Is this OK?

Hi All, This is my first post so please be gentle with me!
I have reached an agreement with my soon to be ex wife and although we seem to agree on it, will it come back to bite me latter?

We have been married for just under 7 years and have 2 wonderful children (6 & 3). I work full time and my wife has 2 part time jobs.
Our separation has been very good so far, and we will probably remain good friends when all this is sorted out. We are both still in the marital home (separate bedrooms)and our day to day lives haven''t really changed. We have talked about finances and we both agreed that neither of us can afford our current home so have put it on the market. When its sold we will have about 50K equity to play with and the split we have come up with is as follows:

15K to pay off all debts for both of us and all legal and conveyancing fee''s for both of us to purchase a new home.
The remaining 35K would be split 70/30 in her favour.
I Would then pay her child maintenance of £300 PCM (calculated from CSA Calculator)

My current salary is around £35000 and hers is around £22000.

Everything else was easy for us, we have 2 cars, no savings/investments. Pensions are the same and even the house has been divided up quickly with no hassle.

What i need to do is protect myself from any future financial harm as i feel i have done enough for this woman.When we met i had my own home with half my mortgage paid off and she came to me with over £20k in debts.(I would have been mortgage free now if we hadn''t of moved into "her" dream house) I cant/don''t want to go down a legal road as this would further reduce my part of equity and i''m only just qualifying for a mortgage as it is.

Thank you for any advise offered.

Hi and Welcome

Great to hear that you resolving things amicably. You need to get the settlement written into a Consent Order, agreed and stamped by a judge. Wiki offer this service.

Hi, Thanks for a speedy reply. I''ve been told about these consent orders but were under the impression that I couldn''t have a Clean Break because I would be paying CM. Do they not take that into account?
I don''t even know if our proposal would even be considered fair, so am a little apprehensive about courts etc. just in case she gets awarded more.
Thanks.

If you agree then it''s easy. You get the agreement written into legalese and a court rubber stamps it. The problem (and expense) come if the settlemeent is contested and has to be fought out in court. Yes you will be paying CM but that doesn''t affect the division of assets. A possible stumbling block is spousal maintenance - some courts would want to see at least a nominal amount written in in case your stbx falls on hard times at soem point in the future. More knowledgeable wikipeeps will advise whether this is likely in your case.

Having a consent order written and stamped by a court is not the same as going through the courts to determine a fair settlement. CM is a separate issue you have agreed a family based arrangement which is fine, if this was to fail an application could be made via the Child Support Agency ( a separate entity and nothing to do with the court).

What you have stated seems relatively fair, although there is still a difference in incomes even when adding on CM. She has the 2 children to support who are both still young. She is getting more of the equity which makes this fairer but its not a huge amount only about £10k over what you will receive.

Again thanks for your replies, it does make things easier. I''ll just add that although our incomes are different at the moment i have supported her financially through University and she graduated this summer with a first class degree. Its almost ironic that now its finished and she doesn''t need my support any more, she wants out. Coincidence Hmmm i wonder.

So i expect her future earnings to at least match mine or even exceed them.

Thanks again.