Man agreed to live with ex-wife but took her to court over family home when he remarried
Source: Straits Times
Article Date: 14 Dec 2024
Author: Selina Lum
The court said it is important that couples and lawyers think through the workability of agreements on financial matters after divorce.
As part of their divorce settlement, a couple agreed to live together in their matrimonial home for 18 years, until the property is sold after the youngest of their three children turns 21 years old.
The husband also agreed to pay $2 million in maintenance to the woman and children, while the wife agreed not to lay claim to his other assets, which included a condominium in Shenton Way.
But a dispute over the matrimonial home arose 10 years after the agreement, when the man remarried in March 2023 and decided to move out.
On his wedding day, the man took his former wife to court, asking for the property to be sold immediately and for her to shoulder half the mortgage repayments.
On Dec 12, the Appellate Division of the High Court ruled that it was “just and equitable” for the former wife to bear half the mortgage repayments from July 20, 2023, the date a district judge first made such an order.
The three-judge court ordered the woman to do so by reimbursing her former husband out of her share of the sale proceeds when the property is eventually sold.
The man had appealed to the Appellate Division after a High Court judge ordered him to bear sole responsibility for the outstanding mortgage repayments.
His bid to sell the property immediately was dismissed by the High Court judge, and the Appellate Division did not allow any further appeal on this issue. This means the couple cannot sell the property before 2031.
In its written judgment, the Appellate Division noted that at the time the couple negotiated a settlement in 2013, each was making equal contributions of $6,216.50 a month from their CPF accounts towards the mortgage instalments.
The court said having the couple bear equal responsibility for the mortgage repayments would not be contrary to what they would have agreed to back in 2013.
The court said it was aware that ordering the woman to reimburse her former husband out of her share of the sale proceeds meant the man had to bear the full repayments first before the property is sold.
But the court noted that if the man could not meet the mortgage instalments on his own, the mortgagee bank may force a sale of the property at a lower price than the couple would have obtained on their own.
“Given that she will eventually have to bear half the mortgage liability due from July 20, 2023, onwards and that she will be entitled to half the net sale proceeds, it would also be in her own interest to prevent a forced sale from occurring,” said the court.
The couple married in 1997 and have three children now aged between 14 and 20. While they were married, the husband, a businessman, “employed” his wife, a housewife, merely to give her a salary.
The woman filed for divorce in March 2013. A consent order was later granted by the court regarding custody of the children, maintenance and the matrimonial property, after the couple came to an agreement on these issues.
In 2023, disagreements arose over the matrimonial home.
This led the husband to file court applications to vary the consent order. Among other things, he sought the immediate sale of the property and reimbursement of mortgage payments from his former wife.
On July 20, 2023, a district judge granted the husband’s application for the property to be sold immediately and ordered the parties to bear the mortgage repayments equally.
The woman appealed against this. On Feb 14, a High Court judge reversed the order for the immediate sale of the matrimonial home.
The judge also ordered the husband to bear sole responsibility for the outstanding mortgage instalment repayments.
The man was subsequently given permission to appeal against the mortgage issue.
In its judgment, the Appellate Division said it was necessary to make an order addressing the mortgage issue to enable the divorced couple to carry out the original consent order.
Making an order on this issue did not undermine the finality of matrimonial proceedings, since no explicit terms regarding mortgage were specified in the consent order, said the court.
The court also said the evidence suggests that the couple did not consider the issue of the ongoing mortgage repayments at the time the consent order was granted.
It is important that parties and lawyers think through the workability of agreements addressing financial matters after divorce, the court added.
Source: Straits Times © SPH Media Limited. Permission required for reproduction.
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