Using mediation for financial agreement

elsien

I missed the bit where you’d paid half for his solicitor. Absolutely  do not pay any more towards that. As the previous post  said, they are working for him not for you. Get any final agreement properly checked out with your own independent advice even if you don’t want to pay them to do all the negotiating for you.

RAS

Given that other posters on here have agreed their financial settlement amicably and got a solicitor to write it up for £900, this solicitor seems rather costly. Are you sure you are not paying half his divorce fees?

And no, you should never be paying half you ex's legal fees.

You should not be allowing your ex to propose any financial settlement given his past history. You need to think about your daughter's future needs and your own and write your own proposal. Have you tried wikivorce?

Do you even have a financial disclosure?

NornIronRose

Thank you all. 
I love that I can get some unbiased grounding here. Good point about the solicitor's fees. I genuinely hadn't considered it the way you lot have seen it. It wasn't the divorce fees by the way, as I had paid those, then kept half of the fee back from money that belonged to him that I sent back to him.

I've just had another message from him demanding that I email his solicitor with the amendments that I want to be made. 
I realise that I have made a mistake in giving him half the money for the solicitor to have drawn this up. Now I am left with a useless agreement, and a grand out of pocket, that I could have used for my own solicitor to check the agreement. 
I am 100% not going to sign this one. 
Not sure what the best course of action is so feel free to chuck in your ha'pence worth. 

a) Do I email his solicitor with the amendments that I want?

b) email ex back and tell him that we can go ahead with the divorce and do the financial agreement at a later date (which I'm sure is possible)?

c) email ex and ask him for the £1k back so that I can use it to instruct my own solicitor?

I am not going to engage in any more text conversations with him. Every message (especially the voice messages) send my blood pressure up I'm sure. I did previously tell him that it needs to be essential emails only, but I was so shocked, and furious, yesterday when I read the agreement that I texted him. 

elsien

Definitely not b. You really need to get the finances sorted. Seen too many posts on here where people have left it and it’s come back to bite them later.

RAS

I'd suggest you block his number.

Reply to his solicitor explaining that the proposals are completely unacceptable and you want the £1k fee returning so you can get your own legal advice.

Avoid any further contact with your ex, except through his solicitor.

And please come back here before you start any further negotiations.

Have you got a financial disclosure from him?

kazwookie

Get your own solicitor ASAP

tightauldgit

NornIronRose said:

Thank you all. 
I love that I can get some unbiased grounding here. Good point about the solicitor's fees. I genuinely hadn't considered it the way you lot have seen it. It wasn't the divorce fees by the way, as I had paid those, then kept half of the fee back from money that belonged to him that I sent back to him.

I've just had another message from him demanding that I email his solicitor with the amendments that I want to be made. 
I realise that I have made a mistake in giving him half the money for the solicitor to have drawn this up. Now I am left with a useless agreement, and a grand out of pocket, that I could have used for my own solicitor to check the agreement. 
I am 100% not going to sign this one. 
Not sure what the best course of action is so feel free to chuck in your ha'pence worth. 

a) Do I email his solicitor with the amendments that I want?

b) email ex back and tell him that we can go ahead with the divorce and do the financial agreement at a later date (which I'm sure is possible)?

c) email ex and ask him for the £1k back so that I can use it to instruct my own solicitor?

I am not going to engage in any more text conversations with him. Every message (especially the voice messages) send my blood pressure up I'm sure. I did previously tell him that it needs to be essential emails only, but I was so shocked, and furious, yesterday when I read the agreement that I texted him. 

Honestly, given the exchanges here so far I don't trust you to do a) without getting your own legal advice. i think you are going to short change yourself and regret it later and/or sign up to something that you didn't fully understand the implications of which comes back to bite you later. That maybe sounds a bit harsh but I'm just trying to give you a sense check. 

You can certainly do b if you want but what would be the benefit of it? It also would take away any urgency to resolve the financials. 

You can try c also but I imagine he will just say no and then there's nothing you can really do since you agreed to pay it. Maybe tell him that you are not going to sign anything until you've had it checked by a solicitor who represents you - and to be honest a court might ask you to do this before they agree to an order anyway - and that if he wants to progress this then he'll have to agree to pay half those fees just as you have paid half of his. 

The moral of this story is that you really shouldn't have been so eager to bend over backwards to give him back the money he gifted you previously and that belonged to you as you could have used that to instruct solicitors now. At every step of this process your main concern seems to have been making sure that he was happy rather than that you were taken care of and you seem to be continuing down that path. I think you really need someone to give you a shake and tell you to stop being such a doormat and take what you are entitled to to set yourself up in your new life. Sounds like he will be just fine either way, and even if he isn't why is that of your concern? 

NornIronRose

Thanks all. And no TAG, it's not too harsh. Happy to have a bit of a shake. 
Just in the middle of a few things now so will have a read back later and get into it properly. 

Unfortunately when you have been in a controlling and coercive relationship for 25 years, it is not wasy to change those habits. 

NornIronRose

Just wanted to add that he did not 'gift' me the money, that I then paid back. 
This was his money in an account that he made me open in my name. Then asked me to withdraw and transfer it to him. Which I did, as it was his money anyway. 

And yes, he 'made' me open it. I'm sure you can all see the pattern here. 

elsien

Which as we said before  is a marital assets so technically not just his money although I do appreciate that you feel otherwise.