Hi, I'm looking for some advice regarding my situation and realise I need to take legal advice also but trying to educate myself beforehand and get some opinions.
I'm a joint owner of the home I live in with my children. My ex partner (we never married) and I split up 5 years ago, he moved on bought a house and is quite well off.
We never went to court to settle anything as there were no issues regarding children or custody etc, we worked everything between us to suit the children at the time.
The children and I continued to live in the home. There didn't seem to be any option at the time as I wasn't working and couldn't afford to buy another house nor buy my ex out. I was devastated by the breakup and subsequently had a mental breakdown. It took years to get better but I did and got back to work.
All through, we've divided the mortgage repayments equally. He's paid low child maintenance in relation to his earnings, his justification is he pays it into the mortgage.
The house needs major repairs again and I will have to borrow 15k from the CU which everyone says I'm mad as I won't ever see it back. In an ideal world we'd like to start over again, the kids and I somewhere new and sever financial ties.
My question is; do I have recourse through the courts for a property division or is it just a split of 50/50 being joint tenants? I don't qualify for cohabitee status as it's prior to 2011. We were together 10 years in all.
Would it make any difference that I paid the deposit on the house, paid for the renovations and furnishings and have paid for repairs, maintenance and utility bills through the years? My ex had no savings of his own when we met.
There's aprox. 100,000 in positive equity if house were sold.
I imagine my ex will want a 50/50 split as he doesn't have any obligation to do otherwise.
Do you have any thoughts on division via court? Thank you.
I'm a joint owner of the home I live in with my children. My ex partner (we never married) and I split up 5 years ago, he moved on bought a house and is quite well off.
We never went to court to settle anything as there were no issues regarding children or custody etc, we worked everything between us to suit the children at the time.
The children and I continued to live in the home. There didn't seem to be any option at the time as I wasn't working and couldn't afford to buy another house nor buy my ex out. I was devastated by the breakup and subsequently had a mental breakdown. It took years to get better but I did and got back to work.
All through, we've divided the mortgage repayments equally. He's paid low child maintenance in relation to his earnings, his justification is he pays it into the mortgage.
The house needs major repairs again and I will have to borrow 15k from the CU which everyone says I'm mad as I won't ever see it back. In an ideal world we'd like to start over again, the kids and I somewhere new and sever financial ties.
My question is; do I have recourse through the courts for a property division or is it just a split of 50/50 being joint tenants? I don't qualify for cohabitee status as it's prior to 2011. We were together 10 years in all.
Would it make any difference that I paid the deposit on the house, paid for the renovations and furnishings and have paid for repairs, maintenance and utility bills through the years? My ex had no savings of his own when we met.
There's aprox. 100,000 in positive equity if house were sold.
I imagine my ex will want a 50/50 split as he doesn't have any obligation to do otherwise.
Do you have any thoughts on division via court? Thank you.
