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Hi everyone, I’m Dr. Michael Mantell with another Family Law Matters joined by Bonnie Rabinovitch-Mantel owner and managing partner of the Primus Family Law Group, a family-oriented firm where experience meets results. Hi Bonnie. Hi Michael.
Now you know once again this is our every third or fifth episode that we have to remind people because they continue to ask, we are not related, we don’t spell our names the same, they sound alike but he’s got an extra L because he’s missing things in his life and I don’t need that extra L so we are not related. But you have two N’s in Bonnie and I have two M’s, Michael Mantel, so we’ll let our audience decide. But we are not related.
We’re obviously having fun because it’s Halloween time and we’re getting into… Look at my nails. I know, but I wouldn’t show them. Okay, let’s go on.
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But we’re getting into the holidays and this means money and spending money and one of the things that we know that happens in couples, especially in couples who are divorcing of course, wait what? I have to pay his or her credit card bill for the gifts that he or she is buying for that person that they are seeing on the… Wait a minute. No, no, no. Tell us about how this works.
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Okay, so when you’re divorcing everything that you acquire both good and bad during the marriage is presumed to be community property, meaning it’s presumed to be a conjoint asset or a joint debt. So I have people tell me all the time, but I don’t have access to that credit card or my name’s not on that. It doesn’t matter.
It really doesn’t. Now there are a few exceptions that a judge will consider is not benefiting the community like gambling your money. That’s not really benefiting the community.
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If people are having affairs and spending the hotels and the stuff on the credit card, that’s not benefiting the community. But if you married somebody who believes, you know, spending on Louis Vuitton is a weekly thing and that’s the person you married and you knew this and this is what’s going on, then yes, you are responsible for half of the community debt when you’re getting divorced. But what if I didn’t know it? I didn’t know that he or she is a, you know, whatever, Louis Vuitton.
So this is where the law says you should have known it because you knew you opened the closet door and there was 27 purses and you should have known it. But the point is, though, that this is where the argument comes. This is where the issue comes.
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I shouldn’t be responsible for having to pay for that, right? Right. Especially when somebody says, well, I’m frugal. I don’t shop at Nordstrom’s.
I go and shop at Target. And unfortunately, the law is very clear. They’re not going to deal with that minutia, which deals with the presumption that whatever you guys have accumulated during the marriage will be separated and equalized in some fashion as you get divorced.
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What would lead someone to want to spend thousands of dollars in legal argument about not wanting to pay a thousand dollars of a credit card? Why would someone do that? Hopefully, if you have a good attorney, they give you that cost benefit analysis of, hey, if it’s a thousand dollars, it’s probably going to cost you six, seven times that much to argue about it. So maybe that’s not the hill we die on today. Whereas unfortunately, there are other attorneys that do want the fight because the money then goes to them.
And hopefully people see these things and understand it and choose an attorney that’s going to be more reasonable and work on things that are worth fighting for, you know, the custody, the visitation and these other things. Now, of course, if we’re talking about hundreds of thousands of dollars, Michael, because that does happen, you know, it depends on the relative debt we’re talking about. Yeah.
I have so many questions about this topic because I hear it so much, so just not even in divorced couples, but in couples who are married, you know, why are you spending so much money? And, you know, when that couple divorces, they’re going to have quite an angry time of this. And this speaks to your skill in mediation as opposed to litigation. So if people have questions about this, whether it’s a credit card bill or whatever else it is, you know, the fancy car, how can they be in touch to get some more information about this and maybe calm them down and seek clarity? Michael, that’s what Primus tries to do.
We really do try to bring resolution, you know, as neatly and as efficiently and as least gut-wrenchingly as possible. So if you want to reach out to us, it’s 619-574-8000. That’s a direct line to our office and you will be put on my calendar for a free 30-minute phone consultation.
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Or you can reach us online at www.PrimusFamilyLaw.com and we’ll get back to you in the same way.