My ex husband won’t give back my parents inheritance

[dalmationdotty]

I am in the process of a divorce after a long marriage. Long story short. Over the last 10 or so years my father used to give me lump sums of money from part of my future inheritance. He said he’d rather I had the money now when I needed it. He has since passed, bless him. I used the money as a deposit to buy our first home and our second home and also to do our extension etc. Which my husband knew and was very happy about. Without my parents help we would have never afforded our current property. I also worked part time so have always contributed to the running costs and mortgage too. Now we are looking to possibly sell the property and in splitting the profit I have asked for the inheritance that was mine to be accounted for. My husband just laughed at me and told me I was an idiot. FYI I am not wanting to sell the house as still have young kids at the local school and I have been paying the bills and mortgage myself since he has left. He only pays me child maintenance and nothing more and hasn’t contributed to the upkeep of the house either since he has left. He is forcing or trying to force a sale as he needs the money to buy his own home which I don’t think is unreasonable at all. But he says we split the house 50:50. FYI he is on a huge salary 4 x mine and is renting a very nice big family home, but he wants to own a home not rent anymore.
Any advice??

Thanks for your email, will let you know when I know my legal position after solicitors this week.

If you ignore him you will see if he is employing tactics (which I suspect he is).

My prediction is if you don’t comply, the next step will be to get angry.

Yes definitely because last time he asked me about it I replied I didn’t know what I was doing. So he started shouting at me and threw me out of his house. Luckily the kids were waiting for me in the car so didn’t witness it. Was very upsetting tho and I was shaken up and had to hide it from the kids. He has shouted at me before when he found out u was dating. Saying I’m not paying for you to f**k your bloody boyfriend in my house. I quietly asked him to leave my home. Sadly kids heard and I was left dealing with the fallout, reassuring then that daddy abs I were fine etc

What happens to people??! I’m no angel but I’ve never lost my temper with him in front of my children ever. Not even when we married.
I’m trying to be fair and reasonable but I won’t be bullied into a deal that leaves me in a financially terrible position.

Forget being fair and reasonable he’s not being. He’s trying to force you into agreeing to stuff which is in his best interest don’t. And I say this as some who got divorced very amicably I got a lawyer he didn’t my lawyer suggested stuff I spoke to ex we agreed what we wanted to do and I went back to my lawyer sometimes she wasn’t best pleased but it worked for us and as we were both being reasonable I had no qualms doing it our way. If at any point he’d done what your ex is doing the rules would have changed.

Oh and I meant to say. I got to stay in the home till dd turned 18 and when it’s sold it will be a 50:50 split but coz I’d worked pastime after we had kids I got 65%of his pension which was not inconsiderable as he’d always worked full time in a good job while I put my career on hold.

OP if you also pay into a pension pot and have any other assets these will be put into the pot along with your STBXH; the entire pot would then be split between you. That's what happened when I divorced and my then STBXH tried very similar tactics (which didn't work, btw).

Our pension pot was split 50:50 which meant I gained quite alot from his and I also got about 80% of the house settlement due to some differentials which the judge took into account. I also got spousal maintenance to enable me the time it would take for me to up my earnings and support myself and my DC. So to reitarate everything others have said get down to the Solicitor and take no prisoners!

Is there a chance he's seen this so is making up shit to guilt trip you or try and make his case stronger?

@SunshineCake no way he would see this as he has no idea about mumsnet or social media.
I’ll see what the lawyer says and not be blindsided into anything without advice!

Never agree to anything in writing , when replying to your ex..
Just write thanks for the info.

Don’t do anything directly. You are paying £££ for a solicitor. It all goes through them.

(Your XH will try to convince you a solicitor is a waste of money, that you are both sensible adults and quite capable of doing this between yourselves).

Whatever you do, get a solicitor.

You can't afford to not get professional legal advice.

It'll cost now, but it'll pay off long term when you're not bullied out of your entitlement to marital assets.

It is entirely fair that on divorce it's a 50:50 split of assets but that includes all the assets including pensions, savings (debts), housing, cars etc. Your inheritance was sunk into the household assets and are no longer retrievable - they are not yours alone. And bear in mind When looking at the resulting settlement a father also needs to provide suitable housing for himself and the children as well as the mother's need to do so. You don't want your children having to stay in a one room hovel when they're with their Dad do you?
(Sorry I just realised I assumed kids are involved!)

Whilst keeping the house might seem like a good idea bear in mind the need to maintain, heat and light it and pay council tax for it. That can be a significant and punishing commitment.

I don't quite understand why a mother can't work during school holidays as suggested by one poster. A mother can be expected to support herself and the children to the best of her abilities.

Legal advice is essential. It will pay itself back over and over again and ensure you feel like you got a fair deal - which is very important to avoid future bitterness. The babe if divorcees. And bear in mind two household are always more expensive than one so you cannot expect to live to the same standard post divorce without significantly increasing your own earnings ( or a windfall!). It will not be affordable whatever the causes of the breakdown of the relationship.

When I divorced, I told my solicitor that I had paid the deposit on the house from my inheritance from my grandparents, it was always understood that I would get that amount as well as my share from the house. In the end due to my ex leaving the house empty with no heating during freezing weather & the pipes freezing & bursting causing all the ceilings to come down & the central heating boiler splitting, my parents has to pay for repairs & my ex was told that unless he contributed to pay half the repairs he would have to relinquish his share of the house, which he did & I got the house back & sold it. Get yourself a good divorce solicitor who knows their stuff, check to see if there is any way you can get legal aid, if there has been any proven abuse or violence & you are on a low income then you may be able to get it. Otherwise it might still pay in the long run to find some way of paying for one as it could give you a better financial future on your own.

Boulezvous if you are referring to the comment I made regarding school holidays, I did not say that mothers could not work - I said I worked part time, not full time. This, in turn, has impacted my current/future earnings. My exh would commit to NONE of the school holidays and holiday entitlement in my job was 20 days (pro rata) plus BH. My exh and I agreed that it was not in the best interests of our young children to be in childcare before and after school 5 days a week plus 9 full weeks of school holidays. There were a lot of other circumstances at play that were taken into account but are too identifying and I don’t want to discuss here. My point was meant to suggest that the division can be adjusted to reflect individual circumstances and a split isn’t necessarily 50:50. Apologies if that was not clear.

I really don’t want anyone to think I meant parents shouldn’t/can’t work due to school holidays. Just that in our circumstances we agreed that me working part time instead of full time was best for the children and we adjusted our division of (almost non existent) assets accordingly. It really does depend on the circumstances. My exh has a sort of hobby/job that means he is always away and doesn’t really earn anything. If he’d had 50% of the equity he’d have bought a car and a holiday - it wouldn’t have gone on setting up a nice second home for the kids!