Separation Agreement

Separation agreement is useful if you haven’t yet decided whether to divorce or dissolve your civil partnership, or if you can’t yet do so. It’s a written agreement that – typically – sets out the financial arrangements that you’ll put in place while you are separated. It can cover a range of areas:

• Who pays the mortgage or rent, and household bills?
• Who continues to live in the family home and/or what happens if it’s sold
• What happens to any debts, such as mortgage, loans or overdrafts?
• What happens to savings, investments and other financial assets?
• What happens to any items such as cars or furniture, especially bought jointly?
• Whether maintenance is paid to support one of you and/or any children
• Childcare arrangements: who any children live with and parental access

For those couples who are planning to make their separation permanent, the separation agreement would ideally be set out in the form of a final financial agreement that can be presented to the court when the divorce or dissolution finally goes through.