Divorce advice - splitting assets after short marriage

Mrbishman

Short marriage with no children or shared assets 8 Minutes ago
Hi Guys
Could I please get some opinions on my situation regarding splitting assets following a short marriage?

Here are the facts:
!) My wife and I were married for just over a year and a half prior to separating.
2) We have no children, no mortgage (we always rented - never owned a house), and no shared bank accounts.
3) Whilst together, neither of us were financially dependant on each other.
4) Neither of us had any assets when we got together, financial or otherwise.
5) At the time we separated, I had approximately £5k in savings, and my wife had approximately £2k.

Upon separating, I moved out of the property that we rented in order to live nearer my workplace - this was a simple room in a flatshare to help me save money.
I've also since changed jobs to one paying a significantly higher salary - which has mean that I've been able to build up a lot of money in savings - a mixture of having a healthy salary, living in very modest accommodation, and having no commuting costs.

My wife and I separated on good terms, and she said she wouldn't contest the divorce - as it was a mutual decision as things weren't working.

I'm about to start the divorce process (as two years is nearly up), and am looking into consent orders and financial orders, etc.
I'm worried that my wife might be granted a large chunk of my hard-earned savings during the divorce process - which seems very unfair to me as I've deliberately lived a modest lifestyle since separating in order to get on the housing ladder before long.

Could anyone please share their thoughts on if they think I'm right to be worried, or what other people have been through in similar situations?

Many thanks in advance!

Paul

AnotherJoe

IANAL but since you can show you've only really built the savings up since separating, and its been such a short time of marriage, seems unlikely to me there would be any such order.
Are you using solicitors?

comeandgo

Who would grant her this? A divorce settlement will be what you two agree, only if you can't agree it goes to court.

Mrbishman

Hi guys
Thanks for the quick responses!
@AnotherJoe I'm not using a solicitor yet as the divorce process hasn't yet started. As soon as we hit two years of separation I'll be starting this, and will try and get a consent order agreed with her for us to keep our current respective assets - so will need that done by a solicitor or hey this done using an online service.

@comeandgo I'd like to think noone would grant her any of my savings, but after reading online that this isn't necessarily the case (although I'd see it as common sense), it got me thinking she might be granted a big chunk of she decides not to go along with the consent order, and it goes to court.

Many thanks!

hazyjo

Been there, got the t-shirt (twice!).


How long did you live together before getting married? That may affect things, but I doubt it seeing as the savings were accrued later.


You (more than likely) won't have to give her anything. It should just be an easy financial split. This is presuming England, and presuming nothing drastic in the law has changed in the last few years.


We did it ourselves. Was fairly straightforward.

anna_1977

do you need to go to the expensive of a consent order when there are no significant assets? i wouldn't have thought so.

Has your ex made any indication she wants any money from you?

gingercordial

If everything remains amicable you should be fine. Your circumstances aren't dissimilar to my divorce a few years ago (5 years, renting, no kids, cash which we split 50/50 based on what we had at the time of separation not what came after).

You do need a clean break order so that neither of you can come to the other one for money later in life.

If you are not arguing this is a simple process. It does go in front of a court along with a declaration of assets and income (Form A - much shorter than the Form E used for a contested settlement) and therefore you won't be able to hide anything (not that you should try anyway). You don't attend the court hearing. A judge will see the declarations but it will be one of a pile of them they have to stamp that day and they will give it a quick scan if that.

In theory if the amounts are wildly mismatched it is possible for the judge to intervene at this point and say that they don't think the split is fair, but that is highly unlikely unless you have somehow become a millionaire. They will just stamp it to get through their pile of paperwork. Job done. For reference my declaration had my assets at about £80k versus my ex's £40k, mainly because of pensions, and that went through fine.

Of course if she sees your Form A declaration and decides that she doesn't want to be amicable after all that's a different story, in which case it would be time to get proper legal advice.