D-I-V-O-R-C-E Question

[mjshira]

Since there is no absolute expectation of payment how can there be division of payment? Seems like the company is right and this should be outside the settlement. She should have no claim on future income that is not expected unless she maintaining custody of children. If a person makes a given amount of money in period one (present) and ten times that in period ten (future) she should have to take him to court to pursue a higher settlement. If she is being this petty, this man, no matter how sad, needs to be defensive of his assets as she is going to get a lot of them anyway just as a function of it being a 50/50 state.

[Dottore]

James:

She is only claiming a half interest in the deferred comp. that has accrued at the time of the settlement.

The reason there is no absolute expectation of payment is, as I understand it, a very real risk that the company will tank - and the deferred compensation is not entirely secure in such situation - although I note what gmeteer has said about this upthread.

[MRM]

It seems to me that part of the marital estate is the inchoate right to receive defered compensation from the husband's employer. Both parties agree that any future payments should be split equally; the only question is the correct vehicle to ensure the payments are made correctly, if they are received at all.

I don't know what the correct vehicle would be, probably as suggested above some sort of assignment of benefit or payment, but it should be a simple matter of getting the right form, going back to court long enough to get a judge to order the assignment or whatever, and then serving it on the company. It will probably require some more lawyer time, but I would think that if your friend limits the scope of representation to this one issue, they exes have an agreement on paper for the lawyerto review, it would be relatively inexpensive to have the lawyer do the right paperwork.

[Dan in Pasadena]

Originally Posted by red-beard

Cash her out, get it done, move on, don't look back. There is no other sane way.

Yup, agree wholeheartedly.

I went through this about 7-8 years ago. I work for a large public agency so there was no issue of it "going out of business" but some of the best advice I got was come to a resolution NOW. DO NOT sign any agreement to give her X number of dolars later.

I ended up transferring a lot of money from an IRA I had to one she set up for herself with the same family of mutual funds. I don't know about elsewhere but in California we were a "marriage of long duration" - over ten years so I had to not only give her a lot of this deferred comp but also take on a ton of debt she had incurred during the separate/reconcile/serparate ordeal of 2-1/3 years. Of course she had not serviced that debt adequately and when it was transferred to me?.............EEK........it was at 23.9%. I about "shat" as the expression goes. It hurt and it hurt worse because I was stupid. I waited to transfer the funds as long as possible out of regret, bitterness, whatever and because the value of the market was dropping I ended up paying her with a greater number of shares than it would have taken if I'd just acted quicker.

When the market rebounded she got more than she otherwise would have because she had a greater number of shares of mine. BUT...I am financially free and because of her earnings and the age of our children i didn't have to pay spousal nor child support. Almost 8 years later and i have recovered but I will never have the financial position I once had.