Will I lose everything?

[lgggg]

What is the name of your state (only U.S. law)? Illinois

Female, long term marriage, two adult children. Want out of abusive marriage, husband threatens that he will make it as hard on me as possible if I try to go. Decades of controlling and abuse, will try not to weigh down the topic with specific details unless needed. Email and phone records spied on, husband controls all money, constant emotional abuse and put downs, am not allowed to socialize or spend any money.

I worked for 40+ years in my profession. Husband quit working decades ago but continued to bring in income from rental property. I have gone to see attorneys and get conflicting advice about what to expect.

I had hoped that because we used our combined money to support the rental property all along, that if he should ever try to sell it, I would be entitled to something. My paychecks were used to pay property taxes, fund necessary repairs, etc. But I am informed that because he inherited this property, I will get nothing.

Meanwhile I worked at my career for decades and brought home the majority of the money that was used to raise the family, while he checked on the rental property once or twice a week and otherwise read the ENTIRE daily newspaper in his recliner chair each and every day. Recently retired and also informed that not only will I get nothing from him, my retirement fund and annuities are likely subject to being shared with him because they stem from a career that took place during the marriage.

I hope and pray for a judge that would settle for the obvious middle ground, my husband has a place that he can go live for free, he will continue to gain income from the other tenants. While I'm not sure that I even want our house in the condition that he has put it in, I would hope that I would be awarded the home and not have to share such a large portion of my retirement with him until the end of time. But with him vowing to make this as difficult as possible, it seems legally that he really could come out so far ahead. I never thought at this point in my life I would be back out in the world having to rent a place or pay off an entire new home purchase all over again (with only half of my retirement actually being mine), but if he doesn't relinquish his half of ownership for our home, it seems like I would probably lose that too.

Am I really at risk of having to lose so much to free myself from the torture of this man? Is it really going to shake out that I will lose half of my income, have to sell the house and split it with him if he refuses to let it go (although I probably wouldn't feel safe being somewhere where he can find me anyway), I will never see any return from all the money I put into that property of his, and he will have a place to live, his income, and half of mine.

I actually had papers issued to him once before but I continually back out and try to uphold the status quo and pretend everything is okay at home because it seems I will lose so much if I try to get away from him, although it's not like I can access any of my money even if I stay with him because he controls it.

Are my only options seriously either to endure this man until the day that my heart stops beating and at least have my home to live in, or try to get away from him, lose half of everything, watch him sell his property and net half a million or more that he doesn't have to share, and I'll be somewhere trying to get by paying rent at this stage in my life? I could understand so much being awarded to him if he had no way to support himself and nowhere to go, but he has that property, a free roof over his head and a source of income, why would a judge decree that I have to give him so damned much.

Am I really going to lose here no matter what I do?

 

[Ohiogal]

What is the name of your state (only U.S. law)? Illinois

Female, long term marriage, two adult children. Want out of abusive marriage, husband threatens that he will make it as hard on me as possible if I try to go. Decades of controlling and abuse, will try not to weigh down the topic with specific details unless needed. Email and phone records spied on, husband controls all money, constant emotional abuse and put downs, am not allowed to socialize or spend any money.

I worked for 40+ years in my profession. Husband quit working decades ago but continued to bring in income from rental property. I have gone to see attorneys and get conflicting advice about what to expect.

I had hoped that because we used our combined money to support the rental property all along, that if he should ever try to sell it, I would be entitled to something. My paychecks were used to pay property taxes, fund necessary repairs, etc. But I am informed that because he inherited this property, I will get nothing.

Meanwhile I worked at my career for decades and brought home the majority of the money that was used to raise the family, while he checked on the rental property once or twice a week and otherwise read the ENTIRE daily newspaper in his recliner chair each and every day. Recently retired and also informed that not only will I get nothing from him, my retirement fund and annuities are likely subject to being shared with him because they stem from a career that took place during the marriage.

I hope and pray for a judge that would settle for the obvious middle ground, my husband has a place that he can go live for free, he will continue to gain income from the other tenants. While I'm not sure that I even want our house in the condition that he has put it in, I would hope that I would be awarded the home and not have to share such a large portion of my retirement with him until the end of time. But with him vowing to make this as difficult as possible, it seems legally that he really could come out so far ahead. I never thought at this point in my life I would be back out in the world having to rent a place or pay off an entire new home purchase all over again (with only half of my retirement actually being mine), but if he doesn't relinquish his half of ownership for our home, it seems like I would probably lose that too.

Am I really at risk of having to lose so much to free myself from the torture of this man? Is it really going to shake out that I will lose half of my income, have to sell the house and split it with him if he refuses to let it go (although I probably wouldn't feel safe being somewhere where he can find me anyway), I will never see any return from all the money I put into that property of his, and he will have a place to live, his income, and half of mine.

I actually had papers issued to him once before but I continually back out and try to uphold the status quo and pretend everything is okay at home because it seems I will lose so much if I try to get away from him, although it's not like I can access any of my money even if I stay with him because he controls it.

Are my only options seriously either to endure this man until the day that my heart stops beating and at least have my home to live in, or try to get away from him, lose half of everything, watch him sell his property and net half a million or more that he doesn't have to share, and I'll be somewhere trying to get by paying rent at this stage in my life? I could understand so much being awarded to him if he had no way to support himself and nowhere to go, but he has that property, a free roof over his head and a source of income, why would a judge decree that I have to give him so damned much.

Am I really going to lose here no matter what I do?

He is entitled to half the marital property and debt as are you. Which means half of all retirement, savings and such that accrued during the marriage. You may be entitled to the increase in value of the rental properties which would most likely be miniscule unless there was marital funds that were used to renovate. In addition, if you earn more than him, you may end up paying him spousal support for a period of time depending on incomes/property. Here is the thing you are missing: you were fine with the situation for years. The court is going to look at it that YOU chose him. YOU decided to remain married to him. YOU were fine with him staying home. What evidence do you have of any alleged abuse? How does he control your money? Do you have it direct deposited in an account of your own? Why do you ALLOW him to control you?

 

[lgggg]

Thank you I came mainly for the confirmation of legal details and not necessarily to have to defend my character. If you caught a detail I mentioned above, I only recently fully retired and have come to learn what life is like being home with him every day. I am certainly guilty of codependence and not addressing this issue much earlier as I should have, I get that. Being out of the house working most of my life allowed me to put up with the behavior and escape to work for the majority of the week. This is why it has only reached a boiling point and been fully brought to my attention after dealing with it for such a long time. Now I experience it seven days a week.

Initially my husband sold me on the idea of staying home and him not returning to work with justifications like it would allow him to always be around to deliver and pick up the children from school, despite living 200 yards from the private elementary school in an extremely safe neighborhood, and the children never necessarily enjoying the fact that they were unable to walk or ride their bikes along with all the other kids. He also would refer to the need to take care of the rental property despite not knowing too many other landlords who own property treating it as their full time job that requires one or less weekly visits to cut the grass or collect rent.

In a similar fashion he took over the management of our money by saying he was the one who was home with time to balance the books and get bill payments out to the mailbox. So I went along with this figuring he might as well manage some of the things that needed to get done while I was working all day. Little did I know that it would slowly translate to having to defend every purchase I make and asking him for gas money as if I am a child requesting allowance. At this point I am not even confident that I know where all of our money is.

Also kind of hard to pick up and leave someone who made threats all along like that he would call my place of work and tell them that I was having some sort of affair or was unfit to remain employed there, or threaten to kill himself, or any other method of manipulation. You do not seem too familiar with the dynamics of mental abuse and emotional blackmail if you make it sound so simple that I should have just left a long time ago. At no point have I ever felt safe to do so, nor do I even now. As I said I even had paperwork served to him once already since retiring, but was fooled by promises of change when he was in a good mood, and threats of how much I would suffer for this when he was in a bad mood.

I also tried to stay put while the kids were still young for the sake of "keeping the family together".

And as you basically confirmed in your response, I have been hesitant in leaving because of how much I stand to lose from this process. I was in no hurry to end up in court and find out that I can never afford to retire because of how much the ruling will be in his favor. I foolishly hoped that at some point as the disagreements continued, he would reach the point where he would agree to split amicably, rather than his open admission that he will make the process as lengthy and as expensive as possible. He is clearly in no way satisfied with his life with me either so I held out hope that eventually it would get to the point where we would both accept that we need to go our own ways. But he insists on keeping a death grip on me, likely because he knows he has put away nothing for himself, has hardly any social security coming his way because of his sparse work history, my ability to provide affordable health insurance to him and the rest of the family thanks to my employment, so he knows exactly what he's doing when he says he won't let me go easily. But it seems he'd stand to make plenty of money and be perfectly stable even if we were to split, now that I'm finding out how much he would get from it. But the day will never come where he will agree to let me go.

I guess I really am stuck for the rest of my life then, if leaving would put me in a position to have no place to go and only half of my money. I did not work for 4 decades only to end up having to rent some studio apartment just to have some semblance of personal freedom.

 

[single317dad]

Thank you I came mainly for the confirmation of legal details and not necessarily to have to defend my character.

You need to get ready to "defend your character." The attacks that will come during a contested divorce will be difficult to bear; I suggest you get used to it, quickly.

I guess I really am stuck for the rest of my life then, if leaving would put me in a position to have no place to go and only half of my money. I did not work for 4 decades only to end up having to rent some studio apartment just to have some semblance of personal freedom.

Get a good attorney and stop being so dramatic. "Oh, woe is me" won't get you anywhere. Divorce this man, take what legally belongs to you, and move on with your life.

My paraphrase of an old saying: "The best time to act was long ago. The second best time is now."

 

[LdiJ]

There are a few things that you can do now to make life a little better for you, outside of divorcing.

You can open your own bank account and redirect your income to that bank account. You can withdraw half of any marital savings (that you know about) and redirect that to your own account. You can do many things to assert your independence.