Separated house sold

Mewend

Hello
we need some advice please.
my husband and I separated 2years ago sold our home and was shared 50/50 no mortgage.
I moved to a different country and bough my new home alone which I own outright. Paid STD on it.
now my husband is in the throws of buying his new home but has been told he has to pay 3% over the STD.
we haven’t spoke of divorce and separated amicably after 35 years.
I wasn’t asked to pay this 3% over as we are buying our separate homes and not together or have not got any other properties so no second homes.
this doesn’t seem right to us can anyone shed some light on this please?

We don’t want to go down the divorce route at this time until we are both settled in our new homes.
 

MattMattMattUK

Mewend said:

Hello
we need some advice please.
my husband and I separated 2years ago sold our home and was shared 50/50 no mortgage.
I moved to a different country and bough my new home alone which I own outright. Paid STD on it.
now my husband is in the throws of buying his new home but has been told he has to pay 3% over the STD.
we haven’t spoke of divorce and separated amicably after 35 years.
I wasn’t asked to pay this 3% over as we are buying our separate homes and not together or have not got any other properties so no second homes.
this doesn’t seem right to us can anyone shed some light on this please?

We don’t want to go down the divorce route at this time until we are both settled in our new homes.

You still have a legal share in the homes as you are not divorced, it legally is a second home, the assets are joint as you are married. 

Why wait until you have bought homes, just get divorced?

RAS

Even worse, since you aren't divorced he could ask that the current value of your house is taken into account when the financial settlement is done. And he could inherit your home if you die. Get legal separation or divorce Asap.

It costs very little to divorce, and if you can agree the finances, a small fee to get the consent order written up.

mebu60

Owning the assets while still married and not legally separated complicates things as others have said. You should resolve that asap. And (re)do your wills afterwards. 
Given that is it less than three years since you sold the joint home, your husband could take the approach that he is moving from his principal private residence to his next principal private residence within the allowed timescale and answer the relevant questions on that basis. 

Annisele

In general married couples are treated as one person for the purposes of the stamp duty surcharge. So, if one of you owns a property, both of you are counted as having an interest in that property. That's also true for some other taxes, like capital gains tax - in general a married couple can only have one main home for private residence relief purposes.

There's a decent amount of wriggle room in those "in generals". As others have said, the replacing a main residence argument might work for your husband and his purchase, but he'd need to speak to his legal advisers about that. On the CGT side, separated couples can sometimes nominate one main residence each but that depends on a bunch of things.

If you're planning to divorce anyway, it's likely better to do that sooner rather than later. Acquiring more property is not going to make things less complicated!