Pamela Felicity Furbert v Ronald Eugene Furbert

• Jurisdiction: Bermuda
• Judgment Date: 21 January 1987
• Docket Number: DIVORCE JURISDICTION 1985 No: 31
• Date: 1987
• Court: Supreme Court (Bermuda)

Between:-

Pamela Felicity Furbert

and

Ronald Eugene Furbert

[1987] Bda LR 30

DIVORCE JURISDICTION 1985 No: 31

In the Supreme Court of Bermuda

Mr. Pachai for the Petitioner

Mrs. Cartwright for the Respondent

JUDGMENT

Collett, J.

There are cross-applications between the Petitioner wife and the Respondent Husband in these ancillary relief proceedings. The main issue concerns the disposition of the former matrimonial home which is the principal matrimonial asset. A further issue is a proper figure for maintenance of the two children of the family of whom the wife has custody.

The parties were married in 1981 and separated in 1984. Before their marriage there was, however, a long standing liason and the eldest child, who was born in 1972, was legitimated by the subsequent marriage. The youngest child was born in 1982. The parties are in early middle-age.

The former matrimonial home in St. George's was purchased in joint names in 1982 for $200,000. The wife's mother advanced $26,000 towards this purchase and it is still outstanding. A further $24,000 was paid by the parties out of their joint savings. An amortised mortage in the total amount of $130,000 was obtained from the Bank of Bermuda of which $84,416 currently remains to be repaid. The house is a two-apartment building: one apartment is presently occupied by the husband and the other is rented, the rents of which are paid directly to the Bank. Since the separation the husband alone has been making up the instalment repayments to the Bank and he has undertaken the maintenance to the property. The wife with the children has been living with her mother. The property was professionally valued by L.P. Gutteridge Ltd., at $300,000 gross in December, 1985: there has been no more recent valuation.

Counsel for the husband asks me to assume that, during the intervening 13 months since the valuation was made the market value of the former matrimonial home has appreciated by at least a further 10%, given the appreciation of 50% which the evidence shows occurred during the preceding three years., The Court is entitled to take judicial notice of a continued steady rise in the value of residential property in Bermuda over the past few years and, despite the wife's objection, I consider it would be unrealistic to ignore this factor. I shall therefore assume the current gross value of that property to be $330,000 at the present time.

Counsel for the wife asks me in assessing the nett equity in this property to allow deduction also of a notional estate agent's fee of 5% or $16,500 on sale and legal costs of sale amounting to a further $3,000. This approach which is suggested in Jacksons Matrimonial Finance and Taxation, 3rd Edition at page 133 was specifically approved by the Bermuda Court of Appeal in Clayton Williams v. Beatrice Williams, Civil Appeal No. 8 of 1982. That decision is of course binding upon me and I shall allow these further deductions accordingly. The resulting calculation leaves a nett equity in the property of $200,084 of which one half would be...