accepting a settlement

Hi am new to this so hope you will bear with me. Am divorcing husband on grounds of unreasonable behaviour. He has made me an offer of me keeping allproceeds of house sale and he keeps pension - on paper pension is much larger than equity in house. He also would not pay any spousal maintenance, would pay towards our daughter and would expect all legal costs to be taken out of sale of house. I would like to acccept this offer to allow a Clean Break but my solicitor is not happy. Am meeting with her in a couple of days. Can I insist that I want to settle out of court even if she doesn't aggree, she is a tough lady!!

Lorian,

A couple of thoughts....

- one the one hand you should at least consider what extra your solicitor says you are entitled to. Is it a LOT more than you are happy to accept?

- but...be aware that some would argue that the solicitor has an incentive to have you battle the ex all the way to the finish line, rather than settle amicably now.

One point of law that may help you feel better about the deal you are being offered is that you cannot compare directly pound for pound the house value vs the pension value. It is not an exact science but a 100k pension is worth less than a 100k house cos u cannot cash in the pension today. Perhaps a 100k pension is worth only 50 to 70K (depends on your age etc).

As u say, clean break means no spousal maintenance..but you will still get child support.


You can insist that you want to accept the offer. In which case a Consent Order is drawn up. The court then considers this and as long as u have received legal advice and the order is not obviously grossly unfair then it should go through OK.

Thanks for the prompt reply. That was my thinking that the cash from the house sale would be better now as that would allow me to buy a small property for me and my one daughter left at home and not have to be dependent on him. (equity value about 295k, pension 400k)
The pension may be worth a lot but I would only be able to access that when I'm 60. I'd rather start living now and worry about the future later. I do have a very small pension of my own so not totally unprepared and my way of thinking is that as little one grows up I can increase working hours to build up my pension. Does that sound reasonable?

It looks sensible to me if it means you can buy a new home outright for yourself and your daughter, and presumably you will be able to build up more pension yourself in the future. The pension might only get counted as being worth about £300 000 in any case. You might want to build in the token £1 per year spouse maintenance in case you fall on hard times later, as you are the parent with care.

Sadie

It seems a fair settlement except he should pay his legal costs and you should pay yours.

Best to settle out of court if you can. Try mediation if possible.

He has to pay a minimum of 15% of net pay for one child.

Put in the £1 nominal in the consent order.

Thanks for the help guys. I take the point about the nominal consent order and the legal costs. Will put counter offer to him, he won't be happy and will threaten to take it to court but have to take that chance.
Thanks agin, wish I had found this site when I began all this, would have saved some sleepless nights!