Entering Marriage with valuable assets, where do I stand

Imp

I give you.....


http://divorcecover.com/

kloana

I agree that it's sensible to protect what you already have, as individuals.

My husband and I are happily married, and I hope we never find cause to divorce.

But should the day ever come (never say never), he could potentially be left near-penniless, as a direct result of him being lax. Reason being, he came into a significant inheritance, and he allowed me to place every penny of it in my sole name. In fact, he told me to do so. He's rubbish with money and very easily tempted to spend.

I've protected and nurtured it - but practically and legally speaking, what's to stop me blowing it, either now or in the future? Nothing that I'm aware of.

Similarly when we were buying our home, he left every aspect of it to me and wanted nothing to do with the legal side of things. How very tempting it was for me to fill out the paperwork for us to be 'tenants in common', with unequal shares of the property (in my favour), and just have him sign it. I didn't, by the way (we're joint tenants).

I'm playing devil's advocate, because I'd never screw anyone over financially, no matter what, but it can be quite easy to create the 'right' conditions in order to do so!

Guest101

kloana wrote: »

I agree that it's sensible to protect what you already have, as individuals.

My husband and I are happily married, and I hope we never find cause to divorce.

But should the day ever come (never say never), he could potentially be left near-penniless, as a direct result of him being lax. Reason being, he came into a significant inheritance, and he allowed me to place every penny of it in my sole name. In fact, he told me to do so. He's rubbish with money and very easily tempted to spend.

I've protected and nurtured it - but practically and legally speaking, what's to stop me blowing it, either now or in the future? Nothing that I'm aware of.

Similarly when we were buying our home, he left every aspect of it to me and wanted nothing to do with the legal side of things. How very tempting it was for me to fill out the paperwork for us to be 'tenants in common', with unequal shares of the property (in my favour), and just have him sign it. I didn't, by the way (we're joint tenants).

I'm playing devil's advocate, because I'd never screw anyone over financially, no matter what, but it can be quite easy to create the 'right' conditions in order to do so!

Let's hope you never get a very expensive legal lesson on what you 'think' the law is in divorces

kloana

Guest101 wrote: »

Let's hope you never get a very expensive legal lesson on what you 'think' the law is in divorces

I have limited knowledge of what the law is, and no intention of finding out. I 'think' you might have misread or missed my final paragraph, too ('interesting' use of quote marks! ).

easilydistracted

I'd agree with everyone who says there's no way to legally protect what you bring to a marriage. I own a house with my partner and because were not married the money I brought into the house is definitely protected by a trust deed. Although I earn quite a lot more the rest of the house is owned in 50-50 shares despite him contributing less than half to the mortgage and I don't go round pinching the pennies on a day to day basis. It just meant that we felt fair going into the relationship and could then forget about the deposit and get on with our life together. I have to say I'm struggling to see the motivation for marriage with your current views, but then its not something I'd want to do full stop.

Mrs_Ryan

C_Mababejive wrote: »

I agree but think about this,, if/when the house needs work doing i,e decorating,carpets,windows,building work,,,will he have any say in the matter? Will he be asked/expected to contribute?

He will have no influence or power in the relationship and will to some extent be in thrall to some woman who provides the roof over his head.

He might as well be part of the furniture.

It might seem ok for a year or two but after a while the cracks will appear..

I kinda know that feeling. OH and I have been living together for nine years. The house is his alone, he won't let me contribute to any of the bills and certainly won't let me have my name on the deeds. On Thursday, the house will belong to him alone. There are quite a lot of things in the house however that actually belong to me. Most of them have been bought by my mum and she's made it clear they are gifted to me alone so if we should split I can take them with me.
Despite this, he relies on me to make the household decisions, he is having the bathroom specially adapted for my disability needs and is relying on me to tell him how I want it doing. He has asked me to choose our new kitchen and organise and oversee the fitting of both the bathroom and the kitchen to how I want it doing. He allowed me to choose all the fixtures and fittings for the bathroom. When we bought a new bed, he told me to choose the one that would make it easier for me with my needs. I always say to him it's his money and his house but he says to me it's my choice and he will go along with what I want. I guess it's about compromise? We aren't married, just living together. I'm aware that he could just decide he's had enough at any time, kick me out and I would have diddly squat in the way of rights.
I'm down as his next of kin on his care records, I stand to inherit his pension pot/death in service benefit if anything were to happen to him. I don't feel inequal in the relationship, he's worked damn hard to pay off the mortgage on his house- he bought the house all on his own with a large deposit and smallish mortgage which never even reached its term before he paid it- so I don't see why I should expect to share in that. If I took everything in this house that belongs to me he would be a bit stuck!
Only thing I do moan about is his refusal to put me on the council tax bill- I'm entitled to student exemption so then he would be classed as living alone and receive a discount- but he refuses to do this so ends up paying more!

duchy

So if you aren't on the council tax anywhere else then he is making a false declaration to the council each year and is claiming he lives alone so claims the single occupancy discount ? This also means you can't vote because you can't be on the electoral roll ?

As a fulltime time student claiming fees (or any benefit ) that will track back to the coucil tax eventually (unless you are claiming incorrectly ) that you live elsewhere which is another fraudulent declaration as far as the authorities are concerned -the fact the bill would be lower if he declared correctly and then applied for exemption for you is irrelevenat as the exemption is ignored unless applied for). Whilst I appreciate he is protecting his investment -this could end up biting both on the bum very hard indeed when cross checks are made.

Mrs_Ryan wrote: »

I kinda know that feeling. OH and I have been living together for nine years. The house is his alone, he won't let me contribute to any of the bills and certainly won't let me have my name on the deeds. On Thursday, the house will belong to him alone. There are quite a lot of things in the house however that actually belong to me. Most of them have been bought by my mum and she's made it clear they are gifted to me alone so if we should split I can take them with me.
Despite this, he relies on me to make the household decisions, he is having the bathroom specially adapted for my disability needs and is relying on me to tell him how I want it doing. He has asked me to choose our new kitchen and organise and oversee the fitting of both the bathroom and the kitchen to how I want it doing. He allowed me to choose all the fixtures and fittings for the bathroom. When we bought a new bed, he told me to choose the one that would make it easier for me with my needs. I always say to him it's his money and his house but he says to me it's my choice and he will go along with what I want. I guess it's about compromise? We aren't married, just living together. I'm aware that he could just decide he's had enough at any time, kick me out and I would have diddly squat in the way of rights.
I'm down as his next of kin on his care records, I stand to inherit his pension pot/death in service benefit if anything were to happen to him. I don't feel inequal in the relationship, he's worked damn hard to pay off the mortgage on his house- he bought the house all on his own with a large deposit and smallish mortgage which never even reached its term before he paid it- so I don't see why I should expect to share in that. If I took everything in this house that belongs to me he would be a bit stuck!
Only thing I do moan about is his refusal to put me on the council tax bill- I'm entitled to student exemption so then he would be classed as living alone and receive a discount- but he refuses to do this so ends up paying more!

duchy

kloana wrote: »

I have limited knowledge of what the law is, and no intention of finding out. I 'think' you might have misread or missed my final paragraph, too ('interesting' use of quote marks! ).

I think it's pretty clear that you don't understand that when it comes to divorce all marital assets are joint regardless of whose name they are in and that any attempt to remove or conceal any of those assets from the financial assessment would be fraud - There's a massive difference between assets when married compared with unmarried when it comes to a split.

I really don't understand why anyone would get married if they wanted to ringfence their assets for the future- it;s essentially signing a contract and then not expecting the terms of the contract to apply.

cashewnut

kloana wrote: »

I have limited knowledge of what the law is, and no intention of finding out. I 'think' you might have misread or missed my final paragraph, too ('interesting' use of quote marks! ).

It doesn't matter that his inheritance is in your own personal bank account. He'll get half of it if you divorce.

Mrs_Ryan

duchy wrote: »

So if you aren't on the council tax anywhere else then he is making a false declaration to the council each year and is claiming he lives alone so claims the single occupancy discount ? This also means you can't vote because you can't be on the electoral roll ?

As a fulltime time student claiming fees (or any benefit ) that will track back to the coucil tax eventually (unless you are claiming incorrectly ) that you live elsewhere which is another fraudulent declaration as far as the authorities are concerned -the fact the bill would be lower if he declared correctly and then applied for exemption for you is irrelevenat as the exemption is ignored unless applied for). Whilst I appreciate he is protecting his investment -this could end up biting both on the bum very hard indeed when cross checks are made.

Nope.
I'm on the electoral register and if you read my post properly you would see that if he added me to the bill he would get a discount- he pays the full council tax that he would pay for more than one person living in the house. He definitely doesn't get a single occupancy discount- I know because I deal with the bills. His ex was living here previously and moved out about 6 months before I moved in. He was an inpatient in hospital for three of those months so although he told the council she had moved out he was never living alone as he had people staying to look after him when he got out of hospital then I moved in so never claimed the single occupier discount, I recently had to shred ten years of bills for him (he's a hoarder due to his illness) so I can testify to this. I've never been on the council tax bill at either of the last two houses I lived either to be fair but the council knew I was there and I wasn't on the bill when I lived with my parents either.
My fees loan and benefit claims are both made at this address, I've never attempted to claim I live elsewhere. Like I say, they know I'm here but my names just not on the bill. Having a look at the CAB page, it seems he is the one liable for the council tax. I'm further down the list- I know if it didn't get paid he would be the one getting sued. Like I say I have spoken to the council about it, they know I am here but didn't seem concerned my name isn't on the bill.