No significant assets either way?

Dear all, I went through a Decree Nisi recently. From the onset I have handled my own affairs as I left wife with everything we had other than my clothes and £2,000 odd cash I had in my personal account. We exchanged finacial affidavits in January and position is:
Self: Cash +/- 2,000
Shares +/- 400 (current market value)
Debt +/- (2,000)
Nett +/- 400
Wife (ex?): Cash +/- 14,000
Shares +/- 8,000 (current market value)
Other assets cars etc nominal value say 2,000
Nett +/- 24,000
Assets are as set out above, nothing more than that. No property, nothing else. We were married 22 years.
My nett salary is 2,300, wife''s 1,650. We have a daughter aged 21 who is still at college and lives with mum, I am paying a minimum of 400 a month towards her plus paid the majority of her years tuition fees. From recent letters from her lawyers it seems that she may be trying to get more out of me. I paid for the decree nisi and don''t see that I should be liable for anything further? As I understand it given that she has the assets I could be claiming from her? Not that I want to, I am haapy for her to keep what she has but I certainly don''t want to be paying her. Any advice much appreciated.
Take care all

Hi Blogg

Do you have any property?

How long were you married?

Two questions you will be asked for more experienced wikipeeps to give you an idea of what any settlement is likely to be

Kind regards

The chances are that her solicitor has got her to tick all the boxes on the form re financial settlement just to cover her in advance of financial disclosure. That does not mean she will actually ask for - or get - any of those things. This often causes a lot of angst.

Put simply, if you have little or nothing then there is little or nothing to split. You are best off reaching an agreement between you - with the help of mediators if needs be - and not spend what little you have on legal fees.

It is probably a good idea to fill in a form E financial disclosure voluntarily asap - and suggest she does the same. Then you can work out how best to split things.

It would seem sensible that you pay off the debt between you and then divide what is left ... probably slightly more in her favour as you are the higher earner.

Incidentally you say there are no other assets ... do you have any sort of pension? If you do, this may be an important factor.

Hadenoughnow

Hello

Thank you for your useful and informative reply, much appreciated.

From the onset I wanted to leave lawyers out of the whole thing. I offered to give my "ex" a minimum of £600 a month until June this year when our daughter finishes college. She wasn''t having it and insisted I sign an open ended agreement to pay £800 which I refused to do. She went off to lawyers in a huff and hence ended up with a £370 a month plus legal fees. I think that has added to her huff.

I am still keen to save her further legal fees and will try putting your advice to her making it clear that it isn''t my advice as she is clearly averse to anything I say.

Pension, she has a small pension of 2,500 per annum, I have nothing.

To be fairer than fair to her I am happy to pay off the debt on my own.

Thanks once again for your advice.

Take care