What Am I Entitled to in a Divorce Settlement?

There is no fixed share: nobody is automatically entitled to half, and nobody walks away with nothing because they did not earn the money.

When it comes to deciding how wealth is split in a divorce, English courts do not discriminate based on your role within the family. What you are entitled to depends on what there is, what each of you needs, and what you both contributed, financially and otherwise.

Breadwinner vs housewife divorce rights

In 2023 a court in Andalusia ordered a man to pay his ex-wife more than €204,000 for 25 years of housework. The couple had a separation of property agreement, similar to a prenuptial agreement, under which whatever each of them earned was theirs alone. She had raised their two daughters and run the home while he built a business.

That was a Spanish decision and it does not bind courts here, but it raises the question of what happens in England and Wales to the financially weaker spouse who made sacrifices during the marriage, such as acting as a stay at home mum.

What is a housewife entitled to in a divorce?

Equality is the starting point for any financial settlement in England and Wales. This means each party should receive a fair share, not necessarily an equal one, of matrimonial assets such as money, property, investments, pensions and business assets.

If both parties earn a similar amount and make similar contributions during the marriage, the court will likely order an equal split.

In reality, however, it is rarely a 50-50 split. The court’s main aim is to achieve fairness and ensure that one party does not profit at the expense of the other due to their money-making abilities.

What the court must take into account

The factors are set out in section 25 of the Matrimonial Causes Act 1973. In plain terms:

• What each of you has, earns, or is likely to earn in the foreseeable future.
• What each of you needs, and any obligations or responsibilities you carry.
• The standard of living enjoyed during the marriage.
• Your ages, and how long the marriage lasted.
• Any physical or mental disability either of you has.
• The contributions each of you made to the welfare of the family, including looking after the home or caring for children.
• Conduct, but only where it would be unfair to ignore it.
• Anything of value either of you loses because of the divorce, such as a pension benefit.

Where there are children under 18, their welfare is the court’s first consideration.

The bar for conduct is high, and an unhappy marriage is not conduct.

Different rules apply to inherited wealth and pre-existing trust funds. In those cases, assets are much less likely to be divided equally.

What is a non-working spouse entitled to in a divorce?

There is no set figure, but a non-working spouse is very often entitled to more than half of the capital.

If you have been out of the workplace for years, you cannot rehouse yourself on a mortgage you have no income to support, and the court is looking at whether both of you can live independently at the end of the process.

What tends to move the outcome in a non-earning spouse’s favour:

• Time out of the workplace, and how realistic it is to return to it.
• Age, since retraining at 55 is a different proposition from retraining at 30.
• Caring responsibilities that continue after the divorce.
• A significant gap in earning capacity that is not going to close.

You may also want to read about claiming compensation for lost earnings in a divorce, which occasionally arises where one spouse gave up a high-earning career.

Homemakers are the same as breadwinners in divorce

When assessing each party’s contribution to the marriage, the court has made it clear that homemakers stand on equal footing with breadwinners. Stay-at-home parents may not contribute to the family’s bank account, but they do make an equal contribution to the welfare of the family, and it is treated as such.

The result is that a stay-at-home spouse or financially weaker partner could be entitled to receive more of the other partner’s income or assets if this would make their settlement fairer. Often, the financially stronger party will be ordered to make ongoing spousal maintenance payments in order to meet the other party’s needs.

This approach is more generous towards the financially weaker party than many other jurisdictions, which make financial settlements based on financial contributions alone.

A 50-year-old woman who has not worked for the duration of her 30-year marriage may struggle to find a job and support herself financially. She might expect to receive a larger share of the matrimonial assets than a 25-year-old who earns a similar income to their spouse and could easily start again on a reasonable salary.

Homemakers vs breadwinners in civil partnerships: a key case

The same financial principles apply to civil partnerships as to marriages. The language of the Civil Partnership Act 2004 mirrors section 25, so the approach on dissolution of a civil partnership is the same.

Lawrence v Gallagher [2012] EWCA Civ 394 was the first substantial appeal on finances following dissolution. The couple registered their partnership in December 2007 and separated seven months later, but because they had lived together since 1997 the relationship was treated as lasting 11 years and 7 months.

Total assets were £4,175,000. At first instance the financially weaker partner was awarded £1,690,000. The Court of Appeal then allowed an appeal against that award, reducing the lump sum element from £577,778 to £350,000 and removing a share of deferred bonuses altogether.

In that case, non-financial contributions counted, and a flat one partner had owned before the relationship began was brought into the reckoning because it had been the shared home.

What am I entitled to after 20, 25 or 30 years of marriage?

Length of marriage is one of the section 25 factors.

What a long marriage tends to mean in practice:

• Almost everything is matrimonial. After decades together, assets brought in at the start have usually been mixed into the joint finances so thoroughly that separating them is unrealistic.
• Equal sharing is a stronger starting point. The longer the marriage, the harder it is to argue that one of you contributed more.
• Pensions become central. In a long marriage the pension is often worth more than the house, and it is regularly the most overlooked asset in the settlement.
• Maintenance is more likely. A spouse in their fifties or sixties who has not worked for decades may need ongoing support rather than a clean break.

A short marriage works the other way. The court is more willing to look at what each of you brought in and, where there are no children and no real needs to meet, to put you both roughly back where you started.

You may also be interested in divorce in your 60s and the financial implications.

What happens to the house, the pension and the business?

In outline:

• The family home. Usually the largest asset and the first thing to resolve, because both of you need somewhere to live. See who gets the house in a divorce.
• Pensions. Frequently the most valuable asset after the house. See how pensions are split in a divorce.
• A business. Rarely sold; more often it is valued, with the other spouse compensated from elsewhere. See protecting a limited company in a divorce.
• An inheritance. Often, though not always, left out of the sharing exercise, unless it is needed to meet needs. See inheritance and divorce.
• Savings and investments. Generally matrimonial if built up during the marriage. See savings and investments in a divorce.
• A jointly owned property where contributions were unequal. See beneficial interest in property.

What if we cannot agree?

Most couples never see a courtroom. If you can reach agreement, a solicitor turns it into a consent order and the court approves it.

If agreement is difficult, the options before court include mediation, where a neutral third party helps you find your own agreement, and family arbitration, where a qualified arbitrator decides the issue privately and bindingly.

Do not agree a settlement without knowing what the assets are. Full financial disclosure from both sides comes first, and an agreement reached without it can be reopened.

How we can help

If you are trying to understand your rights in a divorce, whether you are the breadwinner or the homemaker, our family team can tell you what a realistic range looks like in your circumstances.

We can negotiate on your behalf and get the agreement approved so that it is binding. Speak to our financial settlement solicitors about your situation.

Call us on 020 7485 8811 or fill in the contact form below.