I and my ex are both early 40s and we have 2 children 11 and 16. We’ve been separated for 3 years and are at the final order stage of divorce which will be applied for once the finances have been finalised.
In a relationship since 2003 and married since 2017. Separation happened in 2022 after I discovered a second affair with a work colleague 15 years younger than my ex.
We own the family home jointly and there’s around 130k equity in it. She lives there with the children and I have rented since separation, I have the children every other weekend and a day/night in the week and pay the CMS amount of child maintenance after ex requested it to go through CMS. Prior to this we had an informal arrangement where I paid the same amount as now each month.
I work full time and a month prior to separation, was promoted and had a salary increase to 63k (from 42k). She has worked part time since 2012 until last year when she left her job (explained later) and took on a job working 10 hours per week for just over 9 months, she has since left that job and taken on a job at 27 hours a week paying 17k, in addition, she received 8k in UC, 2k in child benefit and 7k CMS. This wasn’t a usual housewife/career husband situation and household duties and school pick ups were mostly split with me cooking all the meals and all of the food shopping etc. From the point of separation and me moving out in August 2022, I contributed half of the mortgage, half of my daughters phone bill, half of club costs, half of a joint loan used to buy our cars (I sold mine due to receiving a company car and we used the money to do the garden) as well as the child maintenance. I kept this up for 2 years before it became untenable and I was beginning to accrue debts because I couldn’t maintain my own household costs as well as half of the mortgage. I had numerous messages and conversations asking for something to be done with the house but was met with anger each time. We eventually went to mediation where it was agreed the house wasn’t affordable and we needed to agree an equity split. It bounced around without an agreement until through sheer exhaustion I said she wins and could have the 75% she said she wanted. The 75% was agreed because at that point, the financial disclosure was based on her 10 hour a week income, not her new job and therefore she claimed her borrowing capacity was 70k. She argued she needed to be able to afford a 200k home and 75% allowed that based on the sale price.
After this, I went for a free appointment at a solicitors where they advised me not to agree to anything without a full disclosure and they would write to my ex to negotiate a fair settlement following disclosure. There was no financial disclosure and her responses to my solicitor were unreasonable. Her last proposal was 92.5% equity, £200 a month spousal maintenance until my youngest is 18 (8 years) and £5000 lump sum paid to account for my non contributions to the mortgage over the past 10 months. Obviously I rejected this and eventually submitted Form A to have this decided in court after she refused to accept my final proposal of 63/37% in her favour. She had updated her mortgage capacity to 134k from her original 70k and 63% represented enough to purchase a 200k house as stated in mediation.
At financial disclosure ahead of filing Form E, there were some things that hadn’t been discussed. Almost £2000 of undeclared earnings from ebay sales, nearly £4000 of contributions from her partner, a £15k payment that was paid into her account from her previous employer which turned out to be a settlement based on her claiming constructive dismissal, of which £7k was transferred into her sisters account which she claims was a repayment to a loan from her sister (no payment into her account exists from her sister) I have sent a questionnaire asking for evidence and details relating to the above and essentially received a reply that said ‘I’ve told you what they are and that’s enough’
At the first appointment hearing it went badly and she was extremely angry claiming I was trying to sell the house from under her and had gone back on a 75/25 agreement. The judge directed her to research houses at 200k and consider shared ownership following the sale of the house as well as send new questionnaires to each other, he also stated that as the part time work has existed she wouldn’t be expected to seek full time work (I have asked for details of the alleged family loan, contributions from partner and ebay income on my last questionnaire)
The house had a sale agreed after being on the market for a year, but she has refused to sign paperwork instructing the conveyancing solicitor to begin work, requested the house be removed from sale and after 6 weeks of no movement, the buyers have had enough and pulled out. She has now refused to allow people to view the house. Since May 2024 (when I stopped contributing towards the mortgage) she has refused to pay the mortgage and instead only pays half, citing that I am not paying my share and it is currently 4k in arrears. During these 12 months she has booked 4 holidays (3 abroad, 1 in this country) she has answered that her boyfriend (the affair partner) doesn’t live there but I drive past the house on the way to and from work and his car is always there. His contributions also time with bills and food shops.
Following the hearing, I reached out to offer to split at 50k to me and the remaining 77k to her. Pensions would be retained by each of us (hers is 45k, mine is 30k) her savings can be kept and I will keep my debts (10k through furnishing a home from scratch as I left with an old TV and legal fees which I have had to stop due to the expense) she can keep all furniture and assets and her car, all of which were jointly bought during our marriage. She has rejected this and proposed 35k to me and everything else to her, £200 a month spousal, £5k lump paid to her.
Our FDR is now in September but I feel like I’m being held financially hostage and would just like a bit of independent validation that I’m not being nuts for asking for 50k as a fair settlement from almost 20 years of a relationship and marriage. I just want this over and to move on with my life and be able to afford a home for my children that is ours and not rented.