Husband's ex wife wanting more money

paulineb_2

Jojo_the_Tightfisted wrote: »

And my father did similar. But my mother didn't have the advantage of a secure professional job, plus her own mental health issues.

Both my children always had contact with their dads. One grudgingly paid maintenance, one didn't. Made no difference to whether or not they saw them, though.

However, I'm the one who had to take the rubbish jobs to fit in with the children, pay the childcare, dinner money and everything else they needed. My career prospects were the ones that were harmed, I'm the one whose outgoings were too high to be able to get a mortgage, the one who couldn't afford to make pension contributions or go out, have hobbies, make friends away from the schoolyard or even just drop into the supermarket for some milk on the way home because the after school club closed at six.


DD2 now lives with her father - and since then, he has decided that, having found out for the first time what's involved in being responsible for a teenager, never mind an infant who needed fulltime childcare and looking after,he feels that he didn't pay enough or give me enough credit for what I did whilst he was off building a career and buying a nice home, car and everything else he did.

My mums job was far from secure a lot of the time, she taught supply for about 5 years until she got a permanent primary teaching post and that work wasnt always guaranteed. It is now and has been for quite some time, but it wasnt always like that. And as I said before, theres a line of thinking that thinks teachers are all well paid. I was in a job about ten years ago, in a managers salary for a charity and I earned almost as much as she did and my pay wasnt large by any manner of means. Shes always said, when she sees colleagues talking about certain expenses or their income, some of her colleagues have husbands who are very well off, shes always had to live on her income and thats it and it makes a massive difference only having one wage. If my dad had paid a decent sum of money for me, it would have made a big difference to my life, but he didnt and tbh, if he couldnt be bothered to see me, I wouldnt have wanted his money anyway and I still dont.

When he dies I expect to be cut out of his will and Ive already been in contact with a friend of his to make it clear I dont want a penny from him ever, even in the very unlikely event he would leave me something in his will, I dont want it.

And she had me while she was at university and carried on her degree after I was born. In fact I remember her telling me when she went to see me in hospital when I was born, I was 3 months early and she was only 19, the nurses refused to let her see me as they had her marked down as a !!!!less mum who would abandon her child. When she did get to see me, it was only her insistence that my legs were blue and that I was clearly unwell that got me moved to special care.

My mum also supported my uncle at many times in his life, who was also a professional person, but he had schizophrenia which impacted on her life for a long time, because he was never unwell enough to come to the attention of any mental health services, but he went through spells of being very unwell, tried to kill himself more than once and on the second attempt around ten years later he was successful. I admire her, shes not had an easy life and she sacrificed a lot to make sure my brother and myself were ok.

Ive also not known my mum to have had much of a social life when I was growing up either, or my brother, that was sacrificed to make sure we were ok. As we dont have an extended family. There was me, my mum, my gran, my brother and my uncle and my uncle died when I was 21, thats 23 years ago now.

I remember my mum telling me when she was around 21 or 22 she was offered a teaching job at very short notice and needed a childcare place which she got because in those days the people in the education dept helped sort that out, but when she was at school there were a lot of comments made to her about having pulled strings to get me a nursery place, which she hadnt. She also wanted to go part time for a spell as she was having problems getting childcare for me and the school told her no, you have to resign if you cant be full time. It was sorted out in the end, but she had to battle for a lot of things when it came to work and me getting childcare. It might be changed days now, but 40 years or so ago I think women who did the job my mum did, whether it was full time, part time or supply, met a lot more brick walls and sexism if thats the right word, for having a job and also having a child.

I know its not easy for a lot of people, even when people divorce and get on well and the absent parent has contact, Im sure its still tough all round.

I have the utmost respect for my mum, I appreciate everything she did for me and I still do, I dont take any of the things she did for me while I was growing up for granted.

FatVonD

FBaby wrote: »

And how do we know that? Many mothers decide when it is time to get back to work, having initially agree with the father that they would return to work, that over their dead body will they do so, and the father has no choice whatsoever but to go with it?

I certainly know a number of families in this situation. As a matter of fact, one of my OH friend was just telling him about this situation a couple of weeks ago. They decided to have a baby when they had calculated they could just about afford to with her going back to work, but she decided at the last minute that she couldn't cope with leaving the baby with the childminder. They had massive arguments about it because they are not in a financial position to do that. He suggested they sell the house but she refused that too. Her position is that it will only be for 4 years because she will then go back to work when the child is at school, and that they would manage by budgeting better. Except that 1 year on, she is spending just as much as before, and he has just found out that her credit card has now reached £3,000. He is very stressed but when he said that maybe she should reconsider her decision not to work, she has said that if he continued to insist, she would go and then she would be able to be a SAHM any way.

So no, not convinced it is always a family decision for the mother to be a SAHM, especially when they end up separated when the child is still young.

And how do we know that they didn't? I agree that is sometimes happens in the way your friend has experienced but there are far more instances where it IS a joint decision.

The OP says she has been with her husband for 5 years, since she has stated there was a gap between the marriage ending and them getting together the child would have been around 5 and would have not long started school so, given that many, many women don't work until their child goes to school I don't think you can say she refused to work after a time when he wasn't happy with that status quo.

If the OP's husband, due to age, could only take out a mortgage for 19 years he would have been around 47 at the time. We don't know what age he and his first wife bought their house but presumably, as there was so little left owing on the mortgage, it was some time ago so I don't think it's unreasonable to assume that, prior to having a child, she also contributed to that mortgage.

So the house is not some great gift that he has bestowed upon her. Half was hers anyway. She has taken on the remainder of the mortgage. so, in fact he has only gifted her (or more specifically their son) less than 50% of the house.


As an aside, assuming the ex wife and the OP's husband are of a similar age, her mortgage will be over less years too so will be more than the £150 people are quoting.

paulineb_2

FatVonD wrote: »

He paid for most of it because they together chose to have a child and for her role in that partnership to be as a stay at home mum so she contributed her time (possibly sacrificing her own career) to make it possible for him to make his contribution to their family a financial one.

I wonder how much childcare for thier child would have cost him for the duration of the mortgage if she'd not stayed at home to raise their child?

We dont actually know that they chose for her to be a stay at home mum, we dont know anything about any career sacrifices she made. Or not as the case may be.

He paid for most of it because he was the one earning, thats the bottom line.

paulineb_2

FatVonD wrote: »

And how do we know that they didn't? I agree that is sometimes happens in the way your friend has experienced but there are far more instances where it IS a joint decision.

The OP says she has been with her husband for 5 years, since she has stated there was a gap between the marriage ending and them getting together the child would have been around 5 and would have not long started school.

If the OP's husband, due to age, could only take out a mortgage for 19 years he would have been around 47 at the time. We don't know what age he and his first wife bought their house but presumably, as there was so little left owing on the mortgage, it was some time ago so I don't think it's unreasonable to assume that, prior to having a child, she also contributed to that mortgage.

So the house is not some great gift that he has bestowed upon her. Half was hers anyway. She has taken on the remainder of the mortgage. so, in fact he has only gifted her (or more specifically their son) less than 50% of the house.


As an aside, assuming the ex wife and the OP's husband are of a similar age, her mortgage will be over less years too so will be more than the £150 people are quoting.

She took on a 30k mortgage

The house is worth 300k. He has gifted them more than 50 per cent of the value of the house if she only had to pay for 30k of it to make sure it was paid off.

The OP says she was given the house as part of the divorce settlement, he paid for most of it, hes taken nothing of the value from it and she had to pay 30k to pay it off in full

Thats a lot more in her favour than a 50/50 split.

FatVonD

paulineb wrote: »

She took on a 30k mortgage

The house is worth 300k. He has gifted them more than 50 per cent of the value of the house if she only had to pay for 30k of it to make sure it was paid off.

No he HASN"T! She owned 50% of it anyway!

FatVonD

paulineb wrote: »

We dont actually know that they chose for her to be a stay at home mum, we dont know anything about any career sacrifices she made. Or not as the case may be.

He paid for most of it because he was the one earning, thats the bottom line.

And he was only able to work to pay for it because she was a stay at home mum.

FatVonD

Even at todays figures, if £30,000 was outstanding on a £300,000 house then their equity in it was 90%. She owned 45% outright and mortgaged the property to raise the 10% still owing so he only 'gifted' her 45%.

The reality is that they probably bought the house for lots less so the £30,000 still owing represents a larger proportion of the initial cost.

Rebecca01

FatVonD wrote: »

No he HASN"T! She owned 50% of it anyway!

Totally agree. However he then he subsequently gave her his half as she was becoming the pwc.

FBaby

And how do we know that they didn't? I agree that is sometimes happens in the way your friend has experienced but there are far more instances where it IS a joint decision.

We don't know either way, that is my point, yet the assumption was made not once but two or even three times on this thread that it was a joint decision.

[QUOTE}The OP says she has been with her husband for 5 years, since she has stated there was a gap between the marriage ending and them getting together the child would have been around 5 and would have not long started school so, given that many, many women don't work until their child goes to school I don't think you can say she refused to work after a time when he wasn't happy with that status quo.[/QUOTE]

And why can't you say that? We just don't know. Even OP probably doesn't know.

FatVonD

Rebecca01 wrote: »

Totally agree. However he then he subsequently gave her his half as she was becoming the pwc.

For the benefit of his son he relinquished his 45%.