Divorce and Financial Settlement help please

[JohnnyMarr]

I am currently in the process of divorcing my husband of 17 years and wondered whether anyone who's been through a similar scenario or is legally minded could cast any light on my situation.

In a nutshell, he walked out at the beginning of the year to cohabit with OW and her child in her property. Subsequently he has been paying maintenance in line with the CMS minimum and the mortgage on FMH, where, at least for the time being, I remain with DCs 14 and 10.

Prior to him leaving I was, by mutual agreement, a SAHM, essentially having been a trailing spouse to enable him to progress in his chosen career - he had a manual job when we married and is now a senior director in a multi-national company earning in excess of 120k/pa. Since he left I have managed to secure a part-time, minimum wage job (am also volunteering) and am in receipt of tax credits. I am neither stupid nor work-shy but sadly, when you're a mid forties single mum who's been out of the work place for over a decade and, to top it all off, you live semi rurally, potential employers are not beating down your door!

We attended mediation where he agreed to continue paying the mortgage and CM until youngest DC is 18, however he has now completely reneged on this and his latest proposal is a clean break whereby he allows me to keep all the equity in the house, which in a very best case scenario would be around 100K, obviously 50k of this is already mine by default (and he has already walked away with 11k of assets) This amount, and the paltry mortgage I may currently be able to get, would leave the DC and I unable to rehouse - he appears remarkably unphased by this despite his insistence that the DC are his top priority (he hasn't seen DD in 4 months and has only had DS eow over the holidays)

Clearly he is adequately housed, has been able to afford mortgage and CM for the last 7 months, and in fact has had enough of a surplus to recently set up his own company (he has failed to disclose this thus far - I estimate start-up costs to have been between 20-30K)

My solicitor is counter proposing he pays 50% of the mortgage for the next 5 years, at which point the house will be sold and I will retain all equity. Youngest DC will be 15. I will remain unable to rehouse unless my own financial circumstances change beyond all recognition. I feel the DC and I will ultimately be shafted whichever option I choose.

Does this seem fair? Do I need to just suck it up? Should I fight it in court?

Any suggestions, thoughts, or genius ideas to enable me to become wholly self-sufficient and give him the finger hugely appreciated!

Thanks for your response babybarrister. I am not averse to working full time, but even if I were able to find a full time position given my lack of recent experience and my location I'd be lucky to clear a lot more than I'm currently getting working 20 hours and claiming TC, on top of which I'd also have to fork out for before/after school care for youngest DC.

It just seems so unfair that I've supported his career progression over the last two decades and now our income disparity is so immense that the children and I are left in a horribly vulnerable position (more fool me!) whilst he swans off into the sunset with money to burn.

But I guess in answer to my own question I do indeed just need to suck it up!

Does he have a pension which could be part of the negotiations? They are offering you all the equity in the house which is presumably just about 100% of your husband's assets? That sounds quite generous. My ex who earned less than I did got 59% of our assets, not 100% (I earn more) and neither pays maintenance.

I wish these threads were shown to all the mumsnetters having a first baby who are considering going part time or not working. One reason my family did okay after divorce was both of us always worked full time.

If you acceptd their offer of all the equity is there a way you could get your husband off the mortgage now eg your parents guarantee your mortgage with you so that he can move on and buy a property himself? So you have a psychological clean break? It sounds like you may not be able to afford the mortgage yourself even when in part time work plus tax credits. Could you share a room with the children and let the other rooms out?

Don't forget the pension. His will be worth a good deal, yours very little. It's important to include that.

Oldie I can assure you I'm cursing the naivety that has left my DC and I in such a precarious financial predicament - hindsight is indeed a wonderful thing. Not that it makes a difference, but in my defence I returned to work when eldest DC was a few months old and only became a SAHM several years later when it became virtually impossible to do otherwise following a move (to further X's career) which meant I was logistically very isolated and had two small children with no support network whatsoever. Latterly we spent three years overseas and I wasn't legally entitled to work so it wasn't a case of just popping out a couple of sprogs and thinking "that's me done"

Forcing 14 year old DD to share a room with her 10 year old brother and I really isn't a viable option, and tbh even if it were I think we'd struggle to tempt a lodger into the fold as X's (several) unfinished DIY projects have left the house in such a state that I keep half expecting Nick Knowles to come knocking at my door!

Shush His pension is negligible, though I have no doubt he'll start topping it up pretty sharpish when he realises it means he can pay less CM.

Thank you both for your thoughts.

Familylawsolicitor Sorry, I only just saw your post.

Unfortunately there are no other assets. That in itself is a whole other story, suffice it to say that X has a bit of a spending habit.

Spousal maintenance? You've been together for long enough for this to be a consideration. This would be in place until you co-habit with someone else, or marry which ever comes first

To give you an idea my now husband in his divorce (together 8 years, married 2) 30k to buy her out of martial home- it only had 15k equity at the time. And then 12k from his pension, then a substianal amount of child maintenance

derty In the scenario suggested above X paying half the mortgage for 5 years would be in lieu of Spousal Maintenance. My problem is that it's entirely possible that I may (despite my best efforts) still not be in a position to take on the mortgage alone in 5 years time and so, at a critical point in DS's education, we would have to move house and quite possibly school.

My initial understanding was that the settlement would be based on need and affordability, with priority being given to the children. Given that he would comfortably be able to afford to pay half the mortgage and CM until youngest DC is 18 I'm struggling a bit to comprehend how we can potentially be left in a very vulnerable position down the line whilst he's taking home < 6k/pm. Whilst I'm willing to reluctantly accept this may be legally "just" it clearly isn't ethically so.

Family At this juncture I remain in the dark as to where the funding for his new business venture has come from as he has thus far failed to disclose it's existence. Clearly that's a question my solicitor will need to be asking.

Really tough. Good luck OP. Xx

It is often ethiclaly very unjust (writing as someone who paid her husband my life savings, more than half our assets and he doesn't pay a penny for any of the children, just about never sees them even a night a way and I work full time - not much justice there either - that you can just choose not to see or help with the children).

Could you not refuse the 5 year offer and point out that will disrupt the child's exams and counter offer that after 5 years if you are doing better financially (you might by the way have remarried even if you haven't got much of a career going) then the maintenance could be revised? The risk you take is he chooses to be a stay at home father and pays nothing to you and the children in future - plenty of higher earners do this after divorce - I am not saying he will but it might happen or he goes self employed and pay himself a tiny nominal salary from the business. So whatever court order you have now about maintenance does not mean necessarily you will be able to stay in the house unless you can earn enough to pay the mortgage or do equity release schemes or find a new husband to pay.

I can see what you are saying about trailing spouse! I forced mine to trail - much better all rond - do that next time. I don't know why women follow men rather than vice versa. Mine had to sell his house and give up his job and find a new one in London because of my career.

Id be very surprised if he didn't have a generous pension from his work, given his title, paypacket and the fact that it's multi-national company - are you sure any pension provisions are negligible?

kazza I'm not sure of anything much, he's been so underhand and devious that nothing would surprise me at this point.

Having said that, I'm fairly certain that he has only recently started paying a small amount into his pension and, at least according to the CETV documentation he produced during mediation, there was only around 3.5K in the pot.

I do think though that it's entirely possible that he has a secret stash of undisclosed cash. As soon as he became aware that he would have to disclose bank and credit card statements during mediation he immediately closed a credit card which he'd had for years, thus negating the obligation to provide the statements. I'm torn between thinking he had been withdrawing cash on that CC which he's subsequently stashed or simply that there were transactions that would have born testament to quite how long the duplucity of his seedy little double life had been going on because obviously there was no OW and we had just drifted apart

Fuck knows I wish I could just find myself a decent job and wash my hands of all this twattery.