Legal advice re. divorce for my friend

[Queenbess]

My friend's marriage is heading for divorce.
The issue is that her DH works overseas. If her DH initiates the divorce, she thinks that due to the laws there, where he has residence, she won't get such a good deal, even though she lives in the UK and they are both UK citizens.

On top of this, her lawyer has said he could get her substantial maintenance- short term at least- due to her DH's income, even though they have no children. She doesn't work so his argument is that she would be able to have maintenance for a while until she finds work or re-trains.

Does anyone have any ideas on any of this? She is already spending a lot on legal bills and although her lawyer is one of the best, I hope he is not promising more than he could deliver.

I'm divorced. I'm also a solicitor (though not a family one). Generally speaking, the way jurisdiction works is that where a married couple are resident in different countries, whichever one of them files first gets to choose the jurisdiction in which the divorce happens (by filing in the jurisdiction of their choice). England has divorce laws that are more favourable to women than many other countries so your friend's husband may well want to file asap where he lives.

If your friend's lawyer really is one of the best, this issue should be one of the first things he addresses with her and he should have advised her accordingly.

P.S. the fact that the husband works overseas will not necessarily mean that he is resident overseas (though he may be).

I would strongly recommend your friend talks to her husband and they try to reach a financial settlement between them rather than using lawyers. Lawyers can often over-promise in the hope of creating a nicely embattled situation... the more arguments and letters going back and forth, the higher their fees. Not saying that's the case here but if everyone can set aside differences and be reasonable, they could all save a lot of time and money.

Thank you both.

I am sure that the H is non resident UK as he is non dom for tax purposes and paid in currency where he works.

She has touched on the topic with her lawyer, but the situation is complicated by the fact that she is not 100% sure she wants a divorce (I am sure this is common) and neither is he- he is taking time to think over what he wants.

I'd say currently is 60/40 him in favour of divorce.

However, she says that should he decide to proceed with a divorce, she would not get such a good settlement through his country of resdience.

She is tempted to initiate the proceedings partly to settle her own mind- is distraught over waiting for him to "decide"- and to get a better deal.

He earns a lot of money and they have properties etc tied up- so it would be tricky for them to work out a simple 50-50 split, IMO, without legal involvement.

It's a difficult one as, if he decides first and files elsewhere then she will probably end up worse off than if she were to file here.

On the maintenance question, I would have thought your friend should be more focused on the capital split. She may well get maintenance for a bit but with no children, it won't be for long. Have a look at the judgment in Miller v Miller - one of the more recent big-money no-children divorces. He was worth about £60million, the marriage lasted about 3 years with no kids, and she ended up with about £5 million. I seem to recall in that case that the wife had been a management consultant or something like that - well remunerated in any case - but had given up work to renovate the couple's properties, organise their lives, etc. The point was: just because she had given up work at his request (she said), the court wasn't prepared to order a division of assets to enable her to live the life she would have had, had they not divorced.

Maybe your friend should consider moving to live in the same country as her husband and the marriage might improve? Just a thought...

Thanks so much.

The idea of moving there was a possibility at one point but the situation has deteriorated beyond that unless they get over this agree to start over. If that happened, then ne would most likely try to work fro the London office.

Their assets will be millions but not as much as Miller! She did run the home etc and organised their lives, but didn't give up a high powered job to do so.

His argument to that could be that if he'd been single, he would not have had such a big house, would not have renovated it, and not needed the back up she provided.

It is a long marriage- 20+ years- and for some of that time she did work, earning a fraction of what he was. She is presumably still thought of as being young enough in her 50s to find work again?

Long marriage probably changes the situation quite a lot. English courts look at the parties' contributions to the marriage and over 20+ years, hers could be very significant.

Strongly suggest she takes advice from her lawyer on the pros/cons of filing here to protect her position, though realistically, once that happens it is unlikely they will end up back together.