Legal Question in Credit and Debt Law in Maine

Re: Marriage debt

In the strictest sense, spouses do not automatically become personally liable for each other's debts. However, in reality, there are many ways in which marriage will blurr the distinction.

You might want to think of debt as pre-marital or incurred during marriage and think of assets as pre-marital or accumulated during marriage.

Pre-marital debt of another spouse may take money away from the marital economic unit, causing the non-debtor spouse to pay for more of the necessities of life, essentially underwriting the other's pre-marital debt. If a pre-marital asset is conveyed jointly between spouses during marriage, then that asset is subject to jeopardy to pay for pre-marital debts. Often couples will refinance during marriage to pay off pre-marital debt, effectively converting the debt to marital, joint debt. Finally, significant debt incurred by one spouse during marriage is often only incurred with the other spouse as a co-signor, or since there is already significant joint assets that may be at risk, the nondebtor spouse has a strong interest in seeing to it that the debt is resolved successfully.