Can we afford to separate?

Rozza

Hi - this is my first post so be gentle with me! My husband and I have been married for 8 years and have a four year old son. We've had marriage difficulties in the past, we went to Relate a couple of years ago as I was on the brink of divorcing him. Things got better for a while, but we now seem worse than ever. We don't get on at all, never have a good word to say to each other and our son often shouts at us to 'stop arguing you two'. This horrifies me, and is one of the main reasons why I am considering separation. It came to a head yesterday, and we have had a serious discussion about separating. In summary, he wants to go to Relate and I'm not sure I want to. If I'm honest, the main reason we're still together is our son, and the fact I am terrified of being on my own financially. I work p/t (26 hours) and earn £21.3K. I have also just started a p/t degree which takes up two evenings plus home study time - luckily, work are sponsoring the vast majority of my fees. Anyway, to get to the point, our house is worth about £145K and there's an outstanding mortgage of about £85K. We have c card debts of £7K. If we were to separate, for me to buy a house near our son's school (2 bed) would cost at least £120K. How/where could I get a mortgage on my current salary? Would it be possible to keep our current house - would I have to pay him his share now? It sounds mercenary, but I need an idea of where I stand financially before I decide whether we should continue, or separate. I'm almost 40, so couldn't take on a long term mortgage, however my earnings will increase in the future when I complete my degree and when my son gets older I will work more hours. Can anyone help or advise me on the financial issues please?

MPwannasavemoney

My wife keeps tellling me we should separate - that way she could claim all sorts of allowances as a single parent etc- you could look into these.

rchddap1

Tad more complicated than that though. Yes there are some 'benefits' to claim, but there are 2 houses to run instead of 1 which is where the additional costs come in.

Fran

You will find some useful info on the House buying & selling board and the Mortgages & endowments board and you could post questions re housing on there.