Financials

[MarkyB68]

Hi, just sounding out for some advice, my wife soon to be ex wife had an affair and after the initial anger and frustration over all the lies and sneakiness we talked and agreed that an online divorce would be best for a quick clean break, but I'm struggling with her version of what split we each get! She has said that she won't go after my pensions as long as I sign over the house which has over 300k equity in it...she has said she will pay me 30k ...I think I worked out the split would be 60% in her favour ...this seems unfair considering she was the one that caused the divorce in the first place? I want it over but at the same time I don't want to get rinsed as I need money to rebuild my life ...please any advice would be gratefully received...thanks

Sadly, the split of assets upon divorce isn’t influenced at all by the reasons that the marriage broke down. It is based on need and length of marriage and who will be the primary carer of any dependent children. Do you have children and, if so, how old are they? What will the residency/ contact arrangements be? Does your wife have a pension? How long were you married?

Each situation is different so you should seek advice from a solicitor on what a reasonable division of assets would be in the circumstances, even if you do the paperwork for the divorce and make agreements between yourselves.

Hi Marky
Your soon to be ExW is ripping you off!
30K is not 60% of £300K. I think
you need to seek advice from a solicitor.

the affair is not relevant to the asset split

don’t sign anything until you have proper legal advice.

youll need to understand both your needs… housing? Chikdren? Earnings potential etc will all be considered. You need proper pension valuations to know its worth re divorce, remember 300k pension is not the same as 300k equity as it’s not liquid asset and has many variables in the future which could impact especially if a long way into future

thetes no Infiniti your op fur anyone to really say at face value what she is proposing does not seem fair legally and you must get proper legal advice

@Nicaveron op is referring to his ex getting 60% of asset pot total if she took 270k equity

Oh and don’t finalise divorce until financial consent order is sorted

I would see a solicitor OP and get proper advice.

The cause of the divorce isn’t relevant for asset splitting.
Do you have children?
60/40 sounds ok to me, although I completely understand your frustration.
if you go to court to argue it, you’ll lose the difference (and some) in fees.

And is £270K 60% of 300K ?

Presumably the 60% is allowing for other assets too like pensions.

Think it’s 60% off all assets - so she’s not touching his pensions, but keeping 90% of the home equity. Or that’s how I’ve read it anyway.

50/50 is the starting point. It does deviate in some circumstances but in your case you have every right to ask for 50/50.

I would say signing the house over and keeping your pension is the easier option having had a nightmare splitting a pension but it is quite age and income dependent, if she for instance gave you £60k can she get a mortgage in her name for the house, as part of a clean break you need to be off the mortgage so you can buy somewhere else.

@Nicaveron no. But it’s 60% of pension and equity which op refers to in his op! What’s so difficult to understand ?

so op is indicating pension of 150K so total assets 450k hence 270 is 60% of that !

@MidlifeWondering hie can you conclude it’s fair. There is no info on

length of marriage
earnings
ages
children ( and ages if there are any)
proper official pension valuation

therefore thete is zero ability to determine fairness

however, one party taking most of cash now while leaving the other with an asset which is highly volatile, now available now, subject to markets, govt pension rules changes which adds loads of uncertainty, will generally be seen as not fair

the above points will be vital before any determination can be made

I think the issue here is that pension has far less immediate value than equity. Your wife cannot unilaterally dictate what assets you take to make a fair split - a court might decide that it’s reasonable for her to take more equity if (say) she will otherwise struggle to buy a house but they will also consider whether you will be left in a position where you can buy a suitable property. And pension in (say) 20 years time is essentially useless right now.

So you might agree a 60/40 split in her favour but with you taking more equity.

And also, whilst the woman often does end up taking a slightly higher asset split due to lower earning power or having the children more etc, you don’t need to agree an unequal split just because you’re a man. 50/50 is increasingly common now.

Also a 300k pension value for a DC pension may not be worth as much as a 300k value for a good DB pension with guaranteed income, considering that 300k pension DB pension would probably be worth 600k a couple of years ago with no material difference to how much it pays out, so definitely not enough information here to judge properly

The pension is also subject to income tax when it is eventually withdrawn so is worth substantially less than the fund value!

I didn’t say it was fair, I said it was ok.
In so much as he can argue and go through courts etc but could end up with less overall.
Or he could cut his losses, get a clean break and move on.
He’s the only one with all the info and I’d hope he’d get proper advice.

But it doesn’t ok at all in the balance of type of assets available. And you were indicating he should accept it rather than face legal fees.

In my opinion, he would possibly be better off accepting it than paying legal fees.
Only he can decide that after getting legal advice.
I’m not sure why you’re getting so offended about it. It’s my personal opinion… if you or he doesn’t agree, you’re very welcome to ignore it.

Legal fees for an hour or two of advice, compared to tens of thousands of pounds at stake?

Nobody has suggested he get into a legal battle with his STBXW. People are suggesting he gets some proper legal advice about what constitutes a reasonable split of assets in their specific circumstances.

How could this not be worthwhile, for a few hundred pounds, given the sums involved and the huge implications for the futures of both parties to the divorce?

Once he has had proper advice and has a sense of what is reasonable, it is then perfectly possible to progress the divorce without further solicitor involvement if the STBXW is also minded to be reasonable and mutually agree a fair split of assets broadly in line with the legal advice.

It’s very clear advice is necessary in this case so that the OP understands the process properly i.e. which factors are relevant from a legal perspective (dependents, length of marriage, liquidity, housing needs) and which are not (e.g. whose behaviour caused the divorce) so that the OP can address the situation appropriately and suggest a reasonable division of assets, refuse any unfair demands, and ensure a financial order is in place before finalising the divorce.

It’s a false economy not to get professional advice specific to your circumstances when the cost of it would be a tiny fraction of the money that would be lost if an unfair settlement is agreed because the OP wasn’t aware of what is considered “reasonable” by the court in their particular circumstances.

I said ‘I’d hope he’d get proper advice’ 🙄

I’m not offended at all. You’re just giving unsound advice

But you also said “he would be better off accepting it [the proposed split] than paying legal fees”. You have no way of knowing that this us the case because he hasn’t had “proper advice”. And it’s not possible for him to get proper advice without paying legal fees for advice from a qualified solicitor, so your comment made no sense.

You can get initial advice for free, so my comment makes perfect sense.
Anyway, I’m bored of arguing with grumpy people, life’s too short.
It was my personal opinion, which I’m entitled to. Have a good evening 👋🏻

As already said get the free legal advice, it's what I did and glad I did as ex wanted to do online thing and I didn't have much of a clue. The advice helped me work out that ex was taking me for a ride so started negotiations again and got something much much fairer