Articles Tagged with Equitable Distribution

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Recently a divorce case made the news with screaming headlines such as “Ex-wife of US Oil Baron to appeal $1 Billion Divorce Award”. Yes, that was billion with a “B” . Intrigued, I was drawn to read how someone could not only receive such an award, but more importantly, on what basis someone would even want to challenge it, representing an amount far beyond most peoples’ wildest dreams. Continue reading ›

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Many in today’s society would view the court’s treatment of dogs and other pets as merely property to be equitably distributed in the breakup of relationship as antiquated, given the increasing role that pets are play in today’s society. A common scenario playing out in relationships across the Garden State today is that many couples begin to cohabit and soon after get a dog or another pet to raise together.  Those of us on social media regularly see pictures posted of couples and their dogs in which they are categorized as their “baby” or loved one.  Couples spend significant time in researching which pet to purchase or rescue from the shelter.   They spend significant time and money on training and caring for an animal that many consider to be a member of the family. Continue reading ›

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When it comes to questions regarding equitable distribution, the one that seemingly gets overlooked or underappreciated the most often is the question revolving around how to divide or distribute the marital liabilities or debts of the marriage.  It is so much easier to comprehend and make distributions of the assets of a particular marriage, but clients often do not necessarily understand or conceptualize that the marital liabilities and debts need to be “distributed” too.   Continue reading ›

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Last week, we addressed the concept of how a gift or transfer of property to one or both spouses may be treated in a divorce.  Butgive what occurs if one of the spouses transfers marital money or marital property to a person or entity outside of the marriage?    Continue reading ›

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It is well settled in New Jersey that when there is a question of whether a transfer of property was a gift or not, “Proof of gift requires evidence of unequivocal donative intent on the donor’s part, actual or symbolic delivery of the gift’s subject matter, and the donor’s absolute and irrevocable relinquishment of ownership.”  Continue reading ›

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According to a March, 2013 publication from the National Center for Family & Marriage Research at Bowling Green State University, authors Susan L. Brown and I-Fen Lin discussed the divorce rate for adults over the age of 50 in their article elderlyentitled “The Gray Divorce Revolution: Rising Divorce among Middle-aged and Older Adults, 1990-2010”.  Continue reading ›

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In 1971, New Jersey enacted Divorce Reform Legislation thereby placing in the forefront  an “Equitable” standard for the distribution of property when people divorce, replacing the long previously held universal rule that when people divorce, property is divided according to title to the property.  Continue reading ›

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Unraveling a family’s marital finances in a divorce can be daunting task.  In all contested New Jersey divorce actions where there is any issue as to custody, support, alimony or equitable distribution, both parties magnifying glassare required to file with the court and serve on the other party a form known as a Case Information Statement, commonly referred to as a “CIS”.  However many mistakenly refer to this form as a “CSI” Continue reading ›