Divorcing after many years and selling marital home paid alone, can I get credit?

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Tiberium

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Any advice or guidance would be appreciated on this matter as I cannot find an answer anywhere.

We have been living separate for many years, she has moved out of the marital home and in a new relationship with another man (divorce is on-going).
We have a joint mortgage where based on the papers we are jointly and equally responsible for paying.
I continued to live in the property and after she moved out I was paying the mortgage 100% alone (and of course everything else: the property upkeep, maintenance, bills and insurance premiums as well).
In fact due to a mistake I have left the overpayment in place so I was actually overpaying the mortgage the whole time.

The property shall be sold and we shall share the remaining equity (and the whole thing is about how to split).
The question is therefore about the credits I can receive from the equity remains after the mortgage is repaid to the bank.

I have seen before somewhere (but can't find it again) a text stating the following: "A person who makes mortgage payments alone on a home jointly held with an ex-spouse is entitled to a credit for the ex-spouse’s share of the ownership expenses - otherwise it would give the non-paying spouse an unjust benefit by the reduction in marital debt!"

So is it my understanding correct that I can push for?
#1. Firstly the very least to get the 100% of overpayments back (that is only if the #2nd point below does not work for some reason)
#2. Or alternatively I should get 100% credit on the whole loan principal paid off (what I was paying off alone )

An example:
- The house worth 300K
- The outstanding principal on the mortgage was 250K (at separation time)
- I paid off 50K alone (from the principal alone) so current outstanding mortgage stands at 200K
- The house sells for 320K

Is it the right thinking that the final calculation for each share for the parties should be like that:
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Property Sale price 320K
Pay off bank loan -200K
Equity remains 120K
Credit for paying mortgage alone: -50K (that should only be paid to me)
Balance remains 70K
And only that 70K should be shared 50-50% (or whatever else percentage) between the parties.

Is that correct?

(Update: the ex-spouse is also in full time employment and always has been)

Thanks in advance.
 
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so the general principle is that if you do not contribute to the mortgage / upkeep of the property after separation, you cannot reasonably expect to benefit from the equity when that property is sold. You are however entitled to your share for the time you were married / before separation.

How that all settles out in terms of hard cash, is generally a horse trading exercise in my experience.

You don't mention children, so I take it you don't have any between you.
 
Hi Tiberium

I don't think that there is a straight answer.

The house will be just one part of the divorce proceedings. Presumably you will look at other assets as well.

Yes, you paid the mortgage in full, but you also had full use of the house. She presumably had to pay rent for her new place.

So you can argue your case that you overpaid the capital and so should get that back, but she might not see it that way.

Brendan
 
Brendan Burgess said:
Hi Tiberium

I don't think that there is a straight answer.

The house will be just one part of the divorce proceedings. Presumably you will look at other assets as well.

Yes, you paid the mortgage in full, but you also had full use of the house. She presumably had to pay rent for her new place.

So you can argue your case that you overpaid the capital and so should get that back, but she might not see it that way.

Brendan
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Hi Brendan,

I respectfully disagree on some of your points.
It all depends on the particular case.
But even if we look at your way (who pays rent and who pays mortgage) it should only apply to the normal repayments since that is what both parties were contractually required to pay to the bank in the first place.
The fact that I (accidentally) overpaid the mortgage should not give her a right to get a share from the overpayment as well.
It's unfortunate the overpayment has occurred but under no way or form I was obliged to continue with the overpayments.

Also the mortgage costs more than her rent.
If she rents she pays for nothing else (landlord fixes everything).

The marital home is an old property and I had to pay a lot over the years to keep the property in a good state of repair (that is obviously an additional cost above the mortgage). And I paid that all alone - resulting in keeping up or increasing the value of the house and this will result in higher sale price.
I think it would be totally unjust if I only paid for all that but she gets half of it anyway.
Are we saying I'd have been better to completely leave the property to fallen into disrepair?

Another complicated matter is that I can also argue that I have actually "used up" my earlier inheritance in paying the mortgage and normally courts handles inheritances separate and the other party may not always be entitled to a share from prior inheritance).
I should have just stopped overpayments and keep my inheritance intact as much as I could (but that not that easy anyway on one wage).

Kind Regards
 
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Tiberium said:
I respectfully disagree on some of your points.
Click to expand...

We are not really disagreeing.

I agree that the overpayments should be taken from the equity. But she may not see it that way and it will be difficult for you to get clean ownership of the house without her agreement.

I could argue the case well for either side.

Brendan
 
Brendan Burgess said:
We are not really disagreeing.

I agree that the overpayments should be taken from the equity. But she may not see it that way and it will be difficult for you to get clean ownership of the house without her agreement.

I could argue the case well for either side.

Brendan
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Thanks for your insight Bendan.

I was not expecting an easy negotiation process.

But she knows very well that she does not want to contribute to the mortgage or anything else and if I loose my job (in my line of work redundancy is common and things are currently looking bleak) we can loose all of our equity in the property very fast (since no one can expect me to be able to keep paying for things from the meager support the State provides for the solo unemployed since I have already used up my savings/inheritance).

Also since we are jointly responsible for the mortgage the bank can knock on her door as well looking for payment if i cannot pay.
Plus the writing is already on the wall (i.e. the next recession might be coming soon - if property prices drops - we loose our equity).

Since no one actually wants to keep the property - the best way would be to come to an agreement and sell quickly.
Otherwise if no agreement and the divorce becomes contested and she gets full 50% (including from overpayment/no credit for me) then I am more than likely going to Appeal and I don't care how much it will cost.

Kind Regards
 
It can depend on if there are other assets or children.

Assuming the house is the sole asset and there are no children.

House will sell for €500K
There is €200K remaining on mortgage
There was €400K remaining on mortgage when you split
After house is sold and mortgage paid off there is €300K remaining.
You can propose that you take €200K the equity you put into the property solely and divide the remaining €100K equally.
So in essence you agree to pay her €50K for her share of equity in the house.

Now your spouse may feel aggrieved that she has paid €100K in rent after the split and you are walking away with €250K while all she has is a roof over her head and no opportunity to purchase ever while you have a serious down payment for a new property. You may counter and say you have spent €70K on upkeep, repair and maintenance of the house since you split plus put an extra €50K into the mortgage as overpayments.

So your ex may consider this and counter with take the €300K, remove the €70K plus the €50K and split the remaining €180K giving her €90K and she happily agree to the property being sold and the divorce finalised. You end up with €210 in this scenario.

As Brendan says you can argue it many ways and it ultimately comes down to some horse trading, offer enough to make the divorce final and have a clean split. If it goes to court for a judge to decide the split you will have extra costs, you will need to have receipts for all repairs and updates, you will probably need some professional to agree on the figure you overpaid the mortgage and you still may not get what you want.

The judge could say, no other assets, no children, sell the house, pay all bills, and split what is left 50:50. If you appeal the first question I would ask is why did you not divorce many years ago and any perceived loss on your part is because of your inertia in not divorcing years ago, so. It the courts problem your decision to wait years.
 
Brendan Burgess said:
I don't think that there is a straight answer.

The house will be just one part of the divorce proceedings. Presumably you will look at other assets as well.

Yes, you paid the mortgage in full, but you also had full use of the house. She presumably had to pay rent for her new place.

So you can argue your case that you overpaid the capital and so should get that back, but she might not see it that way.
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This is the correct advice. It doesn't matter what you think is fair, or what you paid actually. When it goes before a judge it is only then you'll know what you're actually entitled to.

But to help your case it would be best if you could just put everything on one A4 sheet of paper. And good luck with your legal people actually figuring out who should get what. In fact avoiding lawyers altogether as you'll just drag it out with legal bills rising for both of you.

So settle now and be prepared to give more to get out of the mess. This advice is based on a 3 year sibling's Irish divorce and court case.
 
Bronte said:
But to help your case it would be best if you could just put everything on one A4 sheet of paper.
Click to expand...
Good advice.
Bronte said:
And good luck with your legal people actually figuring out who should get what. In fact avoiding lawyers altogether as you'll just drag it out with legal bills rising for both of you
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That very much depends on the lawyer. Just as in every job and every walk of life there are good and bad ones, there are ones that suit some people but don't suit you etc.
 
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