Family Law- Ex deliberately running up my legal bill

[DreamsOfParadise]

I'd be grateful for any advice please.

I'm 2 years into a divorce because Ex and I do not agree on finances. I have spent over 10K in solicitor fees and no end in sight.

In March, ex made a proposal to put an end to it all by agreeing that I receive proceeds of the sale of FMH in return for a number of concessions (no pension sharing, him paying min child maintenance for our 1 DC and me taking on full responsibility for school fees). He requested that I had a consent order drawn up and sent to his sol for approval.

After a couple more (v expensive) letters between sols and some tweaking mine went ahead to draw up the order to his and his sols requirements.

Last week I get a call from him directly to tell me that he is no longer agreeing to it as house prices have risen and he doesn't want me to benefit financially. (The equity in the house probably wouldn't even cover his half of the school fees.)

I got my usual invoice for my sol yesterday for a stupid amount of money for drawing up an agreement that he had no intention of signing. He has now instructed his solicitor to cease work on his case to save him money so my solicitor is now just waiting for a formal response that isn't going to happen.

He knows I can't afford to keep doing this and I certainly can't afford to take him to court but I'm frightened that this is going to continue forever and he won't let go.

I do earn a good salary (not as much as his 100k) but money that could be going towards a new start for DS and I is being thrown down the drain.

Is there anything I can do, please help.

Just to add, there is a history of DV so the thought of mediation fills me with horror.

Hmmm I would just tell him to write direct to you. You negotiate with him via letter then tell him to get his solicitor to draw up the agreement.

You can of course choose not to send your dc to private school??? He can't make you send them there if he's not prepared to pay.

The view I took on money, because I was leaving a controlling marriage, was to let it go. I don't want anything which can be used as leverage, and it would have been like squeezing blood from a stone. There was an inequity in that of course, from a purely financial perspective, but the less tying us, the better.

For me, that was the right decision as trying to get the child arrangement sorted has been expensive and difficult enough. After a year of it, I have made the decision that the best way to get a new start is to focus my energy on me and dc, and just accept this will rumble on.

Can you not just go 50/50 on the equity and walk away, which enables you to make your own decisions about schooling and be quite a bit freer from this man? If he is not paying, he has no say, really.

Could afford to stay in the FMH or are you going to have to move anyway?

I too would want to be free of him etc.

Sick the money for court up and do it, otherwise this will go on for years.

Ask your solicitor about making him pay the court costs if it can be prove he's the one who has been messing about?

Gosh are you me? No advice just you are not alone. In my case he takes around 4 months to respond to any papers from a solicitor and never actually collects court papers sent registered mail.
I agree you need to bite the bullet pay and get it over with (0% credit cards are my solution).

Thanks for the suggestions.

I do seriously want to be shot of this man but the fact is, with a young DS, realistically it isn't going to happen for years to come. I just know that if I were to walk away and let him have everything, he'd find another way to get at me (prob via DS).

I can't afford to stay in the FMH and it is too big for our needs. I agreed with him at the start that I would be prepared to move into a small house in return for keeping DS in his school where he is thriving so whist of course I could remove him from school and cause us both further distress, I just don't see this as fair on our child.

Sorry to hear you too are going through it Lonecat, it's just so frustrating and I don't feel there is anyone prepared to stand up to him. I am divorcing him for UB, although he was having an affair but wouldn't agree to grounds of adultery. The judge ruled at degree nisi that he must pay me the divorce costs but he has point blank refused and my solicitor has told me it will cost me more to apply to court than the money he owes, so all in all, forget it! I just don't see how they can be allowed to do this.

Hope things progress for you quickly. If you don't mind me asking, do you know approx how much it is going to cost?
Thanks

Problem with him not ever paying toward school costs is that senior school is so so so much more expensive. Do you realistically think you will be able to cover that? I agree it would be best to keep your ds where he is thriving for as long as possible.

I would be very wary of you agreeing that ds will always attend private school (and who will choose???) and that you will always bear the cost. Does that make sense? Make sure you don't get tied up and controlled by something like that.

You know your STBXH - is he just out to control you or is he just a tight git? Does he put your ds first? Would he be horrified if your ds didn't go to private school long term or would he not care at all? I suppose how important is image to him?

After all the lower your mortgage now the more you can save to ensure you can pay for schooling in the furture - perhaps something to put in writing to your STBXH solicitor.

I think he will eventually want a divorce as he'll have a pressing reason to get it (OW nagging???) or you will have been seperated long enough to not need reasons. So in some ways who is it benefitting financially by it dragging out - him or you or neither?

Seriously though I would stop using your solicitor and start writing to your STBXH yourself - every time he responds it will be his £££ stacking up not yours? It could be a one liner, "that doesn't work for me, let me know of arse faces next offer" and so on.