Does a broken Marriage have an expiry date?

Touchstone_2

10 years ago, after being married for a number of years, a wife walks out of the family home. In all that time there has been no contact, of any sort, between the couple. Shortly after the wife left Divorce proceeding were initiated but never concluded.
What is the legal position of both parties?
Has the one who "walked" any entitlement to money or assets of the one who "remained"?
Can it be said that the marriage has expired after a specified number of years of estrangement?

TonyMMM

Legally you are still married until the divorce is finalised (or one of you dies).

Financial entitlement would depend on load of factors about who brought what to the marriage etc. Sounds like it would be a good idea to at least try and get things sorted out. Do you have any way of making contact ?

TBagpuss

No, marriages don't 'expire'. IF you want it ended you need a divorce.

Who left who, or why, is normally irrelevant to the financial arrangements.

Financially, the aim is to achieve a settlement fair to both parties, taking into account things such as each party's financial needs, their income and other resources, the length of the marriage etc. The assets which each party has now would need to be disclosed, and the court is entitled to consider, alongside the other factors, how long you have been separated and what financial assets you had at the time of the separation.

For instance, if you stayed in the house and paid the mortgage then you have had the benefit of living there, in return for covering the cost of the mortgage, so it wouldn't automatically be fair for you to claim a higher share of the property. On the other hand, if you started a pension after she left, it would be much harder for her to claim a share of that.

All of this goes both ways, it applies to her assets as well as to yours.