Since 1964, around a third of all marriages in the UK have ended in divorce. The phenomenon has been ramping up over the years, to the extent that today around 42% of married couples are expected to get divorced at some point.
Behind these unhappy statistics lies quite a complicated legal procedure. Just as no two marriages are quite alike, every divorce is distinct in its way.
What is a divorce settlement?
A ‘settlement’, in divorce jargon, is the agreement you reach with your former spouse about how all of your assets and money are going to be divided at the termination of your marriage. The nature of the split will depend on several factors, and no one party is guaranteed anything. It can cover everything from your furniture and appliances to your savings to your pets.
A settlement will make a distinction between matrimonial and non-matrimonial assets. The latter covers any gifts or inheritances received by one party during the marriage. The court will decide what constitutes a fair split, based on the earning capacity of each party to the marriage, your respective ages, and how long the marriage has been ongoing.
Having the settlement agreed upon will help you to avoid friction and disputes later on and help to ensure that the separation is as amicable as possible. The process can be made much simpler in the long term with the involvement of a competent solicitor, even if the services of such an organisation will often prove expensive.
When are partners allowed to claim their rights in a divorce settlement?
Technically, a divorce doesn’t dissolve all financial ties between a married couple. It merely allows you to legally marry other people in the future. In theory and practice, a former spouse can still claim the assets of their ex-partner, provided that the latter has not yet remarried. To guard against this possibility, the divorce would need to be supplemented by what’s called a financial consent order.
A consent order of this kind is desirable even if there are no assets to be divided. This is because it will remove the possibility of any involvement between the parties, and allow your future wealth to be claimed by your former partner.
So, if a person were to divorce without a consent order and then become a multi-millionaire thanks to a lottery win, or speculation on the crypto market, then they might find that their former partner might claim their current earnings.
In other words, it’s something that most reputable divorce lawyers will tend to recommend as a matter of course.
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© Copyright 2022 Antonia, All rights Reserved. Written For: Tidylife
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