Your own belongings are yours alone and your partner does not have any automatic legal right to them. If you own items jointly, you own them in the shares you put towards the purchase price. For example if you put £100 towards a £400 television, you own one-quarter of it. If you do own things jointly, you will have to decide whether to buy out your partner's share, sell them your share, or sell the items and split the proceeds. You may prefer simply to divide up the things you own jointly between you. Except for things like antiques and artwork, most items are worth less when sold second hand than they were bought for or would cost to replace.
Read how others coped:
Penny
Penny
'I felt responsible because I had made the decision to leave, so I wasn't thinking very sensibly.
I just left with my clothes, a few personal possessions and my car. Later when the house was sold, I did get half of that. But there were savings and an endowment policy and all the furniture. I just walked away with nothing. If it was happening now, I would do things differently. I was so wrapped in the emotional trauma of it all, I just didn't think about my future at all. Looking back, a 50-50 split would have been fairer.'
