divorce settlement

[bubbly2000]

My friend & her husband divorced & she has been living in the marital home ever since,approx 6 yrs. As part of the divorce settlement she has to pay him 20% of the equity now the kids are grown up, but she dosent want to sell. she isn't working so cannot take out a loan or re-morgage to pay him off. She went to court the other day & the judge said she has to sell or get a solicitor to go through options, then he gave her another court date. Does she have to sell? Ther will be about 40-50k left after she has paid him which won't buy her another home, so effectively she'd be homeless. Any ideas?

[bednobs]

yes, she will probably have to sell. 1) she agreed to it in the diorce settlement 2) she presumably now has a court order to sell. If the kids are grown up, she could either get a job and use the 50k for a deposit to buy a place, or she could rent something. lets assume rent is 500 per month for a 1 bedroomed flat, she could rent for 8 years with 50k, so it's unlikely she'll be homeless.
you don't say if your friend just dosen't work or can't work, but how is she being supported now? will that carry on after the house is sold? Is she paying a mortgage now?

[bubbly2000]

She is unemployed (for the last yr or so)and recieving job seekers allowance, she is actively seeking work, however she is limited to what she can do because of arthriris in her hands, Benefits pay the interest on her mortgage. She has legal guardianship of her 14yr old grandson (since he was 6)rather than seeing him go into care. she did sign a divorce settlement agreement but shes saying circumstances have changed and shes not selling. I'm worried shes burying her head in the sand & will be forced to sell & she will end up with rock bottom price

[bednobs]

she could approach the ex husband to see if he would accept payment later on or not at all i suppose

[bednobs]

plus it sounds from your figures she had guardianship of the g/s when she made the agreement, so that hasn't changed.
i suppose if you looked at it from the exes point of view, there is no reason not to sell - she has had the benefit of living in the family home for a long time. It's a shame the housing market has dropped, but i guess that's the chance you take when you defer payment. It sounds like she is in a pickle though, so perhaps she could take the judges advice and go to a solicitor to see what options she has

[starone]

Presumably the grandson she is looking after is also her ex-husband's grandson. Is he willing to see him homeless as well or put into care? Apart from that I can see no option for her. She has to sell or find some money to pay her ex-husband for his share of the marital home. Sad but true. Don't know how she can find this extra money. Looks like an impossible situation.

[bubbly2000]

Its not the ex husbands biological grandson. Over the yrs when she was working she has spent an awful lot of money doing up the house, new windows, heating, new kitchen, wooden flooring etc etc (it was very basic and in need of modernisation when he lived there) Now shes upset that hes effectively going to reap the benefits from that. As you said an impossible situation. She has decided to sit tight and drag it out for as long as possible. if she is forced to put the house on the market, what happens if it dosen't sell, the market being what it is at present? Can they force her to drop the price ?

[boxtops]

I'm afraid that unless there is good reason for her to go to court and state her case, the original agreement stands, it's a legal document. It must have said (for example) that when the eldest child reached 18, she would sell and split the proceeds. She can't argue with that, and she would have known this when she spent money on doing up the house - that it would help raise the price of the house in the end. She needs to seek legal advice a.s.a.p., not let it go unactioned - dragging it out is likely to cost a lot in legal fees and she will need legal representation, whatever happens. IMO.

[woofgang]

some housing assocs will do co ownership agreements for people in difficult situations..but I agree, proper legal advice asap!