Divorce and the house

martinbuckley

kingfisherblue wrote: »

your comment is quite judgemental.

In your opinion.

Mine was based on the OP's description of his own child which was "mild special needs", further amplified as "clumsy".

kingfisherblue

martinbuckley wrote: »

In your opinion.

Mine was based on the OP's description of his own child which was "mild special needs", further amplified as "clumsy".

The child receives DLA, which implies more than clumsiness. DLA is awarded based on the additional care needs of the child. It is not awarded because a child is clumsy, although that can be a part of numerous disabilities.

martinbuckley

The question was for the OP. Unless you are his wife, then please refrain from answering on his behalf, or 2nd guessing what the situation is.

loady

ok, keep it civil guys and girls, im taking all of this in and thanks for ALL the input, you need a bit of yin and yang.

Let me clarify his situation a little, he has disparaxia and has recently been put on the autistic spectrum, he was border line but they say that is his, so yes, he can be very clumsy, he was born with a small infarct of the brain, i beleive he was starved of oxygen when they were telling my wife she wasnt in labour when she was...the cord was around his neck and they all looked flustered, they were auxilleries, thats another tyopic though.

I have spoken today with my solicitor and here is what she said....

Hi lawyer,

I send this email with reservation, mostly due to the worry of cost it will incur, however I need advice. Myself and my wife and her brother have met up a few times now to discuss matters, he is hoping to be able to help her financially, possibly along with the help of her parents as well. I thought about equity release in some way but they seem to have an aversion to this, he came up with a few options which I have pasted below, I have posted on a few forums for separation and the jist of advice I am getting is that I am essentially walking away from a 400k without anything, I really don’t know what to morally, I have to think for my own future, any thing I have when I die would go to to my kids in majority, after having read replies to my post in forums I have put forward another offer of me no longer pay the mortgage, she finds/gets me 50k and a clause written into a legal contract that if she cohabits, remarries or inherits enough that she pays me a further 50k.

Your views greatly appreciated.

Regards.

..................

Dear loady

Thank you for your email, I hope you are well.

The options which your brother in law came up with do not appear to have been pasted in your email, please sent them to me and I will let you know my views.

Property

I agree that you should not walk away from the property without anything. The starting point for any financial settlement is that you are entitled to half of the equity of the property.

As we discussed previously, there are a couple of options for dealing with the property:

1 wife provides you with a lump sum and you transfer your share of the property to her now. This is the option which you have been discussing with wife and her brother. But if her family and brother are unable to assist her now then this is no longer an option.

2 A mesher order. You and wife would own the property in shares with the power of sale being deferred to a triggering event. As the property is a three bedroom property and two of the children are living their full-time it cannot be argued that wife is over housed and should downsize now. However, when your eldest son reaches the age of 18, in two years time, wife would be considered as over housed. We discussed whether your eldest son having learning difficulties would mean that he would need to remain living with wife, however, both you and wife hope that he will be able to live independently, potentially in assisted living accommodation. At this time I believe that a court would be sympathetic but would treat your eldest son reaching 18 as a trigger event from the property to be sold. The court would then consider that both yours and Deborah’s housing needs would be a two bedroom property. The percentage spilt of the property will then depend on the cost of properties in the areas which you and wife are looking to purchase as well as your respective mortgage capacities. A quick online search shows that there are two bedroom properties in the area which she could purchase for around £200,000. This would enable her to purchase mortgage free or with a small mortgage after she has increased her earning capacity over the two years.

The other trigger event which we discussed is your youngest child reaching the age of 18 years old. As this is in six years time if you agree to this you should be entitled to half of the total equity in the property. At this point a court would consider that both your housing needs are one bedroom properties and there would be sufficient equity in the property to allow you each to purchase a one bedroom property mortgage free, or with a small mortgage.

Other common trigger events include the property being sold, wife remarrying or cohabiting for a period longer than 6 months.

3 The offer which you are suggesting that she pays you £50,000 now and £50,000 if she cohabits or remarries is a hybrid of options one and two above. The second £50,000 owed to you would be secured by a charge on the property which would become enforceable on a triggering event such as the property being sold or wife remarrying or cohabiting for a period of more than six months. There is also then the possibility the wife could pay the amount owing to you at any time before one of these events, for example if she received inheritance, and then the charge would be removed.

I would say that you receiving £100,000 when there is approximately £326,000 equity in the property would be considered very low and I do not think that this is an outcome that a judge would order especially if you are waiting some time for half of this lump sum. If receiving £50,000 now would assist you in purchasing or renting a property then you would be looking at receiving £113,000 on one of the triggering events but please see my advice at paragraph two above in respect of how a court would consider your and Deborah’s respective housing needs at different times. It is often better for this to be expressed as a percentage rather than a lump sum as property normally increases in value (although there is currently concerns about how the property market will react after Brexit).

Mortgage

In respect of the mortgage it is unlikely that a court would order you to continue to pay the full mortgage when your income is approximately £1,445 per month and the mortgage payments are £705. Whether a court would order you to pay anything to wife by way of spousal maintenance would depend on her income and without details of Deborah’s income it is difficult for me to advise. However. wife would be expected to maximise her earning capacity and work full time.

I appreciate that I can only tell you what it is likely a court would do in the circumstances and this does not account for your moral obligations towards your family. I also have to advise you what is in your best interests and a court would also be concerned about your housing needs. Although you living with your mother is a short term solution it is reasonable for you to be in a position to purchase your own property at some point and not have your money tied up in the property indefinitely.

Please also do not worry about costs I am still holding £500 on account for you and this will cover lots of ad hoc pieces of advice such as this.

Please let me know if you have any queries.

Kind regards

lawyer.

I think what i am asking for is way short of what i am entitled to, i want her to be able to buy me out at the rate, i no longer pay the mortgage, i get 50k upfront to clear my debts and 50k later with attached clause if implemented, if i never get it then it goes to the kids.

Ps. I have a dormant pension that has 28k in it

elsien

If these are real names for your wife and solicitor, I do think you should be taking them out, and I think it would also be better to be summarising the points from your solicitors letter rather than copying and pasting in its entirety. Even though we don't know you, you are still potentially identifiable to people who do and you need to be careful what you are putting out there on a public forum.

loady

DOH! I keep doing it, removed names now