What Can You Do If Your Partner Won’t Leave the House After Separation?

You have separated but are still living together, what are your options?

Firstly, this is a very difficult situation and we fully understand the stress involved when you want to live separately but your partner is refusing to move out. This may be for a practical reason when they want to stay living in the house for the children, as an example, or financially that although you have separated, they simply cannot afford to live elsewhere. Whilst emotions are running high surrounding a breakup, it may be worthwhile considering whether there are any friends or family that they can go and stay at, even for a short while, just to allow you both to have a bit of breathing space and time to digest recent events. If possible, it would be good to try and enter into some form of conversation either directly or over email or message if that creates less tension, to consider a short term solution to address both of your housing needs until you can resolve the wider financial settlement and practicalities associated with your separation.

Family mediation

You may want to consider whether mediation would assist you. Mediation is a voluntary process where you and your former partner attend a meeting with a trained impartial mediator and they try and help you work through some of your issues to see if you can reach an agreement. This can involve practical agreements in the short term such as who will live where and then can also consider the wider financial settlement to include where you will both live in the long term, does the house need to be sold etc. The mediator will be neutral and therefore cannot give either of you legal advice but can sit with you, either in person or via video call, to help you try and work through these issues. It can be helpful to get some of your own family law advice alongside mediation so that you know what you may be entitled to and what a reasonable settlement may look like in your circumstances.

Seeking legal advice

If mediation is not appropriate or successful, I would suggest speaking to a family law solicitor who can advise you on what your options may be and they can have a more active role such as writing to your partner to help facilitate their removal from the property on a voluntary basis. It is worthwhile noting that if you both own a property that you are unable to exclude them from the property by simply changing the locks.

In circumstances where there is any domestic violence or you feel threatened or intimidated, your first port of call should be the police to assist you with any emergency situations and to ensure that you and anyone else in the house is appropriately safeguarded and protected. At that point, it may be necessary to consider obtaining an occupation order which could formally exclude your partner from the property if you are unable to continue to safely cohabit together. An occupation order can also regulate the occupation of the home such as who will be allowed in designated areas at specific times. If you make an application, the Court will consider the ‘balance of harm’ test which is whether it is likely that you or any children are likely to suffer significant harm attributable to the conduct of your partner if an order is not made in comparison to the harm that your partner will experience if the order is made.

We have experienced mediators and family law solicitors at Hodge Jones & Allen Solicitors who are on hand to advise and assist you through this stressful process. Please contact the Family law team on 0330 822 3451 if we can be of any help. Or request a callback.