Overpaying a mortgage in a tenuous marriage

homerjimpson

I'll try (and fail) to be brief. Wife and I have been married about 10 years. Deposit on the house was paid entirely by me, wife contributes about £300 per month for bills, otherwise I pay for everything. 

House is in my name (makes no difference, I know), we have no kids. 

Wife has complex mental health problems that I won't get into, but she can be extremely difficult to live with, we've had a lot of ups and downs. Anything related to finance, she leaves to me - she doesn't even know how much is left on the mortgage, she's not interested. I'm sure I exacerbate this, because I can't be bothered bickering about such things, easier just to take care of it. 

I'm quite diligent, and I regularly overpay on the mortgage. I like reducing the debt. 

However, listening to Martin Lewis's podcast yesterday about marriage and divorce, I did wonder if I'm potentially being a bit foolish (hope for the best, plan for the worst, etc). 

Rather than overpaying the mortgage, am I better off saving that money? Listening to Martin and the gang, I started thinking, if, say, I overpay £1,000 on the mortgage, not only has it cost me £1,000 today, but am I sending 'future unfortunately getting divorced me' a bill for another £500? 

Obviously I care about my wife's wellbeing whether we're married or divorced. But I have to consider my own wellbeing too - if we were to get divorced, I'd rather it was as non-traumatic as possible, and it occurs to me that it would go smoother if I had a chunk of money in a savings account, rather than assiduously paying off a mortgage for years only to realise I'm putting myself into a difficult financial position in the event of relationship breakdown.  

El_Torro

Since you've been married for 10 years it's my understanding (I might be wrong) that if you were to divorce now or in the future you would both get half the marital assets. So whether the money is in the equity of the property or in a savings account it is still half yours and half hers. 

Whether you get a divorce or not it is always worth having some money in cash rather than using it all to reduce the size of the mortgage. This is especially true if you are going to sell the house or one of you moves out. There will be moving costs that are best paid by your cash savings.

homerjimpson

El_Torro said:

Since you've been married for 10 years it's my understanding (I might be wrong) that if you were to divorce now or in the future you would both get half the marital assets. So whether the money is in the equity of the property or in a savings account it is still half yours and half hers. 

Thanks yeah, that's what I thought - but she could, for example, agree to take a lump sum of money from me and we'd just go our separate ways? Because I don't know, we don't talk about money at all really, but her expenses are not high, so it's quite possible she wouldn't want me to know how much cash she's got stashed, either (ya know, if what's mine is half hers, than the reverse is also true....). 

homerjimpson

And of course it follows, in my example, that putting that £1,000 in a savings account, well, that'll only cost 'future getting divorced me' £500, leaving me with £500. If I put it on the mortgage, it'll cost me £1,500 - and I won't have £500 left over, either. 

El_Torro

homerjimpson said:

El_Torro said:

Since you've been married for 10 years it's my understanding (I might be wrong) that if you were to divorce now or in the future you would both get half the marital assets. So whether the money is in the equity of the property or in a savings account it is still half yours and half hers. 

Thanks yeah, that's what I thought - but she could, for example, agree to take a lump sum of money from me and we'd just go our separate ways? Because I don't know, we don't talk about money at all really, but her expenses are not high, so it's quite possible she wouldn't want me to know how much cash she's got stashed, either (ya know, if what's mine is half hers, than the reverse is also true....). 

If you don't go to court then you can make any deal that you are both willing to accept. You know her better than me but I wouldn't bank on her taking less than she is entitled to. 

And yes, you not knowing what assets she has complicates things. All the more reason to get lawyers involved and do it all above board perhaps.

homerjimpson

El_Torro said:

If you don't go to court then you can make any deal that you are both willing to accept. You know her better than me but I wouldn't bank on her taking less than she is entitled to. 

And yes, you not knowing what assets she has complicates things. All the more reason to get lawyers involved and do it all above board perhaps.

Indeed - as I say, this is actually a bit of a worry of mine, because my wife does have mental health problems that make her volatile - if we got divorced, she might demand the earth and moon and stars, or she might accept 3 bob and a pickled egg - I know her better than anybody, and I've no idea. Getting her to discuss this kind of thing is an impossibility. 

It's possible she's got a few mil stashed away - let's bank on that, and go into the weekend with a smile. 

(she doesn't - but she can't have nothing, she spends very little). 

El_Torro

Not to purposefully add to your woes but there is something else to consider:

Does your wife work? Is she on benefits due to her mental illness? If she doesn't work, or even if she does but her income is significantly lower than yours, then a court could rule that since her earning potential is a lot less than yours then she should get more than half the marital assets. 

I've seen it happen in other divorces. 

homerjimpson

El_Torro said:

Not to purposefully add to your woes but there is something else to consider:

Does your wife work? Is she on benefits due to her mental illness? If she doesn't work, or even if she does but her income is significantly lower than yours, then a court could rule that since her earning potential is a lot less than yours then she should get more than half the marital assets. 

I've seen it happen in other divorces. 

She does work, she doesn't receive any benefits or anything like that - she's actually not a UK citizen so isn't entitled to any benefits, and she's not keen on acknowledging her mental health problems in this way anyway (understandably - although she is prescribed psychiatric medication). This is rather what I'm referring to, my wife might have all kinds of financial entanglements like money in overseas accounts, that I doubt she'd want to get into protracted legal wrangles about, if it came to that.  

AskAsk

on divorce, most likely it will be going to court for a financial order and you will need to give her half, irrespective if it is from the house or your savings, so i would say, overpay the mortgage.

the only advantage of having the savings is that you have accessible money to move while you wait for the divorce process to complete, which takes over a year normally.

RAS

If you divorce, it's 50:50 as a starting point, that's house, pension, savings etc. And given her income and health that might be more.

We've seen some very difficult situations here at times, sometimes one party gets hammered financially, sometimes one party decides to exclude the other from the property and takes everything material, even gifts given to the ex, sometimes one party just wants to walk away. 

If you really are considering divorce, perhaps a small storage container where you can keep essential documents and build up a resettlement stash. Just so you don't have to buy everything new for example. 

homerjimpson

RAS said:

If you divorce, it's 50:50 as a starting point, that's house, pension, savings etc. And given her income and health that might be more.

We've seen some very difficult situations here at times, sometimes one party gets hammered financially, sometimes one party decides to exclude the other from the property and takes everything material, even gifts given to the ex, sometimes one party just wants to walk away. 

If you really are considering divorce, perhaps a small storage container where you can keep essential documents and build up a resettlement stash. Just so you don't have to buy everything new for example. 

Yes, this actually has some fairly painful reverberations for me, because my parents got divorced when I was a kid, and it was acrimonious - but the really difficult bit was that my mum was a very troubled person, and despite my dad raising me and my siblings as effectively a single parent, the divorce ended up costing him a great deal financially - which I don't recall him ever complaining about, but all it really did do was effectively fund my mum's existing spiral of self-destruction (ie my dad was paying child support for children he was supporting). So....I have actually experienced this kind of difficult situation, albeit indirectly and a long time ago. 

My wife's family does have more money than mine, and she probably has got some stashed away, the thing that really kicked this off for me was that it had only half-occurred to me before that me being diligent and overpaying the mortgage might be good for 'us', but not necessarily as good for 'me'. 

Being the responsible partner in a relationship isn't always the best gig.