My property taken into account.

Willwak90

Hi all thanks in advance for any help.

I am currently separated from my wife and about to start divorce proceedings.

However we currently get our wages both paid into a joint account. I am wanting to now get my wages paid into my own account but don't want to be seen in a negative manor. I am wanting to start straight away making sure that my finances are in order. 

My question is. After doing the calculator in relation to Child support. Do I take off my mortgage payments as I own the property not my (Ex) Wife. I was thinking that this becomes a support matter ie I'm paying for the house they now live in and I have now got alternate accommodation.

I am wanting to ensure my finances are in order but also don't want to leave them short at all. I want to ensure everything is in place prior to this divorce even starting so I can make it as smooth as possible.

Thanks in advance 

tacpot12

The Child Maintenance Service calcuations assume that the parents live in seperate homes and need a contribution from the paying parent to the receiving parent to help pay for the home that the child/chilrdren spends more time in, and that with that contribution (plus the receiving parent's income and/or benefits) they can pay all the costs of the home they live in. 

If the receiving parent is not going to have any such costs because it is agreed that the paying parent will pay all the mortgage, then the child support should be reduced by some amount to reflect this. The problem is that the CMS don't publish any guiadance on how much of the child maintainance is for accommodation. So you would need to negotiate this as part of your divorce settlement, but note that the court order on child maintenance will only last for 1 year. You can continue to pay and increase the amount, but the reciving parent will always have the option to got to the CMS to get the child maintenance calculated according to the rule ans this won't reflect that fact that receiving parent has no housing costs.

This link provides some further information about this complex area: When can the court make an order for child maintenance? (farrer.co.uk) 

However, your wife effectively owns half your house; you are married and it is a marital asset. On divorce, she would expect to either be given half the house (her name would be added to the title deeds as a tenant-in-common) or money to the equivalent value. One option is that you pay her the child maintenance figure that the CMS calculator shows and require her to pay half the mortgage so that she continues to own half the equity in the house. The legal and financial settlement of the divorce should set out what will happen to the home. It is is usual that the parent who is taking on most of the child care responsiblities is given a right to stay in the house until the youngest child is 18, at which point the house is to be sold so that the divorced parents can finally be completely financially seperate.

If you buy her out of her half of the house and allow her to live their rent free, she will have a problem with claiming any benefits due to the rules on capital. She will have to spend her capital first before she can claim any benefits.

Mediation can be a very effective technique to ensure that both your needs are acknowledged by the other party, and that a fair settlement can be reached. 

In regard to the joint account, it would be best to discuss this with your wife. You can say something like "We are going to need to seperate our finances at some point, and I would like to start by dealing with the joint account. You have some options: 

• Both have your salaries paid to accounts in your sole name, and keep the joint account running for bills. 
• Have your salary paid into an account in your sole name, and pay an amount for bills into the joint account and leave your wife decide if she wants to do the same. (She can probably have the joint account converted to one in her own sole name if you agree to this.)
• Agree that the joint account be closed and you will both have your own seperate account. 

As part of this though, you will need to agree who is going to be responsible for paying any bills, and whether they can pay the bills from the joint account or not.

You can leave this issue to be discussed with the mediatior if you are worried that it will be a difficult conversation. 

When I divorced, the most effective way we found to work out our finances was to make a new budget for each new houshould, and to review the amount needed from both parties to make both budgets work. In reality, two people trying to lives sperate lives will always have higher costs than a couple living together, so we agreed that the shortfall would be split equally, i.e. neither of us would have enough to live on! But at least the shortfall was split equitably. This doesn't necessarily mean that it is split in half, as this might disadvantage the children too much.