Financial issues
We can help you work through financial issues whether you are married, in a civil partnership or cohabiting. Your marital status will impact some financial aspects, but this is something we will address at your initial meeting (MIAM) based on your individual circumstances.
We still start the financial discussions by ascertaining what assets you have between you such as property, pensions, savings and incomes. We will also discuss any debts you have and try to come to an agreement about who will be responsible for these going forward.
Married and civil partnership
The law is flexible in relation to the division of financial assets when parties divorce and a series of factors are taken into account to reach a fair settlement. The main considerations are the needs of the parties, with priority being given to the needs of the children. The need to ensure each party and the children are adequately housed is essential. Other factors taken into consideration are the length of the marriage, the age of the parties, health and contributions made by each party to the marriage, which includes non-economic contributions.
Cohabiting
If you are a cohabiting couple, the path to agreement may be more complex as entitlement to certain finances are very different. For example, for an unmarried couple, if one partner has had significant time out of work to care for children, therefore sacrificing their personal pension, they will not be entitled to part of their partner’s pension, whereas they would be if they were married.
If the children are to remain in the family home with one parent, the other is only obligated to pay maintenance for the children and nothing more. In these circumstances, we will work with both parties to find compromises to ensure the wellbeing of any children as the top priority, even if this means some concessions on either side.
The ultimate aim of these discussions is to obtain an overall picture of your joint financial situation and decide how it can be split to ensure each party has what they need to start new chapters in their lives. We hope to emerge with an agreed resolution that will leave both parties in a good position and any children well catered for.
Let us help
Deciding how the finances should be divided upon separation can be difficult. Assets and incomes which were providing one home for your family, now have to be shared to enable two homes to be paid for. It can also be hard to understand how pensions work and how they can be divided upon divorce, but this is something we can help explain.
Whatever process you use to work out the division of the assets, there should be full financial disclosure between you and your ex partner. Without the full information you will find it difficult to decide how to deal with the assets. We can provide you with advice as to the likely division of the assets based upon the information available and the options available for moving forward.
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