Hi, I'm Dave Ward with The Ward Law Firm, and one of the things that people are often confused about is the process of what's called Equitable Division of Property.
To really understand what's going on with it you first have to understand what types of property court looks at and there are two categories as a general rule. The first one is called separate property. Separate property includes things that you owned prior to the marriage. So if you owned, you know, a Honda Accord before you got married, that Honda is still yours. Meaning that if something were to happen in the marriage and the marriage was to dissolve, your spouse would not have a claim to say that they're entitled to receive the Honda.
Another example of things that are considered separate property would be things like gifts or inheritances from people. Again, those retain their separate character. The other type of property is marital property. Marital property is property that is acquired during the marriage or through the efforts of the marriage, or has appreciated in value due to the efforts of the marriage. This can become a complicated inquiry when we're talking about something that was purchased prior to but had debt associated with it and we need to look at the payments that were made using separate funds, whether or not there was appreciated in the value of the asset, etc.
So, it can become a complicated inquiry when we're trying to figure these things out and there are rules that we have to help us along. One of the most notable ones would be the source of funds rule, which helps us determine if the money came from a particular source then that source should have the appropriate property rights with regard to any equity or anything that is related to those funds. You can see some of our other videos that deal with property division as well for some expanded conversations on some of those things.
If you have any other questions, of course you can check those out or you can give us a call at the number below. I'm Dave Ward with The Ward Law Firm and we help parents protect those things that are most important.