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In its October 22, 2024, decision in Szypula v. Szypula, the Court of Appeals held that if marital funds are used to purchase premarital pension service credits, those premarital credits are marital property. But …

Mr. Szypula joined the Navy nine years before the parties married. He left the Navy two years later. The Court noted that, in general, members of the armed services become entitled to retirement pay only after they complete 20 years of service. Therefore, when the husband left the Navy, he was not entitled to retirement benefits.

After working in the private sector for 14 years, the husband joined the Foreign Service (diplomatic service personnel under the Department of State). The husband enrolled in the Foreign Service Pension System.

Veterans who enter the foreign service may add their years of military service to their Foreign Service pensions by making additional contributions for the years they served in the military. The husband purchased his 11 years of Navy service by having $9,158.00 withheld from his Foreign Service pay over seven years through 2018.

In 2019, the wife filed for divorce. The parties could not settle whether the husband’s purchased premarital pension credits were separate or marital property. After the nonjury trial, Tompkins County Supreme Court Justice Joseph A. McBride held the credits to be marital property.

The pension rights at issue in this case were the product of both his pre-marriage service and the contribution of marital assets.

The Appellate Division, Third Department, reversed, finding that the premarital credits were separate property. However, the Third Department held the funds used to purchase those credits were marital property to be equitably distributed.Continue Reading Premarital Pension Credits Purchased with Marital Funds are Marital Property, But …

Generally, it is the more “successful” spouse who submits the proposed judgment of divorce to the Court to be signed and entered. In all events, a spouse who intends to take an appeal on an issue must make sure:

  • that the issue to be appealed is covered by the judgment;
  • or an appeal is taken

…

The ever-changing landscape of Equitable Distribution case law makes it difficult, if not impossible, to rely on the “law.” A parent cannot (or rather, should not) make a gift to a married child without bringing the lawyers into it.

Take the April, 2016 decision of the Appellate Division, Second Department in Mistretta v. Mistretta. There, the parties had been married in 1991. During their marriage they lived in a home, at first owned by the husband’s mother, and deeded to the husband in 1996.

At the trial of this 2010 divorce action, the husband claimed that the residence was a gift from his mother, and therefore constituted separate property. However, he acknowledged that for many years, he paid his mother $500 per month “rent” (the opinion does not state whether rent was paid after the property was deeded to the husband). The husband and his sister both acknowledged that rental income from the subject premises was paid to the husband’s mother pursuant to the written agreement between the husband and his mother that was introduced into evidence.

Supreme Court, Suffolk County Justice Joseph Santorelli held that the home was marital property subject to equitable distribution. He directed the sale of the premises, with the parties to share equally in any net proceeds or deficiency from such sale.Continue Reading You Can't Make A Gift To Your Married Child Without Getting The Lawyers Involved

OverstuffedIn contrast to its decision in Zaratzian, the subject of yesterday’s blog post, the Second Department, in Eagar v. Suchan, held the same day that a father was entitled to receive child support from a mother after their two children moved in with him.

In Eagar, the parties’ 1999 Settlement Agreement which was incorporated, but not merged into their judgment of divorce, contained separate provisions for child support and the payment of college expenses for the children. At the time, the then 7- and 5-year old sons of the parties lived with their mother.

After the parties’ two children began to reside with the father, he petitioned to terminate his child support obligation.

After a hearing, Suffolk County Support Magistrate (and former Judge) Barbara Lynaugh granted the father’s petition. She determined that the parties’ older child, then 21, was emancipated, and directed the mother to pay child support to the father for the parties’ younger child, then 19, in the sum of $344 per week. Family Court Judge Martha L. Luft denied the mother’s objections to the ruling.

The Appellate Division, Second Department affirmed. It held that Magistrate Lynaugh properly exercised her discretion when applying the Child Support Standards Act formula percentage to the combined parental income in excess of the statutory cap. “Here, the Support Magistrate properly articulated her reasons for applying the statutory percentages to parental income over the statutory cap, and her determination was not an improvident exercise of discretion.” It appears that the mother’s C.S.S.A.-adjusted annual income was approximately $105,000.00, which (applying the 17% formula) resulted in a $344.00 per week award.

The appellate court did not discuss the language of the parties’ Stipulation of Settlement, or why that language allowed for an affirmative award to the father.Continue Reading “I’m Moving In With Daddy”: The Child Support Perspective (Part II)

It depended on what the definition of “the” was.

In Babbio v. Babbio, the Appellate Division, First Department, on July 17, 2014 defined “the” and otherwise interpreted a prenuptial agreement in ways that cost a husband millions of dollars of separate property credits he sought in his divorce action.

Under the parties’ agreement, marital property, generally, was to be divided equally. However, the agreement also provided:

[i]n the event of an Operative Event, Marital Property [as defined elsewhere in the agreement] shall be distributed equally between [the parties] in accordance with the following provisions, except that if the parties have been married for ten (10) years or less and either party is able to identify One Million ($1,000,000) Dollars or more of Separate Property that was used for the acquisition of the Marital Property, that party shall first receive the amount of his or her contribution of Separate Property prior to the division of the remaining value of such property, if any. [emphasis added]

“Operative Event” was defined, inter alia, as “the delivery by [either party] to the other of written notification … of an intention to terminate the marriage.” Here, the Court held that it was the date of the notification, and not the date of distribution that was determinative. As a result, the husband became entitled to the benefits of this provision.

However, construing the parties’ prenuptial agreement in what the Court viewed as being in accord with the plain meaning of its terms, and interpreting every part of the agreement “with reference to the whole”, the First Department found that the party seeking the credit must have contributed $1 million or more of his or her own separate property directly to the acquisition of the particular item of marital property at issue.Continue Reading Husband Denied Millions in Separate Property Credits Because of the Definition of "The"

The August 21, 2013 decision of the Appellate Division, Second Department in Patete v. Rodriguez may have expanded the credits available to the non-titled spouse when marital funds are expended on a separate-property asset.

When New York adopted its Equitable Distribution Law in 1980, courts were now longer bound by which spouse held title to an asset generated during the marriage. Upon divorce, the non-titled spouse could be awarded an equitable share.

Not all property of parties getting divorced, however, is “marital property” subject to Equitable Distribution. The law recognizes as “separate property,” assets owned by one of the spouses either before the marriage, or acquired through inheritance, or by gift from someone other than the other spouse, etc. The appreciation in the value of separate property is also separate property, subject to a claim that such appreciation is due to the contributions or efforts of the non-titled spouse.

Determining what is or should be marital and separate property, and each spouse’s equitable share of marital property is not always clear. Indeed, the rules and guidelines are not free from doubt.

Take last week’s decision in Patete, for example. This divorce was the second time around for these parties. They married for the first time in 1978. Incident to their first divorce in 1981, the wife conveyed her interest in the 68th Street, Maspeth, Queens marital residence to the husband.

The parties married again in 1985. At that time the husband still owned the 68th Street home. Again it was used as the marital residence. As the home was the husband’s property before the second marriage, it was deemed his separate property when the second marriage here ended in divorce.

In 1987, two years into the second marriage, however, the husband sold the 68th Street property. $125,000 of the proceeds were used to purchase the parties’ jointly-owned new marital residence on 64th Street in Maspeth.

The appellate court acknowledged that the 68th Street property remained the husband’s separate property until its sale in 1987. Thus, the $125,000 in sales proceeds used to purchase the jointly-owned 68th Street home was also his separate property. The husband was entitled to a separate property credit for his use of separate funds to purchase the 68th Street home.

However, between the date of the second marriage and the sale of the 68th Street home, marital funds were used to pay the mortgage on the husband’s separate-property 68th Street home. As a result, the Second Department held:

The [wife] should receive a credit for one-half of the marital funds used to the pay this mortgage on the plaintiff’s separate property.

The Court reported that the total amount of marital funds used for this purpose was $7,338.94.The Court did not state that this was the amount by which the principal amount due on the mortgage was reduced, just that such was the amount used to pay the mortgage.Continue Reading Credits on Divorce for Using Marital Funds for Separate Property Assets

House divided.jpgIn its December 13, 2012 decision in Murrary v. Murray, the Appellate Division, Third Department, affirmed the determination to deny a husband an equitable distribution credit for the value of a home which he owned before the marriage and which, after the marriage, he deeded to himself and his wife jointly.

The parties were married in 1986 and have four children. 15 months before the marriage, the husband purchased a residence in Queens County. Tthe parties lived there together for several years after their marriage. In 1991, the husband conveyed the home to himself and his wife jointly. The parties thereafter refinanced the Queens County property and used the proceeds to purchase their ultimate marital residence in Sullivan County, keeping and renting out the Queens County property. In 2003 the parties separated. The husband commenced this divorce action in 2005.

In resolving equitable distrution issues, Sullivan County Supreme Court Justice Robert A. Sackett denied the husband a credit for the premarital value of the Queens County property. On appeal, the Third Department found that that determination was within Justice Sackett’s discretion.

The transfer of that property into joint ownership created a presumption that it was marital property, placing the burden upon the husband to rebut this presumption with clear and convincing proof that the transfer was solely a matter of convenience.

Here, the appellate court noted, the husband’s testimony regarding the Queens County property (characterized by Supreme Court as evasive and questionable) failed to rebut the presumption. The entire Queens County property was thus part of the parties’ marital property and subject to the court’s substantial discretion in fashioning an equitable distribution award.

While the appellate court noted that a credit is often given for the value of former separate property, such a credit is not strictly mandated. The property is no longer separate, but is part of the total marital property. Quoting the 2010 Court of Appeals decision in Fields v. Fields, 15 NY3d 158, it was stated:

There is no single template that directs how courts are to distribute a marital asset that was acquired, in part or in whole, with separate property funds.

Upon review of the record and the entirety of the equitable distribution award, the Third Department was unpersuaded that Justice Sackett abused his discretion.Continue Reading Husband Gets No Separate Property Credit in Divorce for Pre-marital Home Deeded to Himself and His Wife Jointly