General legal information furnished as a service of Fort Lauderdale / West Palm Beach family law attorney Janet Langjahr
What happens to a spouse’s inheritance if there’s a divorce? That question comes up a lot.
And Smart Money tackles it in Hands Off My Inheritance.
The article’s analysis is generally consistent with Florida law. It is worth repeating that, to maintain an inheritance as separate property, inheriting spouses should take care with how they hold and use their inheritances.
Also, it’s important to understand that an inheritance, although not divided, is not ignored or irrelevant in the divorce. On the contrary, an inheritance may be taken into account in how other, marital property is divided - and in whether or how much spousal support there should be.
The Libertarian Party’s candidate for North Dakota’s governor in 2004 has authored an unusual divorce initiative which he hopes will land on the state’s voters’ ballots later this year.
The initiative would:
Anyone who wants to learn more about this unusual initiative can read the Grand Forks Herald article.
The year was 1987.
She asked for $1 million as her share of the property division. He refused.
Early on the day of the hearing on whether to set aside their postnuptial agreement, she was murdered by a professional killer.
Law enforcement favored him as the suspect most likely behind it.
Now, a former local Palm Beach resident is standing trial in Georgia for the murder of his wife.
In this unusual case, the wife’s former divorce attorney is a key prosecution witness.
If convicted, the husband may face the death penalty.
You can read more about this case in the Palm Daily News or on CourtTV.com.
Just don’t model own divorce after it.
It’s no surpise that a divorce can have an enormous impact on a small business owned by one or both of the spouses. But, under the right circumstances, a divorce of a key corporate player has the potential to exert an enormous impact even on a publicly-owned corporation.
Consider the pending divorce of Stephen Pomeroy, the recently designated CEO of Pomeroy IT Solutions, a company currently listed on the NASDAQ stock exchange. According to a Cincinnati Post article, Jennifer Pomeroy, his wife, recently filed at least three related lawsuits in addition to her divorce action.
At least one of her lawsuits reportedly strikes at the very heart of corporate operations, alleging serious misconduct by key personnel. And the company reportedly may face being dropped from NASDAQ.
At least one other of her lawsuits reportedly raises very serious questions about her husband’s alleged propensity for violence.
One of the interesting sidenotes of the article is that the Pomeroys reportedly made a prenuptial agreement.
Most people think of prenups as ways to control property that they acquire either before or during the marriage in the event of death or divorce. Or to avoid or limit alimony in the event of divorce.
But there’s another important, although less obvious, reason for prenups that is implicit: the hope of avoiding wide-ranging litigation that may affect a spouse’s reputation and business, whether directly or indirectly.
Sometimes, the best-laid plans go awry …
A recent Marco Island (FL) Eagle article discussed Florida’s statutes regarding ownership of disembodied eggs and sperm and heirship rights of the children born of them.
As the article correctly points out, in the absence of written agreements regarding the eggs and sperm and estate planning documents regarding the children born of them, the statutes may operate in an unforeseen and unwanted way. If you make all the complex scientific provisions to have children via these methods, it doesn’t make a lot of sense to leave the legal consequences of those precious provisions to a legislated fate you wouldn’t have chosen.
According to an article from right here in South Florida, more women are seeking prenuptial agreements. That’s been my observation in my practice as well.
Besides the fear of the unknown future cited in the article, more and more of my prenup clients report having been burned in the well-known past by a previous spouse skipping out with assets prior to the divorce or by the divorce process itself.
They don’t want to expose themselves to those risks again. They want agreements to protect them.
And they want to know how to structure and manage their finances and property to support the agreements.
CNNMoney serves up some good common sense tips for handling financial matters in Protect your wallet in a divorce. Most of these tips are pretty good ideas throughout a healthy marriage.
Marriage is, in part, an economic / business partnership. Marriage partners should be as well-informed about the financial affairs of the marital partnership as business partners need to be about those of the business partnership.
If a partner is not forthcoming, whether because of misdeeds or control-itis, that is a warning sign of an unhealthy partnership, marital or otherwise. Knowing the finances beforehand is the very best way to ensure an equitable distribution of marital property.
The article also serves as a valuable reminder to update wills and trusts and insurance policies promptly after divorce. Too often, people put this off - until it is too late.
“I’d like to get legally separated.”
Floridians transplanted from certain other states often ask about this.
Florida doesn’t have a procedure to become “legally separated”. Florida spouses who are in fact living separately and apart remain legally married, without a change in legal status.
Therefore, in Florida, if a separated spouse dies, the surviving legal spouse still has full inheritance rights if there is no will. The surviving legal spouse also has certain inheritance rights even if the deceased spouse disinherited the surviving legal spouse in his or her will. Living separately and apart has no impact on the surviving legal spouse’s legal rights.
Physically separated spouses in Florida can, however, in effect, get the benefits of “legal separation” by, among other things, legally “opting out” of Florida’s laws regarding property distribution to spouses. They can do that by making what is called a post-nuptial agreement. (Of course, the agreement must comply with all applicable legal requirements in Florida.)
A “separation agreement” is nothing more than a post-nuptial agreement. If the parties later decide to divorce, the post-nup can serve as a settlement agreement. If one spouse should die before a divorce, the post-nup can also limit the surviving spouse’s rights to the deceased spouse’s estate.
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