Minimising Divorce and Settlement Costs

[MoreSkyParticipant 4865]

Separation of Concerns

There are three main issues when getting divorced:

• Annulment of the marriage
• Financial arrangements and division of assets
• Child custody arrangements (if appropriate)

Each of these are completely separately processes and should be treated as such.

As I have mentioned before, it is possible to get divorced without any financial arrangements being sorted. It is not recommended but it is possible. The annulment of the marriage does not depend on having sorted out the financial arrangements.

Do NOT let the ex’s lawyer try and link conditions between these, unless it is absolutely clear it is beneficial to do so. They will try and throw a lot of unrelated issues together to attempt to sow confusion and to overwhelm Do not let this happen. Isolate the issues and review and resolve each according to its own process. Respond on one issue at a time.

Most, if not all, of the exceptions to this would be to do with child custody which takes priority over everything else.

An example would be: the ex remains in the marital home with the children but access is not restricted in any way. Only a cold-hearted, callous and selfish bitch queen from the deepest, darkest depths of hell’s arsehole would use their children as bargaining chips but there are plenty of them to go around.

My ex did not try this on. Adulterous she may be, but she knew me well enough to know that if she had tried to restrict access to my daughter I would have made sure she was penniless and destitute and they would have to pry the last penny out of my cold, dead hands before I gave her anything.

She was unemployed (see my introduction for details) and she desperately needed my goodwill and money. That said, I believe she had (and has) my daughter’s best interests at heart and that aspect was resolved relatively amicably and with reluctant agreement. Nonetheless, not seeing my daughter as often did cause a great deal of pain and coupled with other issues put me in a very bad place.

Anyway, back to separation of concerns – keep the issues separate, as far as possible, and it will make it much easier to identify and complete each part, and to maintain focus.

"...reinvent your life because you must; it is your life and its history and the present belong only to you.” It is Your Life, Charles Bukowski.

[Gravel PitParticipant]

God damn, 10 minutes of reading this thread and I can tell you, I’m never getting married. I do not need that stress…holy s~~~. Thank goodness I found mgtow when I did.

[MoreSkyParticipant 4865]

Gravel Pit wrote:

God damn, 10 minutes of reading this thread and I can tell you, I’m never getting married. I do not need that stress…holy s~~~. Thank goodness I found mgtow when I did.

Hi GravelPit

Glad it’s got the message across. I’ve still got a bit more to write yet, which I’ll try and do over the next few days.

It was about halfway through the divorce process that I found MGTOW and it not only saved my sanity but quite a bit of cash as well (as I will go into).

I’m not sure I’ve linked it in this thread but on a previous thread KM posted a link to a very interesting read on the fraudulent marriage contract.

/marriage-is-fraud/

"...reinvent your life because you must; it is your life and its history and the present belong only to you.” It is Your Life, Charles Bukowski.

[Branched offParticipant 10920]

Hi MoreSky,
I was just taking a look around and thought I would compliment you on a fine thread with a lot of useful info for those poor souls facing up to the consequence of the marriage mistake. One divorce over a decade ago was enough for me.

I would just like to say for any guys reading that your point about forward planning (from the earliest warning signs of a rocky marriage) is very good and should help minimise financial pain. Small valuable movable assets acquired quietly over time really can be golden here. I would also beg any man in a divorce not to try to “be a gentleman”. Particularly make no gentleman’s financial agreements. Honour is a male concept and you are dealing with a woman…

Anyway nice public spirited thread mate.

A woman is like fire -fun to play with, can warm you through and cook your food, needs constant feeding, can burn you and consume all you own

[MoreSkyParticipant 4865]

Cheers Branched Off.

I promise I will try and finish it off. The really useful money saving stuff is yet to come.

As you say, planning is everything.

"...reinvent your life because you must; it is your life and its history and the present belong only to you.” It is Your Life, Charles Bukowski.

[2icebittenParticipant 147]

@moresky, your information has been extremely helpful. Thank you for sharing.

My mission in life is not merely to survive, but to thrive; and to do so with some passion, some compassion, some humor, and some style. - Maya Angelou

[MoreSkyParticipant 4865]

Thanks 2icebitten.

I was considering reverting to full lurk mode due to some recent idiocy, but comments like yours and Branched Off’s reminds me of the real reason for this site.

"...reinvent your life because you must; it is your life and its history and the present belong only to you.” It is Your Life, Charles Bukowski.

[MoreSkyParticipant 4865]

An Interjection

Whilst I’m trying to think how to write the next bit without identifying myself there was an interesting bit in an old Terrence Popp video which is worth mentioning, which relates to an earlier section

If you are married and and think a divorce may be likely (hah!) then if you wish to put aside some money for post-divorce that the future ex-wife can’t get hold of then you can do the following.

• Withdraw regular amounts of cash
• Stash this cash with a trusted friend
• Shortly before divorce proceedings or confronting future ex-wife, join Gamblers Anonymous and Alcoholics Anonymous
• When questioned where the cash went, say it went on gambling and booze because you were so upset your marriage was breaking down
• Get divorced
• Retrieve cash from trusted friend at a suitable point post-divorce

This can obviously be enhanced by visiting racetracks etc. (not spending) and picking up betting slips.

I’m not sure I would have had the bottle to do this but I can’t see any logical discrepancies.

"...reinvent your life because you must; it is your life and its history and the present belong only to you.” It is Your Life, Charles Bukowski.

[MoreSkyParticipant 4865]

Research, Research, Research

This is the bit that has the potential to save huge amounts of cash.

Before getting divorced I had no real idea of the divorce process and much of what I did know was gained from TV and movies and “what everybody knows”. This is generally based on laws in the USA, and gents in the States you have my sympathies. You have it a lot tougher on the whole I think.

Anyway, the general perception is that when you get divorced the ex-wife is entitled to half your s~~~. Under UK law, at least, the ex-wife is entitled to f~~~ all. But I didn’t know that.

For the sake of an example, lets say my house is worth £300k and that I have £100k in various pensions.

Using the “half my s~~~” approach the ex-wife would be entitled to £200k.

Indeed, this is what her lawyer proposed as an opening salvo in the financial negotiations (using the actual but equally scary figures). I didn’t know any better and thought that this was what she was entitled to. This is not including any child maintenance payments or spousal maintenance.

The initial petition had been accepted by the court, the decree nisi was about to be issued and I’d just learned about the amount of time I would be spending with my daughter.

I had no idea how I was going to come up with that sort of money. I was considering taking contract jobs in the Middle East or senior management positions in London. All of which would have meant I would see my daughter even less, if at all, and I would probably still be penniless.

My lawyer was of little help as he wanted £1000 to do the financial negotiations and had said that I had to come up with a financial settlement that the court would accept.

Needless to say, I was in a very bad frame of mind and couldn’t see a positive way out and suicide was definitely on the list of possibilities.

During work, one day around this time, a senior manager was spouting huge amounts of bulls~~~ basing his arguments on “what everybody knows” and I corrected him saying “the Devil is in the detail, and what you are saying doesn’t apply in this situation”.

This woke me up and I decided to apply the sort of thinking I use at work to my divorce situation.

I researched all I could, and during the course of that research I also discovered Terrence Popp and then MGTOW which put me in a MUCH better frame of mind.

What I learned from that research, I’ll describe in the next post.

"...reinvent your life because you must; it is your life and its history and the present belong only to you.” It is Your Life, Charles Bukowski.

[narwhalParticipant]

As a general rule of thumb, be an unemotional, logical, asshole throughout the process and during any discussions with her after that point. She will absolutely hate you for it, but she will avoid manipulating you or trying to get you to do anything ever against since you’re making it clear that it will never be a pleasant experience.

I need more from the settlement, I don’t have any retirement money!
That is not my concern anymore.
But we agreed I would quit my job to stay at home.
Irrelevant.
Don’t you care at all?
Still irrelevant
Don’t you care about your children?
My concern for my kids doesn’t mean I need to give you money.
My boyfriend cares more about the kids then you do!
{no reaction whatsoever}

Ok. Then do it.

[MoreSkyParticipant 4865]

Research, Research, Research (continued)

As mentioned in the previous post, the concept put forward by the ex-wife’s lawyer was that she was entitled to half my s~~~.

The example being that my house being worth £300k and my pensions £100k she was entitled to £200k.

After a bit of research, it became clear that she was entitled to f~~~ all. Just being married to me doesn’t entitle her to half my s~~~. Under certain circumstances it may be true that the resultant financial settlement is half of all assets but that is only the case when married for a long time and the ex-wife has also been contributing.

It is also the case that it is not the ex-husband gives to the ex-wife, it is that the higher earner gives the lower earner a sufficient settlement, in the eyes of the court, such that they can be financially independent to a level appropriate to the amount of time they have been married.

The point of researching is as follows:

• To understand the divorce process
• To understand what the court is looking for
• To understand how much, if any, of your assets are applicable to examine
• To understand that “half your s~~~” is bollocks and to find out what actually applies in your particular situation
• To minimise your apparent “value” and maximise hers reducing any difference to minimise the amount you have to give to “equalise”

In my fictional example, let’s add in some additional data:

My house is worth £300k with a remaining mortgage of £150k.
I bought the house 5 years before we were married and never put her on the deeds and always paid the mortgage and all the bills from my account and never had a joint account.
We were married for 10 years.

Firstly the value of the house in the calculation is the equity not the list price. That is, £150k equity rather than £300k market value.

As I had the house for 5 years before the 10 year marriage, she can only make a claim on two thirds of the equity, that is two thirds of £150k which is £100k.

Taking the “definitely will be accepted by the court” approach of splitting 50/50, this would mean to pay her off would be 50% of £100k which is £50k. This is obviously a lot lower than the 50% of £300k which is £150k.

Additionally further reductions can be made as there are costs associated with buying and selling houses which reduces the equity available for calculation. Let’s saying it costs £5k to buy or sell a house resulting in total costs (to me) of £10k reducing the equity to £90k and her pay off to £45k, and that is taking the conservative approach. I’m not sure how deposits are included in the calculation as when I bought my house you could get away with low deposits but these days they are significant.

In the example my various pensions totalled £100k. Pensions plural, is important here. I had pensions from various jobs I had been in before, during and after the marriage.

I had been tempted during the marriage to consolidate them in one pot. THIS WOULD HAVE BEEN A VERY BAD MOVE.

In terms of marital assets that could applied to the “equalisation” calculation, given the length of marriage, only those paid into during the marriage were relevant to my “value” as part of the calculation, as those are the ones she could make a claim on in terms of pension sharing.

I had four pensions. Two prior to the marriage valued at around £70k; one small one during the marriage, as I worked for myself for a lot of the time and did not pay much into a pension valued at around £10k; and one towards the end of the marriage that I still pay into valued at around £20k.

If I had consolidated them into one pot then the “equalisation” calculation would have been applied to that at say 50% of £100k, which is £50k, rather than 50% of the two smaller pensions which would be £15k.

So, from an initial “half your s~~~” approach requiring a pay off of £200k the offer put to the court could have been £45k plus £15k which is £60k. A difference of £140k.

I actually offered less than 50% (around 30% to 40%) of the relevant splits because I knew she was desperate for the money. The court accepted it as a full and final clean-break settlement as the numbers added up and made sense.

The key here is to understand your particular situation and to understand how to minimise her claim and also your apparent value.

Research is also important to understand the process and it is a process with forms and tick boxes. This part of the divorce is mechanical. The biased and emotional parts come when sorting out custody of children.

If there are genuine joint assets such as businesses or the house was purchased together (and she actually used her own money) then only some of the above applies depending on particular circumstances.

There’s a lot of numbers in this bit. Let me know if I’ve made any errors.

"...reinvent your life because you must; it is your life and its history and the present belong only to you.” It is Your Life, Charles Bukowski.

[MoreSkyParticipant 4865]

narwhal wrote:

As a general rule of thumb, be an unemotional, logical, asshole throughout the process

Absolutely agree. My Dad couldn’t believe how calm I was once I got my head together.

Your / conversation is something that still goes on to this day with my ex-wife. Very accurate. I’ve been called an unfeeling bastard on many occasions.

"...reinvent your life because you must; it is your life and its history and the present belong only to you.” It is Your Life, Charles Bukowski.

[SkinnySweatyManInAGreenSuitParticipant 94]

Keep it up bro. Good info here. Contributing!

Beer & BBQ

[NoMoreParticipant 1233]

MoreSky, I’ve read through this a couple times and it sticks with me. The best thing you can do is perform your own research. Read multiple websites and amalgamate their advice.

I learned that she can’t touch my retirement savings because of the short length of her marriage. When she and her lawyer requested it, I quoted state legal precedence against it. I learned about the actions one is forbidden to take during this process. You can’t force the closing of bank accounts. You can’t harass the other party. Both of which she has done.

Spend as much time learning about the law, legal intricacies, and your rights as you can.

A co-worker recently told me, "If you want to see who someone really is, divorce them." I have found out how true this is. When your wife drops the façade of being the caring partner, you will witness all of the greed, hate, and spite that she has masked. It is truly breathtaking!

[WickermanParticipant 57]

I am not a lawyer so I can’t say that this will work, but maybe others can share their knowledge about this strategy. I managed to escape the fatal embrace of the Predatory Female but I have brothers, in-laws, and friends who went through this entire divorce s~~~ storm. If I had fallen for women’s lies and deceit and ended up losing everything and paying an evil witch lots of money for many years, I would do the following. I would quit my job, put all my meager belongings in storage, and move to a third world country such as Thailand, Phillipines, or Columbia, where the US government had no power to drag me back in chains, and I would tell my ex-wife that I wasn’t giving her another penny until she went to court and released me from all legal obligations to give her my money indefinitely. In exchange for cutting me loose, I would give her a one-time lump sum of money to get her out of my life and never bother me again. Of course I would handle all of this through a reputable stateside divorce lawyer to make sure it was all legal. Eventually the bitch would get so hungry she would agree to my terms, especially since women are so shortsighted. Now I could pay her off, once, and come back to the states if I wished and resume my life but never have to give her another penny or take any of her s~~~. What do you think of this plan?

[Author]

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