Advice for separating after 10 years and joint home

brightonbird

Hi there, 

My partner and I are separating after 10 years. He is buying me out and I'm in the process of buying my own house. We don't have children together (but rather one child each from previous relationships). It's amicable, but he doesn't want to separate. We have loosely agreed figures, but now it's crunch time and we need to tie it down fully.

Luckily for the house we had a Declaration of Trust drawn up so we know how we are splitting the value of the house. He will be paying me some cash upfront and I will have a charge over the house for the remainder.

However there are other financial issues we need to consider, for example:

I will be paying £9k in stamp duty whilst he will only pay around £2.5k (It's actually more like £5k  because he has a second property - which I don't think should be my responsibility).

He will be keeping the great 2.1% mortgage fixed for another 7 years whilst I will be getting a 4.7% for 5 years (crying face). I'm not sure how we reconcile that so that it's fair?

If we were divorcing I would have a solictor to help with this process, but instead I just have a solicitor handling the Transfer of Equity as part of my house purchase. I'm guessing they won't act for and advise me in the same a divorce lawyer would?

Ideally we'll reach an agreement without involving other extra solicitors (it feels like we are currently pretty close to agreement), but I do worry I could be missing something. 

Is there anything extra I should be considering? And am I foolish for thinking we can avoid extra solicitors fees by coming to an agreement by ourselves?

Also, is there a service where I could run what we've agreed past a family lawyer and just get there opinion? 

tacpot12

You are not foolish to think that you can avoid costs by coming to an agreement yourself. Any help you need to come to an agreement, whether with a mediatior or a solicitor will cost you. Have you considered using a mediator? 

There is no standard service where you can run agreements past a family lawyer, but I expect many solicitors would be happy to take your money if you wanted an opinion. 

When couples who are not married seperate the rules are different from when married couples seperate. 

If you are not married, then anything you own outright yourself is yours; this would include your pension provision and debts in your sole name. It would also include assets that you brought into the relationship.  

Anything that is jointly owned could remain jointly owned, but it is much more common to arrange that one person's interest in the property is transferred to other co-owner. Your Deed of Trust is a pre-agreement on what each person's interest in the property is, so that it is clear how much their interest might be. For other assets other than your home, there is generally no pre-agreement on what each person's interest in the asset is, but money in joint bank accounts is regarded as being owned 50/50. A 50/50 split seems fair on the face of it, and it would be for each party to advance an argument as to why such a split would not be fair.

So you probably need to identify if there are assets that you or your ex owned before you got together, and what assets that you bought together. It would seem best to allow each person to take away assets they owned prior to the relationship, and to divide things you have bought together up using their market value as a basis to ensure that each of you takes away roughly 50% of the value. You won't be able to get this accurate to the last pound but it will be close enough. eBay can be a good source information on the market value of household goods.