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Hi everyone, I’m Dr. Michael Mantell with another Family Law Matters. And as always, I am so privileged to be joining Bonnie Rabinovitch Mantel, who is the owner and managing partner of the Primus Family Law Group. Hi, Bonnie.

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Hi, Michael. How are you today? I’m good. How are you? I’m terrific.

Thanks very much. Bonnie, I thought today we would talk about an interesting issue that many families going through divorce struggle with. And that is, I want what I want.

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And I don’t want you to get anything more than what you absolutely deserve to have according to the law, property division. How do we separate out everything that we’ve spent years building up together? How does Primus Family Law Group help people with the issue of property division? Well, we first have to explain to them what the law is. And that’s, you know, everything that you’ve accumulated during the marriage, whether or not it’s from your salary or from your retirement is community property.

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So community property in California gets divided 50-50. I understand you worked for that money. I understand you earned that retirement.

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I understand that. The court understands that. But the other spouse brought value to the marriage.

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And therefore, now you may not think so right now, but they did. And therefore, they’re entitled to half of what was accumulated during the marriage, even if that person was a stay-at-home parent or a stay-at-home spouse. So we explain that to them.

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And then we try to manage their expectations. Because obviously, you know, there are things that are indivisible. For example, the family photos.

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You know, you can’t really go through, divide the photos. So you come up with the solution of copying the photos and sharing the cost. You know, so there’s ways to, you know, the furniture.

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How much do you want to fight over that? But when it comes to bigger things like selling a home or having to be bought out, it’s half the value. Retirements, half the value. Bank accounts, half the value.

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So what happens now in this divorce? Let’s say she has a very hefty retirement package from the profession she’s been engaged in. They divorce. And now that retirement continues to build and build and build.

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Is he entitled to the retirement that she’s earned five years after the marriage? No. What will happen is as of the date of separation is when his, or in this example, his entitlement ends. And any accumulation to that until it’s finally divided.

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Because when you separate, it still takes us time to get enforced. And so things are still accumulating. She may be contributing and that will be figured out.

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The retirement is divided by what is called a qualified domestic relations order. In most cases, there are certain ones that they’re not needed for, but in most cases, that’s what it requires. And there’s a document that specifically figures out the portion and the value that is the community piece.

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And so that gets divided and it gets put into an account. You don’t get it right away, right? It’s what I was going to ask that. So in other words, if he or she has $500,000 in retirement, so he’s in or she is entitled to 250 of that, right? Okay.

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Now, did they get that? I’m divorcing. I want my $250,000 now. Or when does that money come? Well, it depends how old you are, right? If you’re eligible to retire at 62 and start collecting on those benefits and you’re 65, yes, that person can take his share, pay the taxes on them or whatever it is.

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And then, you know, use it. And what if the couple is younger? If you’re 42, what the court will do is, or what the quadro will do is it will divide it. And the person who’s getting his or her share opens up an account that’s like, so you can avoid the tax consequences.

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Because if you do pull it out, you are going to pay hefty. You’ll lose a lot. If you want to, that’s your right to, but understand you’re going to lose a lot of it to taxes and penalties.

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Otherwise, they roll it over. They put it away and they start accruing their own. Is this an area that couples struggle a great deal about? So it’s 50-50 according to the law.

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But what happens when someone tries to say, well, I’ll give you 30% or I’ll take 30, but I want more over here. You guys can make agreements on things that are divisible. So for example, if I has $50,000 of equity and your entitlement to somebody’s retirement is 150,000, you may want to keep the home and not give a darn about the retirement.

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Look how good I was there. Darn. I was very, very impressed.

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And so people can make agreements and that’s what we do. We help people come to agreements that make sense to them. Because the court can’t do that.

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The court cannot say, well, how about you take that over here? Only you can buy agreement. If you have to go to trial, the court’s going to divide every piece in half. Right.

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And if people have more questions and they want to talk to you or another attorney at Primus Family Law Group about property division, how can they be in touch with you? You can reach any one of our amazing attorneys at Team Primus at 619-574-8000. Malani will definitely put you on our calendar to have a consult. And we do a free 30-minute consult to see how we can help you.

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Or you can reach out to us at www.PrimusFamilyLaw.com. And I encourage all those of you who are watching and listening today, if you have questions, please contact Bonnie at the website, Bonnie, for suggestions about other topics that we can cover for you. How can they make those suggestions, Bonnie? They can reach out to info at PrimusFamilyLaw.com. Info at PrimusFamilyLaw.com. Great. We look forward to your suggestions, folks.

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Until next week, when we have another Family Law Matters, thank you very much.