has a very low income, and will be on benefits when the time comes (at the moment i'm paying for everything). She knows she'll have to get new better paying job, but it looks like i'll still be paying CM.

tar

Because she should be Compensated for that IF that’s the case, through the asset split.

Hi OP here. Extra context forthcoming...

I was primary earner, and ex-DW was SAHP (though she had a freelance income). For extra context though, I worked from home most of the time, travelling to London once every 3 weeks. I share the school drop-offs, pick-ups, I prepare the meals every evening I was home, and catered for every single financial concern. We both take an equal involvement in the school as i'm a Parent Governor, and she's chair of PTA. Yes, my pension grew, whilst hers did not, and because of that she will be getting 50% of my pot.

Moving forward the children will stay with me 50% of each month, and I will cover the costs when they're with me. I'll also maintain the insurance on our cars, our collective family/life/health insurance, shared netflix accounts etc. No need to change any of this yet.

She will get half of our assets, so she'll get £330k in cash, and i'm helping to secure a small mortgage for her as she's unable to get one herself. And, I will pay her £613 a month.

Just say it's fair or not?

More than fair by the sounds of it IMHO

Context is important. Seems odd to ask about CMS in isolation when there’s other relevant factors at play.

‘Just say it’s fair or not’

Well, no, i think you and your wife are the best judges of that, with a mediator if needs be.

I think the causes of the breakdown of the marriage possibly will colour things too, if your wife expected that the marriage was a lifelong partnership and that you would continue to work as a team, with her doing most of the childcare, and is now having to get her own place and find a job, having been out of the workplace for many years, and have the children half the week instead of all the time, then it won’t seem fair at all, to be honest, regardless of how much money you throw at it.

You asked if it seems fair. I think it sounds fair.

it sounds fair generally yes

Fair

Me personally I would want far more equity rather than you paying part of my mortgage. I would take the child support.

as an adult and single I wouldn’t want you on my mortgage or involved with my finances beyond the child support.

If I were your ex DW I’d be wanting a far bigger share of the assets and I’d be surprised if a judge signed off a 50/50 split as it disproportionately benefits you, the higher earner. She can argue she sacrificed her career so yours could thrive and her earning power is much lower as a result. I’d be arguing for 75% of assets but you shouldn’t be paying any child support if it’s a true shared care arrangement for the DC.

As a comparison, when I got divorced my DH was on £85k and I was on about £50k and I made the case my career had been held back for his as he took promotions meaning regular travel to London, which was only possible as I picked up the childcare slack. I got 67.5% of assets and we had true shared care so no CMS in either direction.

I was advised I could seek peppercorn spousal maintenance to protect against my income dropping in the future but instead opted for a clean beak, which worked in my favour as he was made redundant shortly after.

Thanks. Clearly i'm a noob on these matters. My concern was whether I was providing too much or too little, especially via CMS. I'm starting to get the message that CMS is not relevant, and what is more relevant is the spousal payments.

How would this be calculated? And lastly, if my ex-DW and I agree on finances, custody, assets, and monthly payments etc, and we get a consent order... can I judge overide this if he they don't think it's fair?

Exactly 50/50 shared care means a nil assessment for CMS. If you actually made an application for an assessment instead of looking at the online calculator, £0 would be the outcome. Of course, you can choose to pay more than the CMS assessment (in this case:anything)

I think it’s fair. If anything I think more fair to her and less fair to you, taking everything written here at face value.

if she worked freelance she must have some skills to get back into work?

Previous posters are incorrect that 50/50 automatically means nil payments

Thank you to all the responses here. Ex-DW and I are still not resolved in terms of dissolving this marriage, but there is no change on the plan and the dispersement of assets etc.
Having read all the comments I think i'm clear that no CMS payment is required, but i'm conscious I should be paying something as I have been the main earner and my future potential is higher. We're both happy to use the CMS calc as the decider as it spits out a figure (£613 pcm), and it not used for means testing.

But... if we don't use this calc for 'spousal maintenance' how do we arrive at a monthly figure, without using mediation?

Many thanks

In my experience it is normally because one person has better qualifications and has chosen a more lucrative field to work in. The situations you allude to do happen but most of the SAHP cases I have seen are where the lower earner didn't have much of a career to give up. I've never seen a real compensation cases where a high flyer has given up a lucrative career.

@DryRiser I would strongly advise you to say no to spousal maintenance and get matters resolved through the asset split if at all possible. Spousal maintenance tends to prevent both parties from being able to move on. If you do have to pay, then I would try to limit it to one year with a Section 28A Bar so it cannot be extended. This will be long enough for her to up her income.

I would say it sounds fair but how are you going to make sure you are genuinely paying half/ most of all trips/ clothes/ days out etc? As a mum I know most of the life admin falls to me. Just make sure there's a way for these costs to be clearly identified or your ex will end up paying the lions share whether you intend her to or not.

That is true in my experience too - although such women often like to tell you they have been prevented from having a career due to their children, the reality is that wasn’t a priority for them prior to children and still isn’t afterwards.

Most women who had a career will have maintained it, that said, being the primary parent does come at a cost - one of those being carer progression and unless it’s all fair and equal on the childcare/life admin front a woman can be held back from their full potential.

I think it used to be an easier argument to make when a lot of couples were having their children in their early to mid twenties and a university degree was less of a prerequisite to a good job. A woman who never went to university and had a child at 21 in the 1980s could plausibly say something like "well, my husband never got a degree either and now he is well paid in the city. I could have done that."

That's a harder argument to make when the primary carer (which more and more often could be the husband as well) has a niche degree in something obscure from a not particularly reputable university and flitted around in low paid work in their 20s until they had children. There's much more concrete evidence in such circumstances that they would not have had a career.

Also, having more working parents on the bench makes it a harder argument to make. Judges with law degrees from good universities and a successful legal career that has taken a lot of personal sacrifice to achieve tend to be less impressed or even offended when SAHMs without the same track record try and claim that they could have done it too.

Exactly - tbh I just think of DH’s ex who says she couldn’t work because of their child but in reality she married and got pregnant in her early 20’s and DH would equally have supported her in getting a career. That’s the typical scenario where “I couldnt work because of the kids” doesn’t hold weight. She didn’t want to work and so had kids and when it didn’t work out for her (divorce) she tried to use it as a bargaining chip.

I think it arises from a misunderstanding of how divorce law works in England. It's an argument that would be made when seeking "compensation" settlement but these are incredibly rare. Most divorcing couples don't have enough assets to fully meet needs, very few have enough to reach sharing and compensation is almost unheard of.

At best, in most divorces, it's a moral argument that carries no weight in the court's decision. It might make the financially weaker spouse feel better about what they are asking for but that's about it and I imagine in a lot of cases they know deep down that it's not true. It also makes me wonder why, in those cases where the other party hasn't been all that successful and maybe gotten into debt, people are not as readily willing to share in that failure?

No it isnt

I would not be happy with this. If I had sacrificed my future earning potential whilst supporting yours, and then we split, then effectively some of the earnings you currently have (due to promotions and pay rises I supported by caring for your children) are ethically mine. Would you be happy if you were in her position, looking at a low earning job because you had enabled her career to flourish? And with your low earning job you are now unable to afford a mortgage?

I would look at it a different way instead. I would split the assets in a way that enables both of you to get a mortgage on a small house in the area you want to live in. The mortgages should be paid off in the same timeframe, so, given that you expect to earn £100k while she expects to earn eg £25k, your mortgage will be far larger. So more equity to her, and no CMS.

I think it's hilarious that you're that high an earner getting financial advice off mumsnet. Cherry picking what suits you.