Legal Question in Family Law in California
My wife and I got married 8 years ago and live in Nor Ca. At the time our marriage I owned 2 pieces of property in Ca. Shortly after our marriage ( less then 1 year) I sold one of the pieces of property and invested the money into another. At the time of the sale and purchase my wife said she wanted nothing to do with my investment and didn't want to be responsible for the debt. With that in mind she agreed to sign an Interspousal Transfer Deed. About three years into our marriage I sold the other piece of property and my wife said the same thing about that one so I asked her to sign another Interspousal Transfer Deed and she did. Both times the Interspousal Transfer Deeds were notarized, filed with the county and have detailed descriptions of the properties locations. During the term of our marriage my wife and I kept separate checking account and she never contributed one penny to either piece of property. For some reason my wife now thinks that she has a right to half of the equity that is in both pieces of property.
Does an Interspousal Transfer Deed help me in this situation under Ca. Family law.
Does my soon to be ex-wife have a right to half of the equity?
Both deeds of trust and Interspousal Transfer Deed say a married man as his sole and separate property, does that make a difference or help me in anyway?
Thank You for your support.
1 Answer from Attorneys
The interspousal deed helps somewhat. She does not have a right to half the equity (most likely). She may, however, have a right to some of the equity. That will depend on whether you had to "feed" either or both of the properties. Keeping separate accounts during the marriage into which you deposited income earned during the marriage only means you kept community property in two separate accounts. So if you had to pay any expenses for the properties out of those funds or if you mingled rents or profits from the properties in your account, you probably created some community property interest in some portion of the equity. Determining how much is an accounting exercise that will need far more information than you could or would want to provide here.
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