Divorce/property advice needed

alreeve27

Hello, my wife and I are splitting up and I need some advice about various aspects of this.

We own our house jointly and it has SSTC, with paperwork going through. We are selling the property chain free, splitting the money and going our separate ways. We have family that we could each stay with if needs be. I am now starting to look at properties myself and have discussed this with our solicitor who confirmed that I can independently purchase another property which would not affect my buyer’s chain.

My wife and I are on amicable terms and have been focusing on the house rather than the divorce itself. I have a few questions about how best to approach all of this:

- By purchasing a property on my own which I will live in by myself, does my wife has any claim/link to this whilst we are not yet divorced?
- we currently have mirrored wills leaving the current property to each other. Is it best for me to update mine immediately?
- my wife’s ultimate goal is to move abroad, which is not likely to be anytime soon, however when we start the divorce proceedings (after house completed), how much physical signing of papers is there throughout the many months that it takes? Conscious that she may not be around for the whole duration and I imagine that would make it a lot slower.

Any helpful advice would be great, thanks.

Alter_ego

I'm afraid all marital assets are considered in divorce proceedings. Including houses bought during the marriage.

Thrugelmir

alreeve27 said:

- By purchasing a property on my own which I will live in by myself, does my wife has any claim/link to this whilst we are not yet divorced?

Yes. As part of the divorce process you'll have a financial consent order drawn up. This provides the clean break. 

Speak to a family lawyer get matters formalised properly. 

alreeve27

Thanks for the replies. I will make some calls today.

Keep_pedalling

As for the wills, yes you should both make new ones now. 

TBagpuss

- By purchasing a property on my own which I will live in by myself, does my wife has any claim/link to this whilst we are not yet divorced?
Yes. Unless and until you have a final court order in place 

- we currently have mirrored wills leaving the current property to each other. Is it best for me to update mine immediately?
Yes. Once you are divorced, any will is read as if the other spouse had died on the date of the decree absolute, but until you have a decree absolute you are still married and the will remains valid. If you make a new will now than you don't need to change it once the divorce is finalised, although if you wanted to leave anything to your wife doe her to have even after to you divorce, you'd need to deal with that - I can't remember if stating in the will that  you wish the gift ./ appointment to stand even following the divorce is enough but your solicitor will be able to advise. 

- my wife’s ultimate goal is to move abroad, which is not likely to be anytime soon, however when we start the divorce proceedings (after house completed), how much physical signing of papers is there throughout the many months that it takes? Conscious that she may not be around for the whole duration and I imagine that would make it a lot slower.
If you divorce her and start the process while she is still in this country, it should not be a major issue - there's only one form for her to complete and she can do that online (Although ideally she should have a UK address for the original documents to be sent to her)

If you agree the financial settlement then she 'll need to sign the order and complete and sign the statement of information; however, the orders can now be submitted online so if she has access to a scanner and printer then she would be able to sign even if she is not in the UK, If she doesn't then a lot will depend on the speed of postal services to and from the country she is in - if outside Europe then using FedEx or similar is likely to be quicker and more reliable than post.


If you are on good terms, then I'd get the process started ASAP. The divorce can be at Decree Nisi stage (at which point you can submit an agreed order) within about 8 weeks

alreeve27

TBagpuss said:

- By purchasing a property on my own which I will live in by myself, does my wife has any claim/link to this whilst we are not yet divorced?
Yes. Unless and until you have a final court order in place 

- we currently have mirrored wills leaving the current property to each other. Is it best for me to update mine immediately?
Yes. Once you are divorced, any will is read as if the other spouse had died on the date of the decree absolute, but until you have a decree absolute you are still married and the will remains valid. If you make a new will now than you don't need to change it once the divorce is finalised, although if you wanted to leave anything to your wife doe her to have even after to you divorce, you'd need to deal with that - I can't remember if stating in the will that  you wish the gift ./ appointment to stand even following the divorce is enough but your solicitor will be able to advise. 

- my wife’s ultimate goal is to move abroad, which is not likely to be anytime soon, however when we start the divorce proceedings (after house completed), how much physical signing of papers is there throughout the many months that it takes? Conscious that she may not be around for the whole duration and I imagine that would make it a lot slower.
If you divorce her and start the process while she is still in this country, it should not be a major issue - there's only one form for her to complete and she can do that online (Although ideally she should have a UK address for the original documents to be sent to her)

If you agree the financial settlement then she 'll need to sign the order and complete and sign the statement of information; however, the orders can now be submitted online so if she has access to a scanner and printer then she would be able to sign even if she is not in the UK, If she doesn't then a lot will depend on the speed of postal services to and from the country she is in - if outside Europe then using FedEx or similar is likely to be quicker and more reliable than post.


If you are on good terms, then I'd get the process started ASAP. The divorce can be at Decree Nisi stage (at which point you can submit an agreed order) within about 8 weeks

Thanks very much, this is really helpful. Is it possible to get the financial order drafted up ahead of the decree nisi stage? Thanks

Thrugelmir

alreeve27 said:

TBagpuss said:

- By purchasing a property on my own which I will live in by myself, does my wife has any claim/link to this whilst we are not yet divorced?
Yes. Unless and until you have a final court order in place 

- we currently have mirrored wills leaving the current property to each other. Is it best for me to update mine immediately?
Yes. Once you are divorced, any will is read as if the other spouse had died on the date of the decree absolute, but until you have a decree absolute you are still married and the will remains valid. If you make a new will now than you don't need to change it once the divorce is finalised, although if you wanted to leave anything to your wife doe her to have even after to you divorce, you'd need to deal with that - I can't remember if stating in the will that  you wish the gift ./ appointment to stand even following the divorce is enough but your solicitor will be able to advise. 

- my wife’s ultimate goal is to move abroad, which is not likely to be anytime soon, however when we start the divorce proceedings (after house completed), how much physical signing of papers is there throughout the many months that it takes? Conscious that she may not be around for the whole duration and I imagine that would make it a lot slower.
If you divorce her and start the process while she is still in this country, it should not be a major issue - there's only one form for her to complete and she can do that online (Although ideally she should have a UK address for the original documents to be sent to her)

If you agree the financial settlement then she 'll need to sign the order and complete and sign the statement of information; however, the orders can now be submitted online so if she has access to a scanner and printer then she would be able to sign even if she is not in the UK, If she doesn't then a lot will depend on the speed of postal services to and from the country she is in - if outside Europe then using FedEx or similar is likely to be quicker and more reliable than post.


If you are on good terms, then I'd get the process started ASAP. The divorce can be at Decree Nisi stage (at which point you can submit an agreed order) within about 8 weeks

Thanks very much, this is really helpful. Is it possible to get the financial order drafted up ahead of the decree nisi stage? Thanks

Yes it is. 

alreeve27

Thanks @Thrugelmir - just a few more questions:

Within the application where I would select unreasonable behaviour, do I then have to provide specific reasons?

By applying online, is it relatively quick for the acknowledgement email to be sent out?

This part seems very straightforward to do ourselves, but presumably we then need to involve a solicitor to draw up the financial agreement, without them being involved in the rest of the process? Do I then submit this myself? I presume that they can’t act for both parties, so would I have to have this conversation myself and then relay it to my wife? Or does it have to go solicitor to solicitor?

Apologies if these are basic questions but thanks for all your help.

TBagpuss

Within the application where I would select unreasonable behaviour, do I then have to provide specific reasons?
Yes - not a lot - typically 2-3 short paragraphs 1 or 2 sentnaces long is all you need. 


By applying online, is it relatively quick for the acknowledgement email to be sent out?
Yes. The court checks the petition to make sure that it is correct (in terms of all the sections being completed and nothing obvious missing) then sends it out - typically a few days from when you submit the petition and pay the fee. 
If you are applying for fee exemption that takes a bit longer to process. 

This part seems very straightforward to do ourselves, but presumably we then need to involve a solicitor to draw up the financial agreement, without them being involved in the rest of the process? Do I then submit this myself? I presume that they can’t act for both parties, so would I have to have this conversation myself and then relay it to my wife? Or does it have to go solicitor to solicitor?
It is normally sensible to get the order drawn up professionally. You can have it drawn up and sent to your ex, it's then up to them whether they chose to go through it with a solicitor or not. Normally the solicitor would then submit it to the court but there's nothing to stop you doing that yourselves. 

meganthompson7

I think first you need to complete the marriage process completely.
Divorce in court is not the fastest procedure, but various factors can influence the exact timing. 
Read the laws and hire yourself a good lawyer