Ah So Etee (alias Chua Ming Soo) v Fan Moli

• Jurisdiction: Singapore
• Judge: Woo Bih Li J
• Judgment Date: 29 August 2008
• Neutral Citation: [2008] SGHC 142
• Plaintiff Counsel: Andrew John Hanam (Andrew & Co)
• Published date: 02 September 2008
• Court: High Court (Singapore)
• Defendant Counsel: Tan Yew Cheng (Leong Partnership)
• Subject Matter: Family Law

29 August 2008

Woo Bih Li J:

Background

1 The petitioner, Ah So Etee @ Chua Ming Soo (“the Husband”) married the respondent, Fan Moli (“the Wife”) on 1 April 1996. The Husband was then 53 years of age and the Wife was 39 years of age. On 17 October 2005, the Husband filed a divorce petition on the ground of the Wife’s unreasonable behaviour. The petition was contested by the Wife. On 30 June 2006, a Decree Nisi was granted. The ancillaries were fixed for hearing by the High Court as the Husband was of the view that the value of the matrimonial assets exceeded $1.5 million. The disputes were over the division of matrimonial assets and maintenance for the Wife as there was no child from this marriage. I should, however, mention that the Husband has an adult son from an earlier marriage and the Wife has an adult daughter from an earlier marriage.

2 After hearing arguments, I gave an oral judgment as follows:

1 I find the matrimonial assets to comprise the following:

S/N	Description	Value (S$)	Held by
(a)	Blk 290 Bishan Street 24, #18-35, Singapore 570290 (“the Bishan property”)	388,000.00	Husband (“H”)/; Wife (“W”)
(b)	Unit 1006, No 38 Binjiang Road West, Zhuhai District, Guangzhou, People’s Republic of China (“PRC”) in Swan Building (“the Swan property”)	85,659.00	H/W
(c)	Unit 6C, No 7, Longkouzhong Road, Tianhe District, Guangzhou, PRC in Regal Court (“the Regal property”)	202,400.00	H/W
(d)	Rent from the Regal property from January 2002 to June 2008	92,179.20	W
(e)	Unit 148, Block 5, Dongfeng Road West, Yuexin District, PRC (“the Dongfeng property”)	115,806.12	Daughter of W
(f)	Rent from the Dongfeng property from December 1999 to June 2008	70,864.00	W
(g)	The Overseas Assurance Corporation Limited policy no. 13030618	39,373.25	H
(h)	POSB (savings)	14,994.71	H
(i)	UOB (fixed deposit)	543,760.20	H
(j)	UOB (I-Account)	7,159.45	H
(k)	CPF	46,282.65	H
(l)	Undisclosed money from sale of shares	179,887.00	H
(m)	UOB (savings)	2,782.18	W
(n)	OCBC (savings)	2,309.75	W
(o)	China Construction Bank	1,550.46	W
(p)	China Minsheng Bank	12,000.00	W
		1,805,007.97

2 As regards items 1(d) and 1(f) above, I have used the rent as asserted by the Husband as the basis for calculation but I have allowed 20% for expenses related to the tenancy, even though expenses like management fees are payable by the tenant of the respective properties.

3 I order the division of matrimonial assets as follows:

(a) The Wife is entitled to the Dongfeng and the Regal properties and the rental thereof and she is also entitled to the amounts in the various banks accounts held by her. The total value is $499,891.71 which is 27.69% of the matrimonial assets. This is on the generous side as I would have been otherwise inclined to give her 20%. However, I have taken this division into account in the maintenance for her.

(b) The Husband is entitled to the Bishan and the Swan properties and he is also entitled to the amounts in the various banks accounts held by him as well as the undisclosed money from sale of shares and his CPF money. The Wife is to deliver vacant possession of the Bishan property on or before 31 December 2008.

4 As regards maintenance for the Wife, the Husband is to pay her $24 (at $1 per month for 24 months from August 2006 to July 2008) as arrears of maintenance. He is also to pay her a lump sum maintenance thereafter based on three years (that is, from August 2008 to July 2011) but the rate per month is divided into two sub-periods : (a) $1 per month from August 2008 till the time she delivers vacant possession of the Bishan property to the Husband and (b) thereafter, based on $1,000 per month up to July 2011.

5 Each party is to take all necessary or appropriate steps to transfer his/her interest to the other party to give effect to the orders made. For the Bishan property, the Registrar of the Supreme Court is to sign any document to give effect to the order made if the Wife does not do so. Until the transfer of the Wife’s interest in the Bishan and the Swan properties to the Husband is completed and the delivery of vacant possession of the Bishan property to the Husband is done, the Husband may defer making payment of the arrears and the lump sum maintenance without being liable for any interest. The Husband may also set-off against these sums, any money owing by the Wife to him by way of costs.

6 The Wife is to pay costs of the ancillaries to the Husband to be agreed or fixed by the court, unless otherwise ordered.

7 Liberty to apply.

3 At the party’s request, I eventually fixed the costs payable by the Wife at $7,000 inclusive of disbursements. The Wife was ordered to pay costs of the ancillaries as the Husband had proved his petition against her.

Reasons on division of matrimonial assets and maintenance

4 There was dispute as to whether some assets ought to be included as matrimonial assets. The Dongfeng property was at the top of this list. While the Husband knew about the Swan and the Regal properties which were purchased in both the names of the Husband and the Wife, he learned later that the Wife had also acquired the Dongfeng property. He claimed that the Wife had no money of her own and she had used the excess from the money he had provided her for the Swan and the Regal properties as well as the excess of the monthly maintenance he had given her to buy the Dongfeng property.

5 There was documentary evidence to show that the excess from his remittances to her to buy the Swan property was $44,532 and the excess from his remittances to her to buy the Regal property was $62,147. He alleged that even if some of the excess sums had been used to renovate these two properties, the sum spent on renovation would have been a fraction of the total of these two sums.

6 The Dongfeng property was apparently bought for the equivalent of $115,000. I noted that even if no deduction was made from the excess sums for renovation, they would still not amount to $115,000 but if the maintenance he had given her then of $1,500 per month was to be taken into account, it was possible that the money used to purchase the Dongfeng property came from him. The Husband had provided the Wife maintenance as follows:

(a) $1,500 per month from April 1996 to October 2005.

(b) $1,200 per month from November 2005 to December 2005.

(c) $ 500 per month from January 2006 to July 2006.

7 The Husband asserted that he stopped giving the Wife maintenance from August 2006 because she refused to account to him for the rental income she was receiving from the China properties. I should mention that the Swan property was not let out but the Regal and the Dongfeng properties were and are let out.

8 The contract to purchase the Dongfeng property was apparently made in November 1997 and the title deed was apparently issued on 5 April 2001.

9 The Wife said that the money to buy the Dongfeng property came from her first husband, Fu Ming, who had bought the property as a future wedding gift for their daughter. The contract to purchase was in both the names of Fu Ming and the Wife although the title deed was issued in the Wife’s name only. She said the latter was done as the daughter was then only 15 years of age. The Wife said that Fu Ming appointed her to take charge of this property as she was still going back to Guangzhou every year. Fu Ming had already emigrated to Australia. In June 2006, she transferred this property to the daughter who was going to get married in March 2008.

10 As for the rent from the Dongfeng property, the Wife initially said in her affidavit of 21 June 2007, that, on Fu Ming’s instruction, she had saved all the rent and converted the money into Hong Kong currency and deposited the sum into an account with Bank of China for a fixed period of five years commencing January 2005. The sum was also intended to be a wedding gift for the daughter.

11 In the Wife’s affidavit of 9 October 2007, she said she did not have receipts showing the collection of rent for the Dongfeng property. The monthly rent was collected by the daughter’s godmother (who was not named) who was a resident in Guangzhou while the Wife lived in Singapore. The godmother would hand the rent collected to the Wife on her visits to China. The Wife used part of the rental proceeds to pay for management and service fees and other outgoings for the Dongfeng property. On or around 21 January 2005, she deposited the rent collected from end 1999 or early 2000 to December 2004 amounting to HK$250,000 (about $52,000) into the Bank of China account mentioned in the preceding paragraph. As for rent collected from January 2005, these had been given to her daughter periodically to pay for her further studies and living expenses in Japan. The Wife did not have any supporting documents as this was a matter between mother and daughter.

12 Fu Ming executed an affidavit to support the Wife’s allegation that it was he who bought and paid for the Dongfeng property in 1997 as a future wedding gift for their daughter. He said he had accumulated savings from his businesses in Australia where he owned Ascension Pacific Ltd Pty, Top Music Shop and Po Feng CD and Stationery Co. He said that when this property was completed in 1999/2000, it was transferred to the Wife as it would “simplify the renting procedures” as he was too busy. He instructed the Wife to save the rental for their daughter and in 2005, he asked the Wife to deposit the rent into a fixed deposit account, also with a view to giving the same to their daughter. Fu Ming questioned why, if the Wife had money to buy this property, she would want to have his name on the purchase contract.

13 Ms Tan Yew Cheng submitted for the Wife that since the Dongfeng property was rented out from December 1999, it must have been completed and fully paid for by then....