Please help/advice

Hi everyone.

I would be very appreciative of any advice, views or thoughts on my situation and whether it would be considered fair and meet the criteria of ‘need’ by a judge.

My wife and I are divorcing after 16 years. We have 3 children (11,12 and 14).

We have a house with £350,000 equity and around £60K in savings and investments.

We have a few other small assets (car each, watch, motorbike etc) but would match these off against each other to be pretty much perfectly equal.

I earn £50k a year (full time) and at present my wife works 3 days. If she was to work full time in her present type of job (quite easy for her to do) she would earn around £24k. I assume her potential full time earnings are taken into account and not just her current part time??

I have a pension (DB) which I have paid into for 5 years prior to meeting and 16 years since meeting/marriage (total 21years).

I have done quite a bit of reading into how the courts ‘might’ and do look at ‘needs’ of the divorcing parties and especially the children and am hoping they will see this as meeting both our needs and of course most importantly the children’s needs. We are amicable and would like to do this as cheaply as possible (no point paying solicitors for some services if we dont need to, to help sort out finances). I know we will use them but just want to keep it to a minimum wherever possible.

We will have the children 50/50 (probably 1 week at a time)

I was thinking a 50/50 split of all assets.

We would then both get around £205K.

I would pay child maintenance to her (doing the calc on the government webpage this works about at about £250-300/month.

We would split my DB pension (she does not have one as she stopped working when we had the children) 50/50 for the 16 years we have been married, and we would both keep our pension prior to meeting. This would be split into two pension pots (with the provider) with one being hers and the other being mine.

We would both be able to afford a small 4 bedroom house locally (with a mortgage each) on the asset split (£205K) she would need to pretty much max out her mortgage capacity and I would also be given the child maintenance payment.

She would also claim the child benefit for the 3 children to further boost her household income.

I know this is not taken into account, but my parents have given us over £100K during our marriage (some of which was from my grandmother when she passed away – my father inheritance) which we have in the equity of the house. It worries me to think that she will get even more if the asset split is not 50/50.

I hope that any judge would see that she must support herself once we are divorced and should therefore work full time (there is no reason why she couldn’t) and not only work part time and therefore claim a higher asset split due to her reduced income working part time.

She has said that she would/try to claim UC but surely this is not right as she is not maximising her income. Anyway that is not the point of this….although it might get a few interesting replies….rightly so in my view! If you can work…..work! Don’t get me wrong if she NEEDS to then that is what it is there for (only until she can fully support herself though).

Anyway, do you think a judge would see this as fair (50/50 split). I may have VERY slightly (£150/200) more disposable income each month.

As stated, my concerns are that a judge would see her part time wage and as a result her reduced (or non-existent on part time wage) mortgage capacity and award her more of the asset share. Surely, they would consider what she could earn (full time)? Also, that I will possibly have slight more disposable income once all bills are paid (really not very much more at all though) so would this small difference make a difference in asset share?

Personally, I think this is fair. Although it irks me slightly that she will keep part of my Dad's inheritance but it is what it is i'm afriad. At least my kids will enjoy some of it as it will help her buy a house which they will live in for a little while.

Any views, advice or personal accounts would be GREATLY received.
Thank you!

You’ll have greater mortgage raising capacity.

After 16 years and three kids you’ll be lucky to be able to ring fence any pension.

Are you sure the trustees of the DB pension will allow her to retain her share in the pension? Remember, there is no pot with a DB pension.