14 months ago i was in your position. Despite what you may think of this woman - get a solicitor. If nothing else, their complete lack of urgency and incompetence will take your mind off other shit 😀
Chin up fella, the kids will be fine (mine love having two houses :D) so concentrate on looking after yourself. It's a cliche but things will be better.
OP.
I don't know you, I've never met you and I've no idea I'd like you if I did.
😛
However, I believe I have some idea of the courage required to leave an otherwise "settled situation".
I hope you and yours all find the peace and the future you wish for yourselves.
Good luck.
I don’t think I have any legal basis for asking for more than half the value of the house, not given how we own it and that there wasn’t ever any formal process of registering the deposit as coming from me – mea culpa, but that was 20 years ago. So I’d kind of resigned myself to only getting half the value of the house anyway and TBH that wouldn’t be a terrible deal.
Part of the reason for my suggestion that you try to 'recover' the inheritance, is that - almost regardless of the actual amount of money involved - it could be galling if that money was effectively passed on to someone other than your own children, e.g. as a result of your partner marrying someone else or having other children, especially if you knew that your own parents had worked hard and made sacrifices to provide that inheritance, and expected that you would pass it on in turn to their grandchildren. In that sense it's not about the money, but what the money represents.
In reality, if you have been the higher earner for most of your relationship, it's probably the case that you are going to be better off financially anyway as a result of her having no claim on your pension (which she would have if you were married).
I hope that things get better for you all soon once you've got past the immediate pain of the separation.
Go to mediation. They will help you work out all the things you need to work out and put something in writing which will be supportive if you ever need to go to lawyers.
Sorry to hear the news.
If it was a long marriage (15 years) then it is a 50/50 split plus arrangements for kids, so anything you had before,or the inheritence, is meaningless.
I used www.wikivorce.org and their legal services to progress the divorce and keep the costs down, but the most important bit of it was the financial consultation service.
It is about £400, or more if the arrangements are complex, of which half goes to the wikivorce charity.
You fill out a spreadsheet with all the assets and provide them details of the length of the marriage, number of kids, etc.
They will give you one phone call to discuss, and then provide a recommendation of what a fair split looks like. You can use their advice afterwards but it will be chargeable.
As long as you are both open and transparent about what you tell them, and the phone call conversation, then there is no reason for either of you to question their advice.
If either of you had more assets before, or 'put more into' the marriage, then one of you may feel aggrieved over the suggested split of assets, but it is best to 'suck it up' and accept it (if you go tothe solicitors to argue it out then it will probably cost you a lot more anyway), and perhaps amicably discuss any slight re-arrangements you want to make to the split that would better suit you.
When you get divorced nowadays they want you to have gone to mediation, you have to confirm it on the forms, but there is no point if you are not argueing and the mediator will not give you any advice as to how to properly split up your assets, so you run the risk that the financial consent order you come up with won't be acceptable. I went to see a mediator and wasn't impressed.
I put on my divorce form that I had used the wikivorce solicitors to come up with the consent order, instead of mediation, and it seemed to be aceptable.
If either of you can confess to adultery this is also good, as the divorce will go through quicker. It won't matter to the settlement who is at fault anyway.
Wrapping up the financials quickly should be a priority as it is depressing being uncertain about your financial future, as 'sucking up' the financial advice and hit is important to avoid getting bitter and angry.
Good luck.