Divorce house split calculator: keep the home, buy your ex out, or sell

Divorce house split calculator at a glance

Keep, buy out or sell: which route fits your split?

Being married or not changes the tax, and so does the paperwork you sign. The table compares the common routes. “Married” here includes civil partners. The exemptions apply only when the transfer is part of a divorce, dissolution, annulment or legal separation, not just because you have moved apart.

Does being married change the Stamp Duty on a buy-out?

Yes, and by more than most people expect. On a buy-out, Stamp Duty is charged on what the person keeping the home pays, plus the share of the mortgage they take on. Married couples and civil partners who split the home as part of their divorce pay none of it. Unmarried couples pay the usual rates. If the person keeping the home also owns a buy-to-let or another home, the higher rates can apply. They don’t if that person already owned at least a quarter of this home and it has been their only or main home for the last 3 years.

Same home in every example: worth £420,000, £180,000 left on the mortgage, a 50% share passing, and the person keeping the home taking on the whole mortgage. So the equity is £240,000, the buy-out sum is £120,000, and the half of the mortgage they take on is £90,000. Stamp Duty is worked out on £210,000.

If Example 3 had lived there for 3 years, the higher rates would not apply, and the bill would drop to £1,700. In Wales, Example 2 pays £0 in Land Transaction Tax, because the main rates start at £225,000.

Agreed a figure other than a straight half? Owners often do, for example to reflect who paid the deposit. If Example 2 paid £100,000 instead, Stamp Duty would be £1,300.

Work out any other figures with our transfer of equity calculator.

Agreement, consent order or court order: does the paperwork change the tax?

It can. Here is what each tax looks at.

• Stamp Duty (England): the exemption covers a transfer between spouses made under a court order on divorce, annulment or judicial separation, or under an agreement made “in contemplation or otherwise in connection with” ending the marriage or a legal separation. The same rules apply to civil partners. If you are married but living apart with no plan to divorce or legally separate, the exemption does not apply, and the usual rules do.
• Capital Gains Tax: with a formal divorce or separation agreement or a court order, a transfer between you is at no gain or loss with no time limit. Without one, the window closes at the end of the third tax year after the one you stopped living together, or on the divorce date if that is earlier. HMRC’s own example: a couple who separated on 1 December 2025 can transfer on that basis up to 5 April 2029.
• HM Land Registry fee: a transfer under a court order made under the Matrimonial Causes Act 1973 or the Civil Partnership Act 2004 pays the Scale 2 fee, even if the order says one of you pays the other. Use our Land Registry fee calculator for the figure. It is a government fee, never added to our fee.

A financial agreement is binding only once the court approves it as a consent order. Our family team explains the options in our divorce financial settlement guide.

Will the one who moves out pay Capital Gains Tax on their share?

Usually not on a home you both lived in, but the timing matters.

Married or civil partners. While you live together, transfers between you are at no gain or loss. After you separate, that carries on up to the end of the third tax year after the tax year you stopped living together, unless the divorce or dissolution is granted first. A transfer under a formal divorce or separation agreement, or a court order, has no time limit. The tax year runs from 6 April to 5 April. Separately, Private Residence Relief covers the time you lived there and the last 9 months of ownership.

Never married. There is no spouse rule. Private Residence Relief usually covers the share in a home that was your main home, including the last 9 months after you moved out. If the transfer happens later, part of any gain can be taxable.

If you keep a share and your ex stays in the home (for example until the children are older): HMRC has rules on keeping relief for that time. They apply only under a formal agreement or court order. Take tax advice.

We are not tax or financial advisers. HMRC’s helpsheet HS281 sets out the rules.

Why does coming off the deeds still leave you on the mortgage?

The title and the mortgage are two separate things. The transfer takes a name off the title at HM Land Registry. Only the lender can release someone from the loan. Until it does, the person who left is still liable for the whole debt, even after the transfer.

What goes wrong most often:

• The lender says no. The lender checks whether the person keeping the home can afford the mortgage alone. If it refuses, the choice is often a remortgage with another lender, or a sale.
• An early repayment charge. A remortgage during a fixed rate can trigger one. Check your offer before you agree the figures.
• The next purchase. If the person leaving still owns part of the old home when they buy again, the higher rates of Stamp Duty can apply to their new home. This doesn’t apply if a court has made a property adjustment order giving the home to your ex, and it is their main home and not yours. Agree when the transfer will complete before they buy.

Lenders change their rules.

Can one firm act for both of you?

Each of you can choose your own solicitor. When one of you pays the other, your interests can differ, so ask us how we would act in your case. Some lenders require separate advice from a different firm (see the HSBC row above). If you are still negotiating who gets what, each of you should get your own family law advice first.

Once you’ve agreed, what happens and in what order?

1. Agree the split, by agreement or through the court. Married couples: the court’s consent order makes it binding.
2. The lender agrees, or the person keeping the home arranges a remortgage in their own name.
3. We check the title and the tax: who owns what, whether Stamp Duty or LTT is due, and whether a return is needed.
4. Both of you sign the transfer deed (TR1) with a witness physically there. The person leaving signs it too.
5. Completion: the buy-out money is paid, the new mortgage starts and the old one is paid off.
6. Tax return, if one is needed: within 14 days of completion in England, or 30 days in Wales. None is needed for a divorce-exempt transfer.
7. Registration at HM Land Registry, and the old lender’s mortgage is removed.

If you own as joint tenants and one of you dies before the transfer completes, the whole home passes to the other. Some couples sever the joint tenancy as soon as they separate. Ask us.

What if you decide to sell instead?

Selling works like any other sale, with two things to watch. Every owner on the title must sign the contract and the transfer, so one of you can’t sell alone. And the money left after the mortgage and the selling costs is split the way your agreement or court order says. If you never married, it follows the title, any declaration of trust, or what you agree.

Two in five requests for a sale-only quote on our website were from people selling with at least one other owner (60 of 143, website quote requests, 2 Sep–29 Oct 2026). Our form does not ask why, so we don’t know how many were separating.

Our sale fee is in “Our fees” below. More on selling your home, or get a quote for the sale. If the sale is to one of you, it is a buy-out: see the Stamp Duty examples above.

What is different in Wales?

Divorce and family law are the same in England and Wales, and HM Land Registry registers the change in both. The tax is not. In Wales you pay Land Transaction Tax to the Welsh Revenue Authority, not Stamp Duty.

• The divorce exemption has its own Welsh rules, for spouses and for civil partners. Property transferred because of a divorce or the end of a civil partnership needs no return and no payment.
• Unmarried couples pay LTT on the money paid plus the share of the mortgage taken on, as in England.
• The rates differ: the main rates start at £225,000, not £125,000. Example 2 above pays £1,700 in England but £0 in Wales.
• The return is due within 30 days, not 14.
• Higher rates in Wales are a separate table with their own rules. The calculator does not model them yet. Ask us.

We act on homes in Wales.

What will splitting the home cost?

• The transfer of equity: we give you a written, itemised quote before you instruct us.
• If the person keeping the home remortgages: our remortgage fee is in “Our fees” below. It includes our legal fee plus Telegraphic Transfer Fee (Per Transfer), Redeeming your existing loan and Lender Portal Management Fee. Get an instant quote for the remortgage, or read about remortgage conveyancing.
• If you sell: our sale fee is in “Our fees” below too.

Government charges are separate and never added to our fees: Stamp Duty or LTT (from the calculator, if due) and the HM Land Registry fee.

Family law costs: our family law team tells you in your first conversation what your matter is likely to involve, and sets out the costs in writing before you instruct us. Our transfer of equity solicitors page explains the conveyancing side.

What happens next

• Adding or removing an owner when there’s a mortgage
• Transfer of equity calculator
• Divorce financial settlement
• Selling your home
• More transfer of equity, explained