Archive for August, 2008

We all make mistakes (though some never admit it) and making mistakes when you’re particularly stressed is more common. Therefore during a divorce, when you’re at your most stressed, mistakes are easy to make. The trouble is that getting things wrong during a divorce will cost you dearly, both financially and with future happiness.

So, here are the ten biggest mistakes men make during divorce. Try to avoid these if you can.

1. Arguing over access to children
Seeing your children regularly is important, both for you and for them. If you don’t see them you’ll both suffer. Sometimes the woman can use them as pawns to get back at you, or leverage more money out of you. Try not to fight tit-for-tat on these matters. Your children are the most important thing, always keep that in mind.

2. Don’t bring another woman into the mix
The temptation to show off a new woman might be a big one, but for obvious reasons you should avoid this. If you start playing one-upmanship now, you’ll lose in the long run. Keep any new relationships quiet and don’t mention them as a means for revenge.

3. Don’t let her convince you that you don’t need a lawyer
You always need a divorce lawyer, without one she could tie you up in knots and leave you financially broke.

4. Avoid constant verbal abuse and battles
Arguing is unavoidable, it’s probably what led to divorce in the first place, but you should avoid abusing each other as it doesn’t lead to any constructive conclusion. Especially avoid doing that in front of the children, as they’ll be the most affected by it.

5. Don’t pick on your ex’s flaws
When arguing it’s easy to point out the many flaws you find with your ex, but this won’t help you reach any sort of settlement. By doing this you’ll alienate her from you and force her to be as stubborn as she can be. No matter how tempting, bite your tongue.

6. Avoid a confrontational divorce lawyer
While it may be in your nature to fight, fighting over every little detail will end up costing you more than it’s worth. Don’t choose a divorce lawyer who wants to battle every little detail, it’s not worth the hassle, literally.

7. Don’t let her walk all over you
Just as fighting every detail isn’t worth it, letting her have everything her own way doesn’t make sense either. Some men just let their ex’s have their own way because they’re too saddened and upset to fight back.

8. Don’t argue over property
When you’ve amassed a collection of furniture or other possessions that mean a lot to you, it can be difficult to agree on who gets what in the divorce. If the cost of arguing over these items in court is more expensive than the items are worth then you shouldn’t waste your time and money doing so. It’s a false economy spending thousands in legal fees arguing over property that doesn’t cost as much as the cost of the argument.

9. Don’t embarrass your ex by serving them with divorce papers in public
You may want to make a big thing of your divorce and make it as public as possible to show your derision for her, avoid this temptation. It will merely serve to kick off the divorce process in an especially bad tone, one that will cost you more as time goes on.

10. Don’t let anger be your first response
Divorce is usually greeted with emotions such as surprise, shock and anger. If you allow anger to be your first response you’ll merely serve to illicit the same response back from your ex, which will make matters worse. Take time to calm down and consider your response carefully, starting a war isn’t going to help either of you.

Clive Bellmore

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One thing you’ll have to do during your divorce is divide up the furniture. This can be tricky, as when you and your ex partner come to live in seperate houses you’ll both need the same things, such as a sofa, dining table and of course the white goods. Often arguments will ensue over who gets what. This can be particularly problematic if you have any antique furniture, as the value of the furniture has to be assessed by an independent expert in order for you and your ex to decide who keeps it, and what the other person receives in lieu of the furniture.

I had a problem like this during my divorce, as I was keeping the house and most of the furniture inside it. I paid my ex-wife for the property, and the furniture, as according to the deal we’d struck up in court, which was signed by a judge. So everything seemed fine, a done deal?

However when I entered the house I found that the wardrobes had been stolen by my ex-wife and her family. I’d paid for them, they were mine, but she’d nicked them, and there was nothing I could do about it. I could have gone through the courts, but it wasn’t worth it for furniture that cost under £500, so I just had to write it off.

Luckily the antique Welsh dresser I had was still there as she hadn’t bothered to take it. I’d call nicking some wardrobes from Argos and leaving an antique dresser a pretty stupid act, but hey!

Clive Bellmore

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Vanessa Lloyd Platt is the divorce expert on breakfast show GMTV, and occasionally on the high-brow show that is Richard & Judy. She dispenses divorce advice for couples going through the process, and she’s also a successful divorce lawyer herself with her own practise, and a string of celebrity clients, including Les Dennis and Anne Diamond.

However, Vanessa Lloyd Platt is also divorced, she’s been divorced a few times, and her most recent divorce was so bitter that she accused her husband Daniel Lloyd Platt of trying to poison her. Seems like a service to the nation to me!

Vanessa, 53, divorced Daniel last year after 17 years of marriage. Vanessa is also an author having written books on successful relationships. She claimed that her husband was lacing her food with chemicals in an attempt to kill her.

However police never charged Daniel with any crime, and on Friday arrested Vanessa for making false allegations and attempting to pervert the course of justice.

I wonder if that’s the sort of divorce advice she gave out to clients? I think her career as a divorce experts on GMTV could be coming to a sudden end.

Clive Bellmore

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Sometimes I’m a little flummoxed at the antics of rich men. I can’t understand how they can marry women, without any kind of prenup or agreement, and then get divorced just a few short years later, costing them countless millions of pounds.

Do they get off on it?

Paul McCartney paid £24.3 million to the evil Heather Mills, which seems a lot of the former Beatle’s money considering she’s done nothing to help him earn any of that. She just came along, flashed a bit of leg (just the one mind you) and let the old fool make a big mistake.

That’s nothing compared to Phil Collins though. That numpty has just had to pay out a record amount for a British celebrity in a divorce, a whopping £25 million. 35-year-old Orianne Cevey, who had only been married to Phil for 6 years, gets almost £5 million for every year she’s been with the Genesis singer.

The thing is, this Phil’s third divorce! His last divorce cost him £17 million when he split from Jill Tavelman. When will these guys learn?

Clive Bellmore

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One of the stereotypes of the divorcee is that they live in their own squalor, unable to pick up a simple cup unless it’s managed to cultivate enough mould to grow a small eco system, and generally leaving the washing up until every available receptacle capable of holding drink is covered in filth. It’s a sweeping generalisation perhaps, but one that is sadly fairly accurate.

I currently live with a guy I went to Uni with, and our bachelor pad is spotless… OK, that’s nonsense, it’s a mess, but who cares?

Well we do funnily enough, we just don’t seem to have the get up and go to clean it up regularly. Of course the answer is obvious, we could get a cleaner. Now, do we really want a cleaner turning up and going through our collection of exotic reading material and imported DVDs? Probably not, and we really should be cleaning ourselves. However, I do remember a former colleague of mine who lives in London regularly hires cleaners to clear up his mess, as he’s a divorcee too. He hires cleaners to clean the rooms, clean the windows and the carpets once a week. Is he lazy? This is the funny part, whenever the cleaner is due to come round he cleans up the house himself first because he doesn’t want the cleaner seeing what a mess his house is in!

What’s the point in that? Cleaning so the cleaner doesn’t come in to a mess! If I’m hiring carpet cleaners in London I’ll be damned if I’m going to Hoover the house first. Yet somehow it’s quite common to do that. It’s a British thing; we’re so stubbornly proud that we don’t want others thinking less of us, hiring a cleaner actually makes us do it ourselves beforehand.

I think I’ll stick without one then.

Clive Bellmore

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Hale & Pace were one of the best British comedy acts of recent years, and were famous for their song routines. They have a certain Northern twang to their humour, which often features beer and whippets. This sketch about a divorced man hits the mark firmly, particularly when he’s having to potter around in the bedroom while his wife gets serviced by another man.

Notice how his kids leg it when he turns up as well? Classic Hale & Pace.

Ignore the French subtitles, I didn’t realise Gareth and Norman had made it to France.

Clive Bellmore

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When you get divorced from your wife (as most of us seem to do these days) the difficult matter of splitting your finances comes into play. You have to divide everything you own equally, from your CD collection to your pets. You also have to split up the family home.

This leaves you with three options. Either you sell the home and split the money between you, which depending on your equity could leave you with a very small amount of cash to buy a new home, or one of you stays in the home and buys the other out. If your wife has the money to buy your share she could remain in the home, or you could keep it if you can buy her out.

It’s rare that any couple will have sufficient funds to buy their other half out, so more often than not one of you will have to remortgage the home. You might be able to do this with your current mortgage provider, or by searching through a series of personal loans providers.

It’s worth doing, particularly in today’s climate where house prices are very low. Selling your house will mean you lose money, buying your own house from your soon to be ex makes good financial sense.

Clive Bellmore

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Divorce usually costs people dearly (more often than not it’s the men who end up paying more) but the economy in Portugal is suffering just as much. According to details released by the Portuguese National Statistics Institute, one third of all outstanding debt to banks in Portugal is as a result of failed marriages and divorces.

So far this year, from January through to May, banks in Portugal had 2.59 billion Euros owed to them. Around 800 million of those Euros were through divorce.

Data also shows that in 2006, almost half of all marriages in the country ended in divorce, 48 out of 100. This figure was the highest in Europe for the year.

Luís Marques is the director-general for Genworth Financial:

The risk is very high.

One third of all bank debt is due to divorce, the other two thirds being mostly caused by unemployment and illness.

Clive Bellmore

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A rich businessman in Neath, South Wales, was so bitter towards his wife that rather than divorce her, he ran up a series of debts, cancelled his life insurance and then killed himself.

That’ll show her mate!

Fifty-Four year old Gerald Mellin tied a noose around his neck and attached it to a tree, before jumping off his convertible Aston Martin DB7, decapitating himself. Not a pleasant way to go. The day before he killed himself he’d cancelled his life insurance policy.

His estranged wife, and mother of their two children, Mirrielle Mellin, stated at the inquest:

We had split up and been to court.

He ran up an extortionate amount of debt. I’ve got to sell the farmhouse now, just to pay the debts.

The policy that Gerald Mellin cancelled would have paid out to his wife, but now instead of leaving her with money he’s left her with debt.

It’s a bit extreme in order to avoid a divorce, but effective nonetheless.

Clive Bellmore

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California became the first US state to legalise same sex divorce just a short while ago, and a pair of lesbians have grabbed the opportunity to split from each other with both hands, just 3 days after they were married.

The dykes, Theresa Ramirez and Adelita Guajardo from Fresno County in California were married on the 27th of June, and then filed for their divorce on the 30th, just three days later. The good news for the couple is that their divorce will be subject to the same laws as heterosexual divorce. According to Tony Capozzi of ABC news:

The fact that it is a same-sex marriage and now a divorce is of no consequence to the court. They’re going to be treated as equally as anyone who comes before that court.

The question here is, as they’re both women, who gets screwed in the courts for all of their money? There’s no man to be robbed blind. Maybe they could borrow one, so they could both do him over for his cash.

Clive Bellmore

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