During divorce proceedings, married couples have to address a variety of different issues. Spouses who own a home together may find themselves disagreeing on issues related to their real property. After years of living in, working on and paying for a home, people tend to have very strong attachments to where they live.
It is only natural for those strong emotions to lead to disagreements during divorce negotiations. Spouses who may already have a strained relationship with one another may find it very challenging to make concessions about an asset that represents a significant amount of their personal wealth and emotional value as well.
The people who prepare themselves for conflict in the early stages of divorce may find it easier to address their disagreements. What issues about a marital home might lead to conflict between spouses?
Who gets to stay?
For many families, the most pressing issue related to the marital home is who retains possession or the right to occupy the marital home. Neither spouse may want to leave the home. Particularly when there may be young children in the family or when the local real estate market is quite competitive, both spouses might prefer staying in the marital home as opposed to leaving and looking for a new place to live. Spouses may need to consider carefully whether they can maintain the home and whether their emotional attachment to it could become a source of pain in the future.
How much is it worth?
Home values change as time passes. The longer spouses have lived in the home and the more improvements they have made to the property, the more likely it is that they need help determining the fair market value of their house. People need to know the estimated value of key assets if they want to divide them in a fair and reasonable manner when they divorced. An appraisal could help determine the current value of the home.
How can they divide equity?
Even after the spouses have decided who stays and roughly what the home is worth, they may still find themselves disagreeing about how to share home equity. They may not have other high-value assets worth a comparable amount. Perhaps the spouse hoping to stay in the home does not have enough income or a high enough credit score to withdraw all of the other spouse’s equity when they refinance. Spouses sometimes have to establish creative solutions for home equity if they want to settle property division matters before they go to court.
Thinking about these and other significant property division issues can help people effectively prepare for divorce negotiations or litigation. The way that people divide their biggest assets can have an impact that persists for years.