I don’t think it will surprise anybody on here who knows me or has followed other similar threads and seen my comments to find that finally it’s my turn and I’m separating from the mother of my kids (I suspect it might surprise some that I’ve taken so long about it, and others probably assumed I’d never find the balls). Having just had about the most civilised discussion we’ve had in months if not years it seems mostly it’s going to be easier than I feared, though as I expect is usually the case the biggest issue is going to be money (it seems there is going to be no issue with access to the kids – if anything she is encouraging me to see them more than I thought might happen – which I guess is the other big issue out of the way).

As I’ve alluded before on here, I have no intention of involving lawyers if I can possibly avoid it and I’m fairly sure the feeling is mutual. We’re not actually married, so there’s no necessity to involve them at all if we can come to amicable agreement on other stuff – which I still hope is the case, and the latest conversation tends to confirm that will happen.

Anyway, the big issue is the house combined with maintenance payments. We’re in the fortunate position of not having a mortgage on the house and it’s worth quite a bit (my share would almost buy outright the house my friends are buying that I’m getting a room in!) It’s been proposed that I get about half the value of the house despite having paid the deposit out of my inheritance and that I wouldn’t pay any regular maintenance – effectively I’m gifting the share of the house bought with the deposit in exchange for not paying maintenance. In a way this seems like a great deal – I’d resigned myself to getting no more than half of the value of the house anyway, given that legally that’s probably all I’m entitled to, though I also think the offer she’s made is rather below half the real value of the house (I’m not quite sure if that is deliberate or she’s just undervaluing the house – question avoided for now as I was happy just to get some principles in place and we talked about a variety of stuff). The question is what the legal situation is and regarding the CSA? Presumably if she wanted to pursue a claim for maintenance in the future she could and I’d end up getting screwed, but I’m less worried about that than the CSA deciding to do something off their own bat.

Just for context, my current financial situation is that I have very limited income but still decent savings, so not paying maintenance right now would be perfect for me. I’m hoping my income will improve significantly in the medium term in which case I’d probably choose to pay something towards looking after my kids anyway.

Anyway, before anybody asks, right now I feel utterly shit – and haven’t even told the kids yet – but ultimately I have no choice, I couldn’t spend the rest of my life like this, so hoping this it a step in the right direction…

I have nothing to say or offer, other than I am sorry for you. Best wishes, man.

Sorry to hear this fella.

Sounds like you have a handle on it but I can offer no advice. My split was a piece of cake with no kids involved.

Hope you get it worked through.

I have no advice for you chap, as no experience from which to draw. But yeah, when I saw the thread title, I guessed – certainly picked up from a few comments that your marriage wasn’t in a good place.

Anyway, just doing virtual fistbumps, manhugs, back-slapping etc and hoping you’re ok and that everything works out for you. If you’re ever down Brizzle way and fancy teaching me and the young lad to ride a unicycle, you’re welcome to holler I up for a beer.

Look after yourself.

Sorry to hear Aracer, no idea on CSA really, but if you have agreed an arrangement as above I cannot see how or why CSA needs to get involved?

Wrt the kids perhaps both of you sitting down and speaking to the kids and explaining things to them (not sure the age of your children)

This place always pulls through and I’m sure you will get great advice.

All the best

I know your preference is not to involve lawyers, but then your concerns are around the equitability of the proposed financial settlement involving property worth £hundreds of thousands and where that might leave things with regard to future legal obligations, child maintenance etc. – sounds like a job for a lawyer to me tbh.

I hope things can work out well for you, the children and your ex.

I don’t know if you can actually avoid maintenance especially if she gets any benefits at all … certainly if her situation changes you might find out that the agreement doesn’t hold-up.  Specifically if she even claims CB then the CSA might get involved without either of you wanting ???

I’d probably check that out first …

Wishing you all the best anyway.

my tupence worth, i get you don’t want to involve lawyers but suggest it’s likely a case of a little expense now for advice may save you a lot in the longer term, even if it’s a case of seeing one together for mutual advice in terms of “do this paperwork, word it like this etc etc.”

Oh and comiserations.

Don’t make any financial arrangement that could leave you open to a different interpretation by the CSA, and therefore meaning that they make you pay, in effect, double.

Better to arrange affairs so you take a larger lump sum and pay regular maintenance.

But better still, don’t take well-meaning advice from chumps like me without getting it approved by an expert.

Aracer, sorry to hear that and i hope it get’s easier for you all. at least you know it’s the right decision even if not the easiest to make.

I’d second what edlong said. you will need a lawyer to sort out financial arrangement such as a clean split between you so that there is no come back down the line. it doesn’t have to be messy but it will firm up the situation for the future and if the CSA do come knocking you’ll have everything in place.

all the best and good luck

You can get an idea of how much maintenance you should be paying, based on income etc , here – https://www.gov.uk/calculate-your-child-maintenance

Thing is, it sounds all amicable, so why would the CSA get involved? If you’re agreeing on all the other stuff, surely you agree on the maintenance payments too?

Thing is, it sounds all amicable, so why would the CSA get involved?

The issue is it being other than amicable in 5 or 10 years, and then finding out they will backdate your “missed” payments because your agreement has no standing. It needs proper legal advice.

Also I’d guess the support payments are a liability to the child, not the parent so the parents can’t decide not to bother, it is a guess though.

Even if aracer and mrsaracer can decide they’re happy with the arrangement I’d very much expect there are hoops to jump through to formalise that. Chances of any government (affiliated) body not having forms, procedures and requirements for making a cup of tea are nil, for something like this there will be ways to go about it if it’s possible.

I don’t think CSA will get involved if you have a mutual agreement in place.

However, If it were me (and it was a few years ago), then I would speak to a solicitor. It might all seem amicable now, but that can change quite quickly. As an example, my ex agreed that if I filed for divorce then she would pay for my solicitor. Everything was agreed, in terms of the split, and once the divorce was finalized she refused to pay. I was stuck with a £7k bill and nothing I could do about it.

As amicable as it may seem now, chances are it will get nasty at some point! Protect yourself and protect your interests.

The other thing I did was agreed 50/50 access to our daughter. This means maintenance payments are nill.

Just from my own experience, we got nil solicitors involved with any of it. My payments are agreed between us and that’s that.

Either aracer knows they can agree something between them and there will be no comeback, or he can’t trust her to make an agreement, in which case they do need to get solicitors involved.

There’s no way I’d be asking for advice from a bunch of strangers on it.

deadlydarcy wrote:

<span style=”font-size: 0.8rem;”>Anyway, just doing virtual fistbumps, manhugs, back-slapping etc and hoping you’re ok and that everything works out for you. If you’re ever down Brizzle way and fancy teaching me and the young lad to ride a unicycle, you’re welcome to holler I up for a beer.</span>

Thanks muchly. I have the offer of a bed with an old mate in Brizzle, so that might not be as empty an offer as you were expecting 😉

It’s been proposed that I get about half the value of the house despite having paid the deposit out of my inheritance and that I wouldn’t pay any regular maintenance – effectively I’m gifting the share of the house bought with the deposit in exchange for not paying maintenance.

If that suits (both of) you, then fine, but it would not sit entirely comfortably with me IF the inheritance had been especially large, i.e. a large percentage of the house value. In that event I would want that to be reflected in the split of assets, and I presume that it could be proven that you had used your inheritance to pay the deposit. If you were married, this would be academic because the house would be joint marital property. I do not know what the legal position is given that you are not married, i.e. whether your greater contribution would be recognised if it went to court or if you bought the house as jont tenants (as opposed to tenants in common) and consequently if that would mean you only have equal shares, regardless of monetary contribution.

If she had to give up working or go part time while your children were young, then it would be unfair to penalise any lesser monetary contribution on her part in that respect (and she may have lost out in career advancement/salary progression and pension entitlement too). Neverthless, if the inheritance were large, I would want to ‘get it back’ as it were in order to control it and ensure that it was passed on to my children, e.g. funding university or a house deposit etc. It’s not unknown for ex-spouses and ex-partners to marry someone else, who then is their sole inheritor when the ex-spouse/partner later dies, with the result that children are cut out of what would have been their inheritance. Future inheritance may be similarly complicated if the ex-spouse/partner goes on to have further children with someone else.

I don’t know if the trade off between the house and future maintenance would be legally recognised and enforceable, and I suspect it might not. Even if it were enforceable, it would probably be very difficult and expensive to go to court to get it recognised if she decided to make a CMS claim in, say, 5 years time.

Moreover, personally I would not be comfortable with the idea of exchanging capital assets in return for not contributing to the continuing costs of bringing up my own children. It smacks of buying your way out of your financial reponsibility for and commitment to your children (I don’t mean to offend or upset you by phrasing it like that, but I think you can see what I mean). Your ex-partner might make some bad or simply unlucky decisions about her finances, or lose her job etc., and the extra money you are proposing that she takes away from the relationship might then be exhausted. Would you then tell her, and more importantly your children at a time of great need, that you had already paid your contribution and it was no longer your problem?

You say you want to avoid involving lawyers, but I suspect what you mean is you want to avoid a split which turns into a bitter protracted dispute which has to be settled in court and consequent expensive legal costs. I would look at it slightly differently: good family law solicitors will have huge experience of people in similar situations to yours, and should be able to give you good advice on how to achieve the amicable split you want. I think money spent now on a family law solicitor, explaining your situation and seeking their advice as to your options (and using them as a – admittedly expensive but good quality – sounding board) would be money well spent. In your shoes I would book an hour or so with such a solicitor on my own, to discuss and explore the situation and options and potential future ramifications.

DezB wrote:

Thing is, it sounds all amicable, so why would the CSA get involved? If you’re agreeing on all the other stuff, surely you agree on the maintenance payments too?

Yeah, that was the principle I’m working on – TBH her first suggestion is probably at least as good for me* as I was expecting as an endpoint. Though without looking at that link I’m already aware that maintenance is income based, so I wouldn’t be on the hook for much now anyway, and as mentioned if things get a lot better I’d kind of expect to contribute a bit anyway (my income is likely to vary a lot over the next year or so).

Thanks for the other advice on lawyers – I guess getting something done formally may help keep the CSA off my back, and it shouldn’t be too expensive if we’re not arguing over it. My general attitude on this though is that with the exception of the CSA messing things up I’ll survive OK whatever happens with payments and ultimately any money spent on lawyers is just being diverted from my kids’ inheritance. And yes, as DezB suggests I’m fairly sure we can do things amicably enough between us – I thought we’d manage before, the conversation we had earlier reinforces that opinion. I’ve no idea what he thinks is wrong with advice from a load of strangers on STW though!

*I have no intention of having my kids lose out or even of screwing over mrs aracer, but then I have to also look after myself.

Future inheritance may be similarly complicated if the ex-spouse/partner goes on to have further children with someone else.

I’m as sure as I can be that’s not going to happen, though point taken on other issues with inheritance if she gets a new partner, and thanks for the advice in general – it might not be what I was thinking, but I came here asking for advice and I’m not going to ignore it.

Yeah, sorry, badly worded. All I mean is you know the person better than any of us. I know I won’t have any CSA related problems in the future, and asking other people won’t change that! There’s bound to be someone who says “You never know!” 😉

a well meaning informal arrangement now may well result in more likelihood of CSA being involved in the future. They charge collection fees every week so spending money now on good advice and formalising an informal agreement could well save CSA hassle and cost in the future.

I guess getting something done formally may help keep the CSA off my back

I am almost certain that whatever agreement you both sign up to, it will not prevent the Resident Parent (or for that matter the Non-Resident Parent) having the legal right to use the CMS and request and enforce the minimum statutory child maintenance. Even where a couple are married and there is a court determined divorce settlement which includes child maintenance or a lump sum instead, after 12 months the Resident Parent can still apply to the CMS and that will supersede whatever was agreed in court about child maintenance. Given that that is the case for married couples, I cannot see unmarried couples who separate not being similarly able to use the CMS at any stage until the child is 18.

Thank **** for that, thought it was more cancer.

Hug ’em while you’ve got ’em.

I’d definitely speak to a solicitor. The CSA don’t **** about… If things change down the line and she decides to ask them to make a claim from you they will take it and even if you had an agreement in place it can take a while to get things reversed. I appreciate things are amicable now but you need to protect yourself in case things change.

*I have no intention of having my kids lose out or even of screwing over mrs aracer, but then I have to also look after myself.

I don’t think that was the implication.

If she has to go into hospital or loses a job or … quite probably has any wish to claim CB.

As Slowster say’s … even if married the CMS takes precedence and through no wish of either of you they can then become involved.

The problem is not people like YOU … it’s that there are many people who are trying to screw the system, their kids (or sometimes anything that moves…)  but they will on the whole play the system for all its worth including how to get round rules.

It’s (often) the well meaning schmuck who tries to do the best for everyone who ends up being chased…

Not that this is directly relevant as I was married but I bought a house and part of the deposit was a loan from my father.  Mrs ex-XTC was a nice person… but at the point solicitors got involved they then queried if I had the loan in writing.  My own solicitor was actually my cousin and he told me it was not worth fighting.  Mrs ex-XtC also said she didn’t think it was fair but her solicitor was like a bull in a china shop.

The reason I mention that is because you might agree now but if something happens that causes her to need a solicitor or CMS get involved then she will find herself being told not to be reasonable.

As I said, consulting a solicitor now does not mean that you are inevitably embarking on an expensive and acrimonious split, and I genuinely think it actually could help to prevent that occurring now or later. For the same reason, in your shoes I would encourage my partner to similarly speak to a solicitor. If both of you have received independent expert advice on the options and various pros and cons, it may manage both your expectations and make the process of splitting much easier.

For example, one of the things I would expect a solicitor to raise would be the need for new wills for both of you and associated financial planning. If either of you die, you will probably both want your children to be your beneficiaries, but at the same time the surviving partner would be likely to find it much more difficult bringing up the children alone, whether due to loss of maintenance or having to give up/reduce/change employment to care for the children full time etc. So until the youngest is 18, you and your ex-partner might need joint life assurance (the type that pays on first death) to enable either of you to fund bringing up the children if the other dies, and wills which put their inheritance in trust (and identify suitable trustees) until they are 18 or 21 or whatever.

A good family law solicitor will routinely encounter these and other issues that they will make you aware of, and will be able to advise on your options. If you try to do this all by yourself, then the applicable phrase is ‘a man who is his own lawyer has a fool for a client’.

Sorry to hear. You must go and consult a solicitor. Good luck

Without reading all the comments Slowster looks spot on.

Solicitors are only expensive if it’s a long and acrimonious split.  Using one now to get a watertight agreement that you both have signed up to is not going to cost a lot of money.

All I mean is you know the person better than any of us. I know I won’t have any CSA related problems in the future, and asking other people won’t change that!

The world is full of people who thought they really knew what someone else would or would not do in a given situation. Nothing is certain.

A relative of mine paid about £200-250 to get his informal maintenance/settlement/access/house thing formalised.

Probably the best money he’s ever spent, when it eventually went south his ex spent several thousand (tens!) on legals to try and improve her end of the deal, only cost him a few hundred as he had the settlement agreement to fall back on.

She ended up with nothing but a yearly cost of living increase on the kids maintenance payments. About 2 quid extra a week.

AFAIK the kids haven’t spoken to her in near enough a decade after they eventually found out what she’d been trying to do to their dad.

All the best to all of you. A new life starts for all of you Make the most of it.

On the financial side I can only go on what I’ve seen work and not work for people around me. The best outcome in the long term seems to be:

Split all the capital accumulated together during the relationship including pensions but not including inheritance. Maintainance based on respective incomes and the amount of time the kids spend with respective parents. Holidays, treats, education for kids based on good will and ability pay. The idea bening that you are funding your kids not your ex. Fair now and generous in the future.

Whether you’ve been an adversary or an ally on here you’ve played fair and I suspect you are like that in real life too. I hope that will help you get through what will be a difficult period and come out the other side with a renewed zest for life.

Edit: and I look forward to seeing less posts from you on here as your new life leaves less time for wasting time with us lot. (winky)

I shall just wish you the best of luck aracer.

I have no words of intelligent advice to offer except if it’s amicable and it can be kept that way then i suspect you will all win and that if lawyers do get involved you will likely both need one.

Good luck.

YGM

My 2p. Legal advice would be worthwhile on the financials. E.g. Securing the inheritance you put in, as a percentage of the house value, so it can only go to your kids…..and not to your ex partner…..or perhaps your ex partner’s new partner…..or perhaps even, your ex partner’s new partner’s kids…. Those are the sort of things a solicitor looks into.

We got round all the bullshit by having equal custody.

We share the time that the kids are with us equally.  I claim cb for one child and she claims for the other. This effectively makes it official.

We go halves on expenses such as school uniforms, clubs and trips.

Thereby taking equal financial responsibility and negating the need for maintenance payments in either direction.

Solicitors don’t particularly like this sort of arrangement as there’s no money in it for them, but it works well for us.

As for your assets.. half each of whatever you currently own. It stings but meh..

Enjoy your new life btw.. It’s gonna be so much better now.

I’m nearly three years down the line from separating from the ex and no nearer to a financial agreement.

I was far too generous and it’s cost me big time. I am now in the hands of an excellent legal professional and I wish I did that from the outset. Some sensible advice to start with would have saved tens of thousands in overpayments by now.

Thankfully my relationship with my two boys is as goods as ever and that’s what counts.

Good luck. My only advice is to get some advice!!

Re above: Your ex isn’t entitled to half your earnings, only assets.

sorry to hear that OP,  but life is short and being happy is important! .

As others have said, I would lawyer up just for advice, then to agree what is confirmed. You never know what will happen in the future , how those involved might change their outlook or have different financial requirements etc

All the best

In this sort of situation binding arbitration can be used rather than adversorial lawyers.  I would be looking in that direction

https://www.divorce.co.uk/divorce-approaches/family-arbitration

I’m very sorry to hear your news OP.

However, reading about the financial arrangements I think you need to get legal advice. There may be a connection between how amicable your partner is being and the proposed financial settlement.

Is this “maintenance” buy out for her or for the kids? If it’s for her, you definitely need legal advice.