Consent order NOT approved

[XmasMonkey]

I know there is a lot of topics on this, so i do apologise.

I have had a letter back from the judge, saying the Consent Order has not been approved as it's unfair (in my ex's favour).

A long story short, my ex and i split 5 years ago. We had a house (in his name as i was due to go on maternity leave just before the purchase) and when the marriage broke down, i left and have rented ever since. We have 2 children together, and we have them 50/50. I have since met someone else, and i have now got the opportunity to buy a house, locally, at a very good price (it needs a lot of work).
My ex earns a lot more money than i do, has a bigger pension and has the £11k in savings. There is about £100k in the house. We have decided to settle at £11k to be paid to me. This is due to the fact that i am now in the final stages of purchasing this property and dont want it to fall through (i wont be able to afford another property as this is a bargain). So i am sending a letter to the judge from us both, explaining that i am happy with the £11k as that's what my ex has available to pay and that i need the consent order so i can purchase the property without my ex in the future, trying to make any claim on it.

Do you think the judge will be ok with this? I just want this to go through! I am panicking about this property sale falling through. This consent order application has been going on for months. I have had legal advise, but i am not using a solicitors for this consent as it was supposed to be an easy thing! I thought that if we both agreed, the judge should just let it happen. I was wrong. haha.

What do you think? I will be sending the response to the judge early next week (my ex has to sign it, and hes not very... co-operative at the best of times)

Thanks in advance.

It’s the judges job to ensure the order is fair and that you have not been pressurised into agreement. Tbh, it isn’t fair and you have been pressurised- although by virtue of your decision to buy without dealing with the divorce first and by the fact you are unwilling to deal with your ex. The judge doesn’t care if you do something stupid he wants to ensure you don’t come back in 5 years and try to reopen the whole decision.

If you are determined to do this I would go through your statement and decision with a solicitor and ask them to draft the statement.

I had the same thing. If you send a letter and say that you have sought legal advice and you are happy with the settlement they will then approve it.

@finallydivorced thank you, I have made sure i have said in my letter that i have sought legal advice and i'm happy with the £11k. I'm not really, but i'd much rather get on with my life and start a fresh in a house i can make a home for my children.

@LemonTT TBH, i had not considered getting a consent order before buying the property. It was a light bulb moment when my parents bought the subject up. The property has been empty a while as a friend inherited it. Luckily she hasn't been pushy yet about the time it's taken to get this far. But she is unaware that I've been waiting on this consent order as i thought it would have been approved by now. Luckily, the solicitors on both sides are mega slow. So time has been on my side so far. I'd be happy to leave with nothing, but my parents gifted me the deposit on his house, and i feel i should at least get that back to use towards my own property.

Is there anyway you can get hold or borrow the £11k so you can complete on your house, then renegotiate a fairer deal for you and the children?

I know you want this sorted and to move on but it doesn’t sound like you’re getting a fair deal at all. You should be looking at pensions as well- he’s walking away with 90% of the equity and 100% of his pension, which I presume yours has suffered with maternity and possibly time out.

the judge is right to question this. But if you really are ok with it you need to write back stating that you have had advise and agree the position ,

I just want out. I know we still have the kids to link us, but time is really of the essence with this house sale. I just don't want to lose it and mess my friend around.

I've gone this long looking after myself, I can carry on. I dont need his money. I just want the chance to make a future for myself with my own property. I just need to judge to approve this. 🤞🏼

The judge is absolutely right to question this. Not only are you walking away with around 10% of the family home, but you are also ignoring pensions. Given that your ex is a higher earner, it’s likely that he will also have a higher pension. As others have said, you could explain that you have sought legal advice and are happy with it, but I’d strongly recommend accepting anything less than 50%.

Your ability to rehouse you (and the children) seems to be based on being able to buy this particular property cheaply, but what if this property falls through anyway? What if you come up against unexpece additional work that needs doing? I may have watched to many episodes of grand designs, but it seems like major house projects are almost always over budged! What if inflation rapidly increases again and the cost of the work is then unaffordable? You also mention being in a new relationship, if so are you relying on sharing bills with your new partner? What if things don’t work out?

Your ex may only have £11k cash (…although he may just be saying that as that’s all he wants to give you - you do say that he is being ‘uncooperative’) but it doesn’t mean that he can’t find other ways to obtain a fair settlement. He may be able to increase his mortgage capacity, cash in a pension or even borrow from family. If not then I would strongly recommend getting the house sold and a fair settlement obtained. If anything you should be receiving more, so that you can purchase a property without having to rely on purchasing something that needs a lot of work.

Really bad idea, you are giving away over 60 grand how will you do the hours repairs with no money, bad idea

The divorce process does not move fast and it's generally not a good idea to have a house sale dependent on it

Our consent order was sent back twice and we were delayed by two months and they was over something much more trivial.

If you have had legal advice then the judge might let it through but he might not.

You would be better off borrowing the 11k from elsewhere and getting a proper settlement.

But surely buying a house when married isn't a good idea as potentially could be an asset?

*When to ask the court for approval
You can ask the court to approve your draft consent order when you apply for your divorce or dissolution, or at any time after that.
It’s usually simpler to ask for approval:

• after you have your conditional order or decree nisi – the court cannot approve a consent order before this
• before you get your final order or decree absolute – if you ask after this, there may be financial consequences, particularly for pensions

The consent order will only take effect after you get your final order or decree absolute.*
I assume you're relying on the consent order so the new property doesn't get included in the assets at divorce, are you divorced? Above is from government website and says the consent order only comes into effect after you divorce, so it doesn't sound like that's going to protect your new property unless your also divorced or have you final order to dissolve a civil partnership.
https://www.gov.uk/money-property-when-relationship-ends/apply-for-consent-order

Hello all,

Thank you all so much for your responses. I shall try and make this as brief as possible and try and answer all your questions.

Yes – I am relying on this divorce so that I can purchase a property. I do not want this being sucked into the divorce.
No – I cant afford anything else in the area I live in, this is the only property I can afford to buy on my own.
Yes – I can afford to pay for it on my own. So I am not relying on my current partner to stay with me to be able to afford it. The mortgage would be affordable for me if I were to become single again.
My parents will be helping me with the deposit and the cost of the re-furb, as a gift.

So, my letter back to the judge did nothing. We now have to go to a hearing. It’s a 20 min hearing and the letter doesn’t mention anything about bringing evidence with us. Does anyone know what will happen? If we come to an agreement within the 20 mins, what happens next? Do we have to fill out new forms and submit them and wait weeks/months for it to be approved, or can that happen on the day?

Many thanks in advance.

Depends on the judge on the day. Some say you’re adults and can come to a bad bargain and they won’t stand in the way. Others will say you can make what arrangements you both like but they won’t approve a final financial order in these terms (which would be final and enforceable) as it’s not fair, just and reasonable.

So you could still have that arrangement with your ex, but either / both of you could come back later and ask for a different order, which would take into account that you’ve already reached a concluded agreement- a post-nup.

Why are you letting your ex walk all over you. You have children to consider, and even if you don’t want your fair share of the matrimonial assets you should claim for your kids sake. Otherwise your ex could remarry and leave most of his estate to his new wife and potentially other kids.

The matrimonial home should be sold so he can give you your 50% share plus a sum equivalent to your share of his pension.

Don’t rush through the consent order for the sake of the house purchase. If this one falls through there will be others and you’ll be much better off with a fair payment from your ex. He presumably knows you are under time pressure and has used that to his advantage but you shouldn’t let him get away with it.

why can’t you put the money that your parents are giving you for the refurb, towards the deposit, instead of the £11k settlement? That way, you could secure the house and most likely have more money to do it up with/pay mortgage down.

This happened to me. My solicitor asked me if I had suddenly remembered an expensive wedding gift such as an (imaginary) piano or some £20,000 Koi in our pond.
What luck it was that I did have £20,000 koi!
So order adjusted to include this marital asset.
It has been 7 years and I don’t regret apparently getting short changed.

Well your ex is a prize shit isn't he? Will he be explaining to his kids why he tried to rip their mum off?

Seriously OP, you've said you're not happy with it and the judge is actually on your side. Don't do yourself down.

I don't think you realise just how unfair this is and you will definitely regret it.

You say that your name wasn't originally put on the deeds because you were about to go on maternity leave. That is awful - you were presumably carrying his child.

He has been a shit by not putting you on the deeds in the first place AND by convincing you that this was a fair and reasonable decision AND by staying in the house while you rent for 5 years AND for taking advantage of you being in a rush AND for not just lending you the £11k now so you can buy the house and deduct it from the settlement later.

If you are married, the starting point would be 50% of everything. That includes the house, regardless of whose name is on the deeds. It also includes the savings as well as up to half his pension.

You say you can only afford this one house, but woykd you be able to afford something else if you received £55k settlement rather than £11k. Potentially you coukd agree to leavehis pension alone in exchange for a bigger share of the house equity

I genuinely can't believe any lawyer has advised this settlement. Where did you get your legal advice from? Were they recommended by your ex or could they he in any way linked with him?

Get hold of the 11k for the house from anywhere else - take out credit cards or borrow a smaller amount from 4 different friends or whatever. But please don't agree to this awful arrangement

Maybe you weren't actually being short-changed though?!

Did you settle for about 5-10 times less than you were entitled to, despite being the lower earner?
Did you receive only 11k in total?

Have you actually read the full OP?

If the judge thinks it unfair to either side, they can tell you to come to a more fairer agreement. You can go back to court 3 times before the judge will intervene and decide what they think is fair.

Also if you buy a property before your consent order is finalised, this can become a martial asset. Best wait until it has been sorted.

@hasanyoneseenmykeys
You say that your name wasn't originally put on the deeds because you were about to go on maternity leave. That is awful - you were presumably carrying his child
OP said her parents gave her the money for her share of the deposit to buy the house, so she must have had her name put on the deeds - she may well have not been included on the mortgage. The children are 50/50. Perhaps both parents thought it best for them to stay in the marital home instead of totally uprooting them, which is why he stayed there? It’s pretty obvious that the OP has got blinkers on in regard to finances, she wants a particular house, he perhaps cant sell or remortgage just like that so she’s willing to take whatever she can.

I don’t think you realise that you’re not just letting yourself down, but you’re letting your children down.

OP even if your ex can't pay you more in cash now (a big if) why can't he agree to pay you more in the future eg end of his current mortgage term, or five years' time or something? That would probably satisfy the judge providing, together with the £11k, it gets you closer to 50%.

So originally, the amount was going to be £29k. We worked this out based on what the house was worth when I left (5 years ago). Since then, my ex has given me £6k of that to pay off a debt. So that bought it down to £23k. When the opportunity came up to buy this amazing house off my friend, I asked my ex what he had saved up of the £23k. He said £11k, and i said, i'll take £11k if he signed the paperwork now (this was back in Aug 2024) So really, this is my own fault. I thought the judge would just agree if we had agreed. Maybe if we explained that, and then put the amount back up to £29k, the judge will approve that?

I really really don't want any more than that. I left 5 years ago, i don't believe that I should be getting half of what the house is worth today.

I don't want to borrow the money from anyone to buy the house I'd like to buy before the divorce as i don't want it being part of our marital assets.