Splitting up in your fifties brings in the house, the mortgage, joint debts and decades of pension. Here is how the money side of divorce works in England and Wales.
You’ve been married for 25 years. The children have left home, the mortgage is nearly paid off and the pension pot finally looks like something. Then one of you says it’s over.
Divorcing later in life is not the same as divorcing at 35. You have less time to rebuild, more to split, and the most valuable thing you own is often a pension you’ve never really looked at. Get the paperwork wrong and you can pay for it for the rest of your retirement.
Since no-fault divorce came in on 6 April 2022, ending a marriage in England and Wales has been fairly simple on paper. You apply online, nobody has to be blamed, and there’s a court fee of £612 (the rate since April 2025). There is a minimum 20-week wait before you can apply for the conditional order, then at least six weeks and a day before the final order.
The thing that catches people out is this: the divorce ends the marriage, not the money. Unless a court approves a financial order, your ex can still make a claim against you, even years later. If you’ve been separated for a decade and you’ve built up savings or come into an inheritance in the meantime, that’s an unpleasant surprise you don’t want.
Most solicitors will tell you not to apply for the final order until the finances are sorted. One reason is that once you’re divorced, you stop being a spouse for pension purposes, and with it can go any right to a widow’s or widower’s pension if your ex dies before the money is settled.
Scotland and Northern Ireland have their own divorce systems, and Scotland in particular divides property differently, with matrimonial property generally counted from the wedding to the date of separation. If either of you lives there, take advice under that country’s rules.
There is no automatic 50/50 rule in England and Wales. A court starts by looking at needs, especially housing, then considers how long the marriage lasted, what each of you earns and owns, your ages and your health. For a long marriage, an equal split is often where things start. It isn’t guaranteed.
The usual options are to sell and divide what’s left, for one of you to buy the other out, or for one to stay put for a set period before the house is sold. Buying out sounds tidy, but at 55 a lender will want to know how you’ll repay a new mortgage on one income before the age they’ll lend to.
Until the mortgage lender agrees to take a name off, you’re both liable for the whole debt, not your half. If your ex stops paying, the lender can come after you for every missed payment and your credit record takes the hit. Moving out doesn’t change that.
Two bits of good news on tax. Transferring a share of the home to your ex under a court order or divorce agreement is generally exempt from stamp duty. And since 6 April 2023, separating couples have up to three tax years after the year they split to move assets between them without a capital gains tax bill, or longer if the transfer is part of a formal divorce agreement.
Loans, overdrafts and credit cards in joint names work the same way as the mortgage. Each of you is responsible for all of it. If £8,000 is owed on a joint card, the bank can chase either of you for the full £8,000, whatever you’ve agreed between yourselves.
So do the boring jobs early. List every account, freeze or close joint credit where you can, and stop any joint overdraft being used. Once the accounts are closed, you can ask the credit reference agencies to remove the financial link to your ex from your file. Debts in one person’s name usually stay with that person, though a court can take them into account when it divides everything else.
At this age, the pension is often worth more than the house, and it’s the asset couples most often forget to split.
All pensions built up by either of you count, including workplace schemes, SIPPs and pensions already being paid. There are three main ways of dealing with them.
Pension sharing is the most common. A court order moves a percentage of one person’s pension to the other, who then has a pension of their own. That gives a clean break: if your ex dies or remarries, your share stays yours.
Offsetting means one of you keeps the pension and the other gets more of something else, often the house. It looks fair on paper, but £300,000 of pension and £300,000 of house aren’t the same thing. The pension will be taxed when it’s taken out and can’t be touched until at least 55 (57 from April 2028), while the house can be lived in or sold.
Pension attachment, sometimes called earmarking, sends part of one person’s pension income or lump sum to the other once it starts paying. It stops when the payer dies or the recipient remarries, which is why it’s now rarely used.
The starting point is a cash equivalent transfer value from each scheme. Ask for one now: schemes usually provide one free statement a year. With final salary pensions, though, the transfer value can badly understate what the income is worth, so splitting it 50/50 doesn’t always give each of you the same retirement income. In bigger or more complicated cases, couples often bring in a pensions on divorce expert, usually an actuary, to work out a fair split.
For a pension sharing order to take effect, the court needs the right paperwork, including a pension sharing annex sent to each scheme. The scheme then has a fixed period to carry out the split, and some schemes charge for doing it. The new State Pension can’t be shared on divorce in the same way, so check your own National Insurance record on GOV.UK rather than relying on your ex’s.
Before applying to court for a financial order, you’re normally expected to attend a mediation information and assessment meeting (MIAM). The government’s family mediation voucher scheme has offered up to £500 towards mediation costs in eligible cases. Agreeing a deal and having a solicitor draw it up as a consent order costs a fraction of a fought-over court case.
For free, impartial guidance, MoneyHelper has detailed information on dividing pensions and property, and Citizens Advice can help with debts and housing. If you’re over 50, Pension Wise offers a free appointment on your defined contribution pension options. For anything involving a large pension, a business or a final salary scheme, it’s worth paying for a solicitor and an FCA-regulated financial adviser. Their fees are small next to a mistake you’d be living with for 30 years.
In England and Wales a divorce ends the marriage, but only a court-approved financial order protects you from future claims, so sort the money before the final order. Joint mortgages and debts stay the full responsibility of both of you until they’re closed or transferred. Pensions are often the biggest asset after 50 and can be split with a pension sharing order. Get a transfer value early, and take regulated advice if the sums are large.
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