fair and equitable financial

my husband and i are arguing about what is fair...we have a 14 year old son..i was working in a good job until he was born..then i gave up to work with my husbands company and was very involved. however i am now not working.

he wants a Clean Break settlememt ..i get the house worth 870,000 and for me to live on income from sale and equity of the house.moving to much smaller house for me and my son...in return he retains savings of 270,000; shares or 40,000, his pension with transfer value of 330,000 and salary of c 90,000. He will pay maintenance for our son per the csa.

i can retain my 10%share in 1 of his 2 companies , but have no call on any monies if the they are sold in the future.

he keeps quoting duxbury to me

i have no pension of my own and am currently about to embark on a course to work toward a life coaching opportunty to make an income ...but that will be somewhere down the line.

help!!

Alexander,

Yours is a case where there is enough capital and income to keep both new households in reasonable comfort/security.

The proposal you are being asked to accept is a higher share of the assets in return for making no claim for spousal maintenance.

Recent caselaw has given the stay at home mum full credit for their contribution to the family.

So you could take the view that as a starting point you are entitled to 50% of the assets, as well as child support and spousal maintenance.

Whilst child support is 15% of his net income, spousal maintenance could easily be another 20%.

You are being offered 870k out of 1510K - so only just over half. It doesn't sound a great offer.

Wouldn't 755k (i.e. 50%) plus 35% of his income (for at least 5 years possibly much longer) provide more security.

Also in your list of assets I don't see any mention of the value of the businesses? How much are they worth? Cos you may well be entitled to a fair share of their value.

How much profit do the businesses make each year? As a very rough rule they could be worth 10 times what they make as profit in one year.

There is a lot at stake here so do not be steamrollered in to a hasty decision.

Let us know if you need further guidance.

My husbands view is if i do not accept the clean break the most i can expect is a 5o/50 split of the assets.

i am unclear as to whether the transfer value of the pension is included in this or dealt with separately.

He took out his pensions in the early 1980`s..we married in 1991 and lived together from 1989.

my husband has been married before and pays maintenance to his first wife of £428 in perpuity.She received the familt house in the settlement and he moved into my home.He says if i go for spousal maintenance it will cause problems with his first wife.

Further he seems to have forgotten that i have been very involved in helping to develop the international side of i 1 of his businesses in the early days.

Any further thoughts would be really helpful..he is bullying his way through this at the moment.

Hi Alexander.

He is bullying you big time! He knows from his previous divorce how things go, so this time he is trying to make sure hes "the winner". In your case my advice is..... (which REALLY sticks in my throat! LOL) is seek legal advice! It seems to me there is a massive pot here and you need to be protected.
Although it doesnt really matter how big the pot is, as the divorce path and AR path is the same throughout the scales, I have a feeling with yours that you are going to need some help. Of course he doesnt want you to involve solicitors because he can manipulate you to his way of thinking. From what i have read in your posts, he is bullying you into accepting what he says is right, but it is not!
What he does not realise is........if you signed a clean break Consent Order, without seeking legal advice you can always seek at a later date more. Mind you this is if a Judge stamped it up without seeing you in court to ask if you think its fair!)
I can also see that he moved into your property! He says if u go for SM it will cause problems for his first wife????? No it will cause him more problems because he will have to pay you SM too!
You have been a BIG part in this mans life, with him moving into your house, helping him with his businesses ect, did i read that he wants to give you 10% share of business but if he sells it, you cant have any of the profit??? I think maybe this man will somehow liqudate it at a later date and change the name of the company, so you know longer have even 10%. (Just me being suspicious, i dont know much about companies)
Anyway my advice? Please seek legal advice, this one is going to be a battle, and you need some people on your side. Dont let this man bully you in any way shape or form. I know its going to cost, but the rewards in your case far outweigh the cost!

Kind Regards and any help you need in the future, we are all here to help.
Louise

Hi,

This sounds very much like my divorce and the numbers are similar. My ex2b is trying to bully me, we are still living together and actually separated last August. You are probably like me in that if he was playing fair you would accept a settlement and get on with the rest of your life,rather than fighting endlessly. My ex2b isn't even considering 50/50. The figures he has bandied about have been more like 90/10 in his favour.I have three kids, two are his and my 3 year old is autistic.It is such a bitter , nasty fight.My ex2b has been divorced in the past too, 15 years ago, but the law has changed now, as I try and tell him. I too gave up a really good job when we got together, and he came and lived with me, albeit for only 8 months. He also has 3 companies, which he seems to try and leave out of any financial discussions, in fact he admitted to forgetting to disclose one in his form E.
I know that when there is a large pot there is plenty to go around, so it tends to be more like a 50-50 split. I too however need some type of spousal maintenence from him as I have the kids to look after especially my little one with special needs. Also, same as you I have no pension. He has a self administered one which has about 400 K in , and he always said "why do you need a pension". So that has to go into the equation too.
My advice to you would be to get a good family lawyer and knuckle down for the fight. Believe me it is not easy but you have to get what is rightfully yours. With men like ours they are never going to voluntarily cough up , they will have to be told by a Judge. Good Luck, if he's anything like mine your going to need it !

I too was told that 50:50 of the property was the very most I would get and that I probably was entitled to much less because I earnt less in the past. Solicitors have been unaninmous in saying that 50% is the very least I would get according to the law. I've handed it all over to a solicitor who knows what the law is. I have no wish to take more than I'm allowed but I need to get reliable advice. I don't know if the soon-to-be-ex simply got it wrong or set out to deceive me - handing it over to a lawyer (even though there isn't that much) means I don't have to worry about misinformation.

I'm a man facing the other end of this type of dispute.
If he wants a clean break, a good starting point seems 50/50, assuming cash/shares didn't come from before marriage. If he wants a clean break, you could do a simple sum on the value of SM: future earnings*appropriate %*number of years (ignore interest on money & inflation) to give you an idea of how much more he needs to pay you now. If you can agree without court (lawyers through mediation is OK) as from what others tell me, going to court is hell and everyone loses.

In my case, I've proposed a 50/50 split, despite 80% of our assets coming from money I had before marriage. I think even split is fair as FMH can be sold to provide 2 smaller homes of adequate size (I'll have kids at least 1/7 of time). My wife works part-time, but full-time would earn more than me after a very short time, and I'm happy to pay SM alongside CM.
However, my wife wants the house + 50% of assets after repay mortgage (say, £700k to her, £20k to me). She is being aggressive & hostile, so I fear I'll end up keeping those lawyers and barristers in port for a while to come.