Divorce financial settlement - instruct solicitor before or after financial disclosure?

[Nearlyalldone]

[cross-posted from the Divorce/Separation forum]

Hi - just wanted to ask for your advice.

Don’t have the decree nisi yet, but am starting to think about the financial settlement.

I have a rough idea of future ex-husband’s current salary (much higher than mine) and that he has much higher savings than me (plus shares, investments etc). We jointly own a mortgaged house - I currently live there with our 2 children. The children predominantly live with me (I have a ‘lives with’ court order).

I have no idea what my ex is planning to offer for the financial settlement but his solicitor has already mentioned the need to agree a settlement to mine. In terms of the correct time to instruct my solicitor to deal with the financial settlement, I’m planning to wait until a full financial disclosure (salary, savings, investments, shares, assets) on both sides has taken place. My aim is to keep my legal costs down as much as possible because my ex is extremely disorganised as well as being secretive, so he’s likely to delay his disclosure and ramp up my legal fees in the process!

Does it make sense for me to wait until the financial disclosure has been made before I instruct my solicitor for the settlement negotiation? I don’t think that I need any advice from a solicitor before then. This seems like a low-risk option to me but I thought I’d check it with you guys.

With regards to pensions, we’re both a similar age (early 40s), have both been paying into pensions since we started our careers in our early 20s, and have 20yrs plus left before we retire. We both work full-time in professional jobs (although he earns at least £20,000 more a year than me due to the nature of his profession). Would these circumstances mean that pensions won’t be factored into our financial settlement as we’ll both be independently financially secure when we retire in 20yrs+?

Half of my work as a solicitor doing these cases is getting the right disclosure.

If you're confident you know what to look for then go ahead. If you're not confident the chance to challenge what might have been witheld in the disclosure process may have been lost if you leave it too late. The Form E documents is the starting point.

I'd ask for a cash equivalency on your pension now. Mine is taking months and holding up the divorce. We need it, even though my ex husband isn't claiming on my pension.

Thank you for your response Collaborate. I’ll use the main requirements from the Form E document as a starting point.

With regards to my query about pensions, I’m aware you don’t have all the details, but what are your initial thoughts? In a nutshell, we both have ‘good’ pensions that we’ve paid into since we started our professional careers in our early 20s. We’re both now in our early 40s, work full/time, and should be independently financially secure when we retire. Would pensions be factored into the financial settlement in this type of case?

Thank you - that’s really useful to know

Pensions are always relevant but I couldn't give an off the cuff response.

Ok, going off the relevant sections of the Form E for ex and me, when the time comes, I plan to ask him for the following in the financial disclosure:

1. salary details + bonus details
2. pension cetv
3. savings
4. investments and shares
5. assets over £500
6. CMS payment amount (using CMS calculator)

in addition, we’d need to get the house valued and get a statement for the current outstanding mortgage.

I’m not sure how to answer the questions in Form E about general financial needs. Would this be something that can be worked out in the negotiations once we’ve each disclosed our finances?

Thanks