Spill the beans ... how did you financially survive divorce?

princessdreamer

Lyn that is awful. I am so scared of ending up homeless with the children. As I said before all I want is to keep our home till the children are grown. I have no money to give ex my only hope is he cares about the children enough to not hurt them any more.

Bondie68

.. using MSE! I have compared, switched, managed every little bit of money possible. I was left with three kids and debts due to my ex going bankrupt and was then amde redudant yet thru extreme money management we still have the original roof over our heads. I've downsized the car and check where cheapest petrol is. If we want to go out we find a voucher first. Shopping is at Aldi/Lidl or at a time when the price tags are being reduced. Energy saving drives my kids mad - but got a sizable discount for reducing my bills by 20%. I am working again coz I did some voluntary work then got offered a paid job. There is no waste in our house - unless you count leftover veg going to our guinea pigs!

adamantine

RAS wrote: »

You do not need the original documents. You can apply for replacements for the central registry but this is expensive.

If you ring the Registry Office(s) that cover the places where you were born and married, they can confirm the price they charge for a replacement. Our local one charges £9.00 for a replacement from an archived register. This is a lot cheaper to get then via the registrar general's office.

ive replaced everything bar the marriage certificate coz we got married abroad and my card is not accepted on the website. my solicitors should be able to order one on their company credit card but thats going to be quite expensive and needs to be authorised by the partners first.

willow_loulou

I didnt !! and I am still waiting (months and months now) to hear from the legal services commision to start re paying my legal aid! It never ends

immoral_angeluk

I was lucky in that I was eligible for legal aid as after the split I was forced to claim income support, so I wasn't charged anything bar a one off court fee for the decree absolute. We lived in a housing association house which I stayed in with our daughters. Thankfully the split was initially amicable so he helped with childcare etc as child maintenance (he now pays his basic liability but at least does this regularly!). He took the car (on HP) and gadgets (tv, console etc) so I had to start from scratch with something, but I'm grateful that there weren't assets to sort out or complications/delays in getting the divorce.

Now, 3 years on, I'm in a much better and secure financial position and am doing well for myself, I have a wonderful new partner and say to this day that getting divorced was the best thing I ever did :rotfl:.

tgroom57

I didn't survive financially, but I kept my sanity and escaped the grave. It was always about money for my ex: he had been intercepting my mail for years and had his eye on my upcoming redundancy money to pay off the debts for his failed business venture. His plan was to keep the house and the children and me pay for it all.

1. I got 'The Divorce Handbook' by Fiona Shackleton, probably out of date now but a good starting point and saved me hundreds at the solicitors. I decided what I wanted to keep, what I wanted to happen and what I could reasonably defend.
2. I successfully argued to keep all my redundancy since he had no intention or means to pay towards my keep or the children - this was decided in court by the judge.
3. I recognised early on that a man who had been unreasonable and underhand in marriage was going to be unreasonable in divorce.
4. Keep your eye on the ball ! I checked everything from the solicitors (and the barrister) against what I found in the book. That book paid for itself many times over!

My final bill was £2500 at the solicitors, because I only kept what was rightfully mine.

My career took a hammering though, through waiting 3 years to get a settlement on the house during which time the housing market collapsed. He told his solicitors he expected me to find a job and/or remarry in that time and he waited for that to happen so he could get a better deal & everything he wanted: his solicitor went along with this for 2 years. He got his business debts paid out from the equity in the house before dividing it between us - my fault for agreeing (under duress) to his debts being secured on the family home several years earlier.

And the moral of this story is: if he ever jokes "Everything of yours is mine, and everything of mine is my own!"
- he's NOT joking.

debtdesperado

I'm not divorced, but I have worked in the family department of a high street law firm. Maybe it's because the only couples we saw were the ones who were fighting, but I have to say they didn't help themselves.... like the couple who were fighting over the recently fitted kitchen (I kid you not). She was staying in the house (with their three children), and he was adamant he deserved at least half. So this was all duly fought over and negotiated between the solicitors, and then a suitable time for him to come and collect the cupboards etc. After all that he turned up with a chainsaw (terrifying his children) and cut the entire kitchen literally in half. And the point of that is what? So then his wife and children were scared, his wife (quite rightly) is then concerned about access, unstable behaviour, social workers got involved... the whole thing was a disaster.Even if you have to get lawyers involved, my tips would be: keep talking between yourselves. The more you can work out before the lawyers ask the question, the better. Bear in mind that your solicitor is obligated in order to do their job properly and not to be negligent to check everything and keep asking 'is this enough, are you happy with this', which is where greedy clients will say, oh if you think you can get a bit more, then do'...which equals more time. Don't give up communicating and leave it to the solicitors, keep talking between yourselves (and not just when you get a solicitor’s letter which makes you angry).Respond to solicitor’s letters promptly, giving all the information you can. Everytime they have to write a letter or pick up the phone, or chase you for some information or a missing signature, the bill goes up. So be efficient, and your bill will be less.Just assume you will be poor, it's going to mess your finances up for years. That is a fact. Everyone getting divorce seems to assume that the money the couple has amassed is down to them as an individual, but the truth is, you did it together. Every time you were able to split or share a bill, you effectively saved money. How many single people do you know who have bought or are living in a family-sized home? Learn for yourself what is enough for you.Someone will always seem to be the winner, someone will always seem to be the loser. However, you never know how life is going to turn out a few years down the road.Be fair and be dignified. Imagine you have to explain your behaviour to someone, but without blaming or mentioning your spouse. Are you really being the calm, rational individual you think you are? Is taking a chainsaw to your new Ikea cabinets really dignified? Or fair, particularly given that your children will be living on Mcdonalds until your ex-wife can afford a new kitchen? Is that really what you want for them, or you? Next time, get a pre-nup...

Coppernob

Can I just say that not all solicitors are greedy. I work for a family lawyer who is considerate and supportive but most of all very reasonable and I wouldn't hesitate in recommending someone going through a difficult divorce to consult him. The process is a minefield and once a Consent Order is made there is no going back. Good luck to anyone going through sucha ghastly phase in their life.:)

findochtywifie

My ex and I had sorted out our finances and the children ourselves. I went to a wonderful solicitor who informed me she could act for both of us if we were both happy with the arrangements we had already made. (No comebacks allowed if I discovered he won the lottery the day before he left!) Result: a divorce costing a few hundred rather than thousands of pounds. I had no idea you could do this.

BobbinAlong

If you think you are going to split and have children under 16, get it in writing immediately who they are living with and signed by both parties. And the visiting arrangements - who pays for and does transport etc. After a year of separation and before the divorce went through, my ex took the children - just kept them at the end of the holiday - and I had a year of fighting to get them back.
Now they are adults and at home equally with either parent when they aren't at uni. Everyone should take the time to find out about financial matters. I officially support them both at uni though as the ex wouldn't take the trouble to learn how student finance works and fill in the forms (and they get full loans through me).