Spousal support is the financial support that one spouse pays to the other after a divorce or separation for a set period. In California, it is called "spousal support," but it can also be referred to as alimony or spousal maintenance. Spousal support can be awarded to either the husband or wife, but it is more common for women to receive this kind of support.
The amount paid depends on several factors, including the couple's incomes and what they agreed upon before marriage (prenuptial agreement). The payment is meant to help the spouse who earns less provide for their standard of living after the divorce.
Alimony results from the court's order, and it lasts as long as the order lasts. However, the couple can agree upon the amount of spousal support to be paid and the duration too. Understanding what alimony is and what it entails will enable couples to reach an amicable agreement without feeling like they are paying off their spouse.
Before getting into the details of spousal support and the factors that determine its duration, we'll first look at some of the standard terms used during spousal support.
Some Vital Spousal Support Terminologies
Splitting up with your partner is never easy, and the legalities of dividing up assets and debts can be complicated and frustrating. California family law is a challenging field to traverse, but it doesn't have to be a nightmare. There are ways to ease the emotional and legal burdens. One way to protect yourself regarding spousal support is to know some key terms. Your chances at a fair assessment may increase when you know these terms because they are the basis for a court's order in a spousal support situation.
Alimony: This is another term for spousal support. While spousal support is used within the court system, alimony is a primary term in the California tax code. Alimony is the amount paid by a spouse who earns more to the one who earns less to help the latter maintain the living standards while still married. The amount will also help the low-earning spouse attain financial stability after a divorce.
Temporary/ Pendente Lite Spousal Support: Pendente Lite is a Latin word for 'during litigation,' which the court commonly uses. It refers to the temporary arrangements spouses can have to negotiate for a lasting spousal support settlement. The court has given specific guidelines for calculating this temporary arrangement that is relatively straightforward.
Long-Term/ Permanent Spousal Support: California's spousal support is not standard since the court understands that a person's need or ability will keep on changing. For instance, if the supported spouse lands a well-paying job, the degree of support required may change. If the supporting spouse loses their job and cannot even support themselves, then similarly, the arrangement will change. Upon the divorce verdict, the temporary spousal support becomes the long-term/permanent spousal support.
Based on your companion and your specific scenario, you may never have a temporary spousal support arrangement or settlement. A temporary support order could interest both parties if the divorce is protracted or acrimonious. The sponsored party means an instant infusion of cash to help with daily expenses. It may be an opportunity for the supporting spouse to define their marital standard of life more precisely.
Factors Affecting Spousal Support
When passing a divorce judgment, it is unlikely that the court will order one of the spouses to pay alimony. In most cases, it is up to the couple to negotiate the spousal support arrangements while factoring in the genuine needs present. However, if they fail to reach an agreement, the court might come in to help settle the matter. Several factors will come into play while determining the spouse that will get the alimony, amount, and duration. These include:
- A spouse's ability to pay alimony (the court considers the spouse's earning ability, assets, generated and unearned income, living standards)
- The marriage's duration
- The earning ability, age, and health of the parties
- The couple's living standards during their marriage years
- The financial needs of both spouses based on their marital living standards
- The supported spouse's marketable skills; the job market for the skills; the expense and time needed for the sponsored spouse to obtain the suitable training or education to establish those abilities; and the potential need for additional training or education to gain more valuable skills or employment
- The liabilities, financial assets, and separate property of each spouse
- The ability of the spouse requesting alimony to maintain meaningful employment without jeopardizing their children's best interests
- The proportion to which spells of unemployment sustained during the marriage has harmed the sponsored spouse's earning capacity for the supported spouse to dedicate time to household duties.
- The degree to which the sponsored spouse assisted the supporting spouse in obtaining a degree, certificate, job, or license
- Any proof of domestic violence
- Any other factor that seems justifiable to the court
By working with an experienced alimony lawyer, both your spouse and you can negotiate for an agreeable settlement that caters to the current and foreseeable necessities of the two parties.
Factors Affecting Spousal Support's Duration
One of the critical factors that a family court will use to determine the duration of the spousal support is the marriage's duration. The general guideline is that the supporting spouse will pay the alimony for half this period for any marriage lasting ten years and below. For example, if the marriage lasted for six years, the supporting spouse will pay the alimony for three years.
However, if the marriage lasted for over ten years, the court has no specific guidance on how long the support will last. Instead, the court will consider different factors but eventually ensure that the arrangement will allow the supported spouse to be close to their marital living standards before managing to support themselves. Some people might refer to this guide as the 10-year rule in other places.
If the spouses separated for any period while married before filing for the divorce, this duration of separation might impact the decision on the support given.
When the court grants temporary support, it will only last when the court gives a permanent order. This temporary support will help the supported spouse during the divorce proceedings. If the marriage took a year or less, the court might give a temporary arrangement since the alimony payment will only take a short duration.
A permanent spousal support arrangement becomes effective after finalizing the divorce. Although termed permanent, this arrangement is not to last a lifetime. The court does not have a specific duration for these arrangements. However, a spouse can seek either termination or modification of the spousal support order. We will look at these instances in subsequent sections.
How Marital Agreements Affect Spousal Support
Spouses could either have prenuptial or post-nuptial agreements to decide the amount of alimony and its duration. The court will uphold the terms of this agreement if they are valid.
For instance, a couple in a marriage relationship of over ten years might get into a marital agreement to settle upon the supported spouse receiving a lump sum amount or short-term settlement. When the court receives this agreement, it will have no option but to grant the couple's wish. The supported spouse might sometimes settle for this arrangement, whereas they could have received a permanent alimony settlement from the court. Regardless, there will be no interference whatsoever.
Negotiating Alimony Payments
During the divorce process, a couple may agree on the terms of alimony, including its duration. It may be in the couples' best interest to involve a third party while negotiating, possibly a mediator or an alimony attorney. The agreement may be more neutral and insightful with this intervention, covering all the required areas.
What Happens Upon Retirement?
When the supporting spouse reaches the retirement age, they have all the rights to retire. The supported spouse cannot force them in any way to continue working just so that they can keep on receiving the support. Instead, the retiring spouse should submit a petition in court requesting the termination of the alimony or its adjustment to suit his current state. It would be best to do this even when some situation forces you into early retirement.
Modifying a Spousal Support Order
It is possible to modify a spousal support order unless you have a prior agreement that no one can revoke or modify the set arrangement. Moreover, once the duration for paying the spousal support expires, it can neither be extended nor modified. Note that either spouse can request the modification of this order.
First, the spouses can talk about modifying the spousal support order. This modification could be on adjusting the payable amount or the duration. If they reach an agreement, they can make it legally binding by signing against this agreement. If they fail to reach an agreement, they can file for a modification in court.
For the court to grant a modification of the spousal support order, the requesting party must prove that there has been a possible change in material circumstances from the time the court passed that order. One of such changes could be a decrease in income. After the court validates the situation, it will change the spousal support amount to a lower figure until the supporting spouse finds a better-paying job.
Other substantial circumstances include:
- Disability or critical illness
- Permanently reduced income
- Unemployment
- The supported spouse cohabiting with another partner
Looking at the instance where the supported spouse is cohabiting with a partner, the paying spouse could file a motion in court seeking a modification of the support amount by either limiting, reducing it, or terminating the order altogether. The argument could be that the spouses' needs are fully met; hence no need for further support. It could also be that the parties' needs have significantly reduced due to the current arrangement, warranting a reduction of the spousal support amount.
However, the receiving spouse could still contest this request by proving that they take care of their needs separately as much as they live with a new partner. The court might still uphold the previous order by giving evidence of this claim, seeing that the person's needs are still the same.
Note that before you receive any notification from the court approving the modification of alimony, you still have a legal duty to keep up with the previous arrangement. After receiving the court's verdict, you can adjust in compliance with the new order. Depending on the prevailing circumstances with both the receiving and paying spouse, the court could decrease or increase the support amount.
When the Supported Spouse Remarries
According to California laws, there are various automatic ways that spousal support can end. To begin with, if the supported spouse dies, the spousal support order terminates immediately. Next, if the date agreed upon by the couple or the court order ends, then the support also stops. Finally, when the receiving spouse remarries, then the spousal support might come to an end. However, some couples stipulate that the support will continue even after their marital agreement remarries. If this is your case, you have no alternative but to keep up with the agreement.
The Effect of Domestic Violence on Spousal Support
Domestic violence plays a crucial role when determining spousal support. Several recent revisions in the legislation have addressed this issue. First, domestic abuse during the marriage is a component that the court must evaluate while assessing permanent spousal support according to Family Code 4320(i), provided there is a record of the domestic abuse. Second, under Family Code 4325, there is a reasonable possibility that a spouse who has been sentenced for domestic violence towards their spouse during the previous five years is not eligible for spousal maintenance.
Terminating an Alimony
Just like modifying alimony, similar factors could contribute to its termination. Unless the judgment was expressly non-terminable the first time it was granted, you could be able to terminate your need to pay spousal support payments if you can establish a legally permissible change in lifestyle. The following are examples of circumstances that could lead to a termination:
- A drop in your income due to circumstances beyond your control, like a severe illness
- You've reached the age of 65 and would like to retire
- Your ex-spouse's earnings have increased
- Your ex-husband or wife has remarried
In addition, when the supported spouse dies, the support obligation is automatically terminated. If they pass away before the expiry of the payment obligation, their estate will be unable to execute the spousal support order in their favor.
The Gavron Warning
This is a notice from the court to the supported spouse giving them a request on their duration to support themselves. The Gavron warning will thus prevent the receiving spouse from depending entirely on the paying spouse for a prolonged duration.
The Gavron Warning finds its name from a case ruled in 1988 on the Marriage of Gavron. The 2nd Appellate District Court of California presided over this matter. At this time, the court decided that the receiving spouse has to know their responsibility to become self-supporting before the modification or termination of an alimony order.
During this time, courts started to avoid rulings in favor of permanent spousal support. Instead, their focus turned to inform the supported spouse on their need to cater to their own needs.
This "notice" basically implies that after the court issues a long-term maintenance order, a former spouse does not have the entitlement to sit back, recline, and neglect to make a decent attempt to support themselves. As previously said, this is a discretionary warning. Even during a divorce proceeding, the court may issue this order.
Below is an excerpt on Gavron warning as presented in Family Code 4330 (b), "The court could advise the sender of spousal support that they should make appropriate efforts to help in catering for their additional needs, considering the specific circumstances recognized by the court accordance with Section 4320, except if the court determines that the notification is ill-advised in the context of long marriage as prescribed under section 4336."
Deduction of Spousal Support Tax
The law allows the deduction of spousal support tax if the spouses file their taxes separately. However, if both parties file taxes jointly, alimony is not tax-deductible. When filing taxes for a specific year, the supporting spouse can decide to deduct the entire spousal support payments made during that whole year.
Find a Divorce Attorney Near Me
The duration of spousal support depends on different factors, mainly the marriage duration and marriage agreements. A spousal support order can also be modified or terminated depending on factors like remarrying and a change of income. When you are the spouse requesting or paying spousal support, you may naturally wonder how long these payments may take in California. We at San Diego Divorce Attorney are well conversant with the laws regarding spousal support in California. We can help you obtain, modify or terminate alimony orders. Call us today at 858-529-5150.
