Do you want to know if you have to support your wife after divorce? It’s a common inquiry once a relationship ends. If you have friends or family who have separated, you’ve probably heard about spousal support.
Spousal maintenance is financial support provided by one person to another who is unable to maintain themselves.
You should know that you are not required to support your wife during divorce unless directed by a judge. However, if the court requires that you pay spousal support, you must comply.
If you make much more than your wife, you will most likely be compelled to support her during the divorce proceedings and after the divorce is finalized.
In circumstances of divorce, legal separation, and domestic violence protective orders, the court might mandate spousal maintenance. If you don’t want to pay the spousal support, you should work with your spousal support lawyers, find your way around it, and present the issue in court.
What does the court consider when deciding on whether you should pay spousal support?
The required components that must be proven for a person to have a right to the payment of spousal maintenance, section are:
Capacity: This refers to one’s reasonable ability to support the other party.
Need: The other party is unable to maintain themselves adequately from their own revenue earning capacity or financial resources due to:
Reasons for not being able to work include caring for a kid under 18 years old, physical or mental impairment, or other circumstances.
You should note that when a court exercises its authority to make an order for the payment of spousal maintenance, it may consider the following factors about both of you: your age, health, income, property, and financial resources, ability to work, appropriate level of life, and impact of marriage/relationship on earning potential.
If the Court is satisfied that your wife is unable to support themselves adequately from their income and resources, and you, the husband, can support the first person, the Court may make such orders regarding spousal maintenance as it deems appropriate.
How can you avoid paying alimony legally?
As much as it’s upon the court to decide whether you should pay alimony to your wife, there are a number of things you can do to protect yourself and ensure that you don’t pay more than you should. Some of these things include:
Have a prenup in place.
Before you even get married, you should agree with your partner about your property rights. This is especially important in mixed-income marriages since it specifies what is solely owned property, what would be marital property, and any basis for split after divorce.
You can insert clauses in a year-based divorce settlement that state that a spouse is entitled to specified assets or alimony after a given number of years. To ensure that you are doing the right things, consult a professional for expert guidelines for creating a prenuptial agreement that protects your interests.
Formalize any agreements if your spouse works in your business
While you may have established a business prior to marriage that would reasonably be considered solely owned property at the time of marriage, circumstances after the marriage may render the said business marital property if your spouse comes to work in the business and helps build and/or operate it.
This may then be considered a family business, and the court may rule that your spouse is entitled to a piece of your firm as a result of their non-financial contribution to its growth.
The goal of formalizing your spouse’s status in the business, such as through written agreements, is to demonstrate that the business remained solely owned despite the spouse’s involvement and that it falls outside of a family business.
This way, you won’t be asked to compensate your ex due to their contribution to the business once you part ways.
Avoid commingling assets
During marriage, it is a good idea not to commingle assets that you want to remain your solely owned assets, for example, putting up a marital asset as security in a loan to get cash for a solely owned asset or vice versa.
If you want your business not to be deemed marital property, monitor the extent of contribution of your spouse to the performance and operations of your sole business; note that improvements by your spouse to a solely owned
In addition to this, while the general rule of law is that liabilities over separately owned assets remain the liabilities of the separate owner, once liabilities are incurred for the benefit of the marriage, the spouse who assumed they did not incur joint liability may be surprised to learn that the law can attribute joint liability even if you did not personally incur the liability.
Keep an eye on the liabilities of your ex-partner.
Be aware of the liabilities that your poorer spouse incurs during the marriage. This is because what may seem to be a separate liability undertaken by your wife may be recognized as a joint liability between spouses if your spouse can properly demonstrate that the liability was incurred for the benefit of the marriage.
If the court rules that you must jointly pay for responsibilities that you did not sign or agree to, you will be held accountable.
Parting shot
Spousal maintenance is often ordered to compensate for any imbalance in the parties’ earnings or earning capacities. It is normally paid for a relatively short period after separation, allowing the person receiving spousal maintenance to retrain, re-enter the workforce, or re-establish themselves.
You are required by law to pay for the support, and you can get into trouble if you don’t make the payments. While this is the case, as shown above, there are some strategies you can use to avoid paying more support than you should.
To have an easy time protecting yourself, always involve the services of experienced family lawyers Fairfax VA. The attorneys will not only guide you in making the right decisions but also help you identify any loopholes in your situation and take advantage of them.
