Law Articles

Divorcing after 13 years: why longer marriages can mean more to untangle financially 22/10/2026

New figures from the Office for National Statistics (ONS) reveal an interesting change in the way couples in England and Wales are divorcing. Marriages which end in divorce are, on average, lasting longer.

In 2025, the median length of an opposite-sex marriage ending in divorce was 13 years – the longest recorded since the ONS began collecting comparable figures in 1963.

At the same time, divorce within the first ten years of marriage has become less common. Of couples who married in 2015, an estimated 16.3% had divorced before their tenth wedding anniversary. For couples who married in 1995, the equivalent figure was 24.7%.

So, while divorce remains a fact of life for many families, the statistics suggest that the point at which couples are separating is changing.

Why does the length of a marriage matter financially?

Thirteen years is a long time in financial terms.

During that period, a couple may have bought a home, changed jobs several times, built up pensions, accumulated savings or investments, started a business, had children or made decisions about whose career would take priority.

As financial lives become more intertwined, separating them can become more complicated.

Under the law in England and Wales, there is no automatic formula which simply divides everything in half. If the court is asked to decide the financial outcome, it must consider a range of circumstances. These include each person's income and earning capacity, property and financial resources, needs and responsibilities, age, contributions to the family and the duration of the marriage.

That does not mean that a marriage reaching a particular number of years automatically produces a particular outcome. Every family's circumstances are different.

The family home may not be the whole picture

When people first think about divorce finances, understandably their attention often turns to the family home. Who will live there? Will it need to be sold? Can either person afford to take over the mortgage? Where will the children live? Those are important questions, but they are only part of the picture.

A financial settlement can also involve pensions, savings, investments, debts, business interests and sometimes ongoing maintenance. Pensions in particular are easily overlooked.

After a longer marriage, a pension built up over many years can be one of the most valuable assets available to the family, sometimes worth as much as, or more than, the equity in the family home.

Divorce and financial settlement are not the same thing

Another important point is that obtaining a divorce does not, by itself, sort out the finances.

The divorce process legally ends the marriage. The financial arrangements are dealt with separately.

If a couple agrees how their assets should be divided, that agreement can usually be incorporated into a consent order and sent to the Family Court for approval. Once approved, the order makes the financial agreement legally binding. If an agreement cannot be reached, either party can ask the court to determine the financial arrangements.

This distinction can come as a surprise, particularly now that the no-fault divorce process has made the administrative side of ending a marriage more straightforward. In fact, the great majority of divorces completed in 2025 were dealt with under the legislation introduced in 2022.

The divorce itself may therefore be relatively straightforward. Deciding what happens financially can require considerably more though.

For separating couples, the aim is not simply to produce a spreadsheet showing who owns what today. A workable settlement also needs to consider what life will look like afterwards: where each person will live, what mortgage they may be able to obtain, what income they will have, what provision they have for retirement and, importantly, how the needs of any children will be met.

The latest divorce statistics may tell us that marriages are lasting longer before they end. From a family law perspective, they are also a useful reminder that the longer two financial lives have grown together, the more important it can be to understand the complete financial picture before deciding how they should be separated.

For further information and advice on this issue, and other family law issues, please contact us for a free initial consultation.