His head start and business, her years at home: 55/45 to her

The couple married in 1997 and finally separated in January 2012, after several earlier separations totalling just over four years. Their three children, aged 19, 15 and 13 at trial, all lived with the mother in regional WA. At the start the husband owned a house with $130,000 of equity; the wife had a car with a loan. He was the main earner, working long hours in a business they bought in 2007. She was the homemaker and parent and had not worked in a decade.

The pool was $1,410,335. It included the family home the husband now lived in, cash from the sale of a block of land, the business (valued at $280,000, the price a buyer had offered), its bank accounts and $358,366 of super in his name. The judge added back $104,000 the husband had paid in legal fees from the business, and counted the $107,000 the wife had already received in partial settlements.

Chief Judge Sutherland found contributions favoured the husband at 55/45. His equity in the house he owned at the start had been the springboard for later gains, and after separation he paid down debt and supported the family. The judge treated much of the wife's evidence with caution: she had not disclosed papers about an inheritance or a doctor's report she had obtained. But her earning capacity was far more limited than his, largely to low-paid work in the medium term, after her years out of the workforce. Weighing that against the $34,000 she had received from selling a caravan and a car and could not account for, the judge made a 10% adjustment in her favour.

The result was 55% to the wife and 45% to the husband. Leaving the business aside, the husband kept the family home and paid her $145,744, and $196,784 of his super was split to her: $621,684 to her and $508,651 to him, counting his legal fees added back. The business was to be sold and the proceeds divided 55/45. If it did not sell within 12 months, he would keep it and pay her $154,000.