Family Law Case Studies Southgate

Stowe’s specialist family lawyers in Southgate work to find clients the best possible solutions to their family law matters

A team of expert and dedicated family lawyers located in London’s Southgate area support clients within the area and across London with matters relating to prenuptial agreements, child arrangements and division of businesses upon divorce, particularly for high-net-worth couples. 

The experienced team, which is led by Managing Partner Phoebe Turner, is committed to providing their clients with the highest quality of service and delivering the best legal advice. 

Our team in London Southgate can support you through the entire process of creating and implementing a prenuptial agreement, working out child arrangements after separation or divorce or deciding on the division of businesses in divorce in a supportive, empathetic and knowledgeable manner. 

Creating a Prenuptial Agreement

Prenuptial Agreements are becoming increasingly popular in the UK. This popularity is not solely confined to celebrities and couples with significant assets and wealth, as the usefulness of prenuptial agreements becomes more widely discussed. 

Whilst prenups do provide a level of protection for a couple, if the conditions of their implementation are met such as it is freely and willingly entered into by both parties, they are not legally binding in England and Wales. 

Prenuptial agreements set out who owns what money, assets and property in a relationship before the marriage takes place and what happens to them if the relationship breaks down. It is recommended they are reviewed and updated every five years, more often if there is significant change for the couple, like inheritance or the birth of a child. 

Stowe Family Law has seen an increase of 144% in cases relating to prenups since 2021 and enquiries on the matter continue to grow month on month. The London Southgate team regularly assists clients with legal advice on the drafting of their prenuptial agreements.

A recent case saw Raj Bhattoa, a Team Leader Partner for the Southgate team, work with a client who had built up substantial assets through business ventures. The client was marrying later in life and had significant wealth and wanted to protect this for the children she had had from previous relationships.

The Southgate team worked with the client to create a fair agreement that was agreed upon by her fiancé and his legal team.

What happens to the children when parents get divorced?

Child arrangements can be one of the most contentious areas of divorce proceedings. However, the Stowe team in London use their Child Law expertise to ensure a fair outcome that puts the needs of the children at the heart of the decision and ensure beneficial outcomes for the parents.

Managing Partner of London and the Southgate office, Phoebe Turner, worked with Team Leader Partner Sarah Peters on a case where the parents were unable to decide on child arrangements after their divorce. The team worked with the parents to decide a child custody arrangement that made sure the wellbeing of the children was paramount.

With the conclusion of legal proceedings, the court issued a child arrangements order that reflected the agreement put together by the Stowe team.

Effective negotiation of the division of business upon divorce

In some divorces, the couple find their main cause of contention is financial issues relating to the division of a shared business or a stake in one that is owned by one party. 

The Southgate team recently advised a client through a complex financial settlement involving the division of a successful local family business - a delicatessen with a cafe, which had been started after the couple had been married for 9 years. The business had grown significantly in the subsequent 17 years of the marriage, and by the time of the divorce was supplying other local traders and doing external catering events. 

Both parties were heavily involved in the running of the business but the wife, the client of Stowe’s Southgate team, was more ‘front of house’ where her husband tended to manage the accounts. The husband provided a valuation of the business but there was a suspicion that there may have been inaccurate disclosure of the value. 

The help of Stowe’s  in-house forensic accountancy team was needed to provide a more accurate valuation, as well as the income generated and potential for future income. 

Negotiations advanced once the accountancy team had provided an accurate disclosure of the business as an asset and a final financial settlement was agreed upon that was fair for both parties. 

Contact Stowe Family Law in London Southgate

Stowe Family Law has 80+ offices nationwide, with more than 140 family law specialists. Our London Southgate team of family lawyers, including Phoebe Turner, Raj Bhattoa and Sarah Peters are experts in all areas of family law. 

We help to support London’s families with all aspects of relationship breakdown, and help clients reach the best possible conclusion of their family law issues.

Our team of elite divorce lawyers and family solicitors in Southgate is located on the 5th Floor of The Grange (Regus), with a local tube connection available via Southgate (3-minute walk). If arriving by car, Leigh Hunt Drive Car Park is just around the corner from the Regus office building. You can call us on 02036 136051 from 8:30am – 7pm, Monday to Friday and 9am – 5pm on Saturday and Sunday. Please note that all in-office appointments are by pre-arrangement only.