Tag: remarriage

Divorce and Short Term Marriages

Baretta action star, Robert Blake, has filed for divorce from his third wife, Pamela Hudak, just a year after the two strolled into Beverly Hills City Hall to obtain their marriage license. What is the impact of such a short-term marriage on divorce?

divorce alimony

And that’s the name of that tune!

According TMZ, actor Robert Blake filed docs in Los Angeles Friday to call the relationship quits. The 85-year-old married Pamela Hudak in Spring of 2017. The couple had known each other for decades and even dated years ago. Blake was previously married to Sondra Kerry from 1961 to 1983.

Florida Divorce

I’ve written about divorce and the length of a marriage before. Florida Statutes actually define what the length of your marriage means. For example, in order to determine alimony, there is a rebuttable presumption in Florida that a short-term marriage is a marriage having a duration of less than 7 years.

Florida Statutes define a moderate-term marriage as a marriage having a duration of greater than 7 years but less than 17 years. And, a long-term marriage is a marriage having a duration of 17 years or greater.

How do you measure the marriage term? In Florida, the length of your marriage is the period of time measured from the date of your marriage until the date of filing of an action to dissolve your marriage.

The Length of your marriage is very important when it comes to determining the kind of duration of alimony payments. For example, permanent alimony is generally for longer term marriages if the statutory criteria are met.

In shorter term marriages and for moderate term marriages, permanent alimony may be considered, but the burden of proof is much higher.

Conversely, bridge-the-gap alimony is generally awarded to allow a person to transition from being married to being single. So, bridge-the-gap alimony is designed for short-term needs. In fact, the length of an award bridge-the-gap alimony may not exceed 2 years.

Durational alimony helps provide a person with economic help for a set period of time after short or moderate length marriages or following a marriage of long duration if there is no ongoing need for support on a permanent basis.

The length of your marriage also factors in to property divisions. When a court divides the marital assets and debts, the court begin with the premise that the distribution should be equal. One of the factors a court can look to in justifying an unequal distribution includes the duration of the marriage.

Don’t do the crime if you can’t do the time.

Blake was accused of murdering his second wife, Bonnie Lee Bakley. Blake was her tenth husband. Bakley was fatally shot while sitting in Blake’s parked car outside a Los Angeles-area restaurant in May 2001.

In 2002, Robert Blake was charged with Bakley’s murder, solicitation of murder, conspiracy and special circumstance of lying in wait. In March 2005, a jury found Blake not guilty of the crimes.

Seven months later, Blake was found liable in a wrongful death lawsuit brought against him by Bakley’s children. Officially, Bakley’s murder remains unsolved.

The TMZ article is here.

 

Prenups and Remarriage

Thinking of remarrying? If so, there are a few precautions your must take to make sure your next marriage is successful, and that your finances and children are protected. This can include financial counseling, reviewing important documents and preparing prenuptial and postnuptial agreements.

prenup for remarriage

First Steps

You have concerns before you get remarried, and those concerns can grow into relationship problems unless you sit down with your spouse or future spouse and talk about finances.

As U.S. News and World Report writes, you should start with a simple discussion about your assets and liabilities. Couples also need to discuss their financial goals.

Do we have separate accounts, or do we co-mingle?

Do we get a new home, or do I keep the home I have, and you keep the home you have?”

There are a lot of personal and financial decisions that need to be discussed before the wedding party.

Florida Prenuptial Agreements

I’ve written about prenuptial agreements before. Prenuptial agreements are about more than just resolving uncertainty in a marriage.

Any couple who brings any personal or business assets to the union can benefit from one. They are also important to have in place before a couple starts investing in businesses, properties and other investments.

A prenuptial agreement (or “prenup” for short) is a contract between people intending to marry. A prenup determines spousal rights when the marriage ends by death or divorce. This can be especially important in second marriages.

If you divorce without a prenup, your property rights are determined under state law, and a spouse may have a claim to alimony while the suit for divorce is pending and after entry of a judgment.

Without a prenup, if your spouse dies, you will have statutory rights under state law to a share of your deceased spouse’s estate and may also have a right to lump sum death benefits, or a survivor annuity under a retirement plan.

That’s where prenups come in. Prospective spouses may limit or expand these rights by an agreement. Prenups are also used to protect the interests of children from a prior marriage, and to avoid a contested divorce. Prenups can be very worthwhile provided they’re done right.”

The most basic of prenups should list an inventory of premarital assets that would stay with the original owner in case of a divorce. Florida has both case law and a statute to help lawyers, judges and the parties determine if a prenuptial agreement is enforceable.

Final Plans

U.S. News and World Report makes several other suggestions which make sense.

Make sure your estate plan is up to date. You need to be extra cautious if you have children from a previous marriage. You want things to work out with your current spouse and also make sure your kids are not disinherited.

Update your will. Your will and beneficiary designations need to be updated for many major life events, including the birth of a child, death of a family member, marriage, divorce and remarriage.

Review all your documentation. If you are entering your second or third marriage, you may need to make significant changes to your estate plan, beneficiary designations and even your emergency contacts.

Make sure that all the documents you leave behind clearly spell out your wishes. Take the time to do proper estate planning, because a prenup may say one thing and the estate plan may say something different.

If they don’t realize it, at death there could be a problem if [the estate plan and the prenup] are not consistent in their goals.

The U.S. News and World Report article is here.