Entitlement

What am I entitled to with regards to the house? We are joint owners, as both our names are on the papers. I pay about a third of the monthly mortgage payments and my husband pays the rest. He also pays all the bills. I know that he cannot afford to buy me out and he would find it a financial struggle to continue living in the house without my input. Can he be made to sell the house, so that we can take our cut and move on?


We have been married for four years and eight months and have no children

Hi Arlene. To do a reasonable assessment, we would need your ages and earnings, savings any assets and pensions.

But saying all that. You have a shortish marriage. You have no kids and its a joint mortgage. You dont say if you could pay for the house on your own.

What is sensible is as part of your divorce is that you sell the house, settle any joint debts out of that equity and split what is left. This considering what you have told me would I think be the likely outcome. If you can both agree on that, its a starting point. C.

I cannot afford to live in the house on my own on my salary, neither could i afford to buy him out. I''m 49 an he is 57. I work for the Crown Prosecution Service as a paralegal on £25.000 a year and i have a civil service pension. He is self employed as an art and antique valuer. I don''t know exactly how much he earns, as it varies and he has never actually told me. There is a small income from a rented flat that he owned before i met him, so I wouldn''t seek to make any claims on that. He has said that he sees the flat as his pension, as he doesn''t have one. I know his propensity to be obstructive for the sake of it, so I''m not sure that he will automatically agree to sell the house, so that we can split what''s left after paying what needs to be paid. Would I have any leverage to get him to do that?

Hi Arlene.

Arlene Thompson wrote:

Would I have any leverage to get him to do that?

That depends. And it depends where in the process you are. You cant force someone to sell. But that seems the most and best outcome. Its the easiest way out of this for you both as neither of you has the ability to buy the other out. But he may not want to hear that from you.

I think the best thing for you both is that you both seek independent legal advice. That way, a legal professional will tell him the likely outcome. Short marriage, no dependants. Its a no brainer really. C.