What Does Hiding Assets in a Divorce Mean in California?
- States approach the division of marital property in one of three ways: the community property standard, the equitable division of all property and the equitable division of marital property. The state may classify marital property as community property. That renders all property acquired by either spouse during the marriage as one-half owned by each spouse. All property owned prior to the marriage or acquired during the marriage by gift or bequest remains the separate property of a spouse.
- When the court applies the equitable division of all property, it divides all property owned by either spouse, whether acquired prior to or during the marriage, among both spouses. The final approach is where the court divides all marital property equitably between the spouses.
- When a court divides assets equitably, the court attempts to divide assets in a manner that is fair. Therefore, the court takes the following factors into account: the age, education, background and earning capacities of both spouses; the duration of the marriage; the standard of living during the marriage; the income of both spouses and their vocational skills and employability; the source of funds used to purchase the assets; the health of the spouses; the assets, debts and the liabilities of the spouses; each spouse's needs; provisions for custody of any minor children; whether the distribution is in lieu of or in addition to alimony; each spouse's opportunity to acquire future income and assets; each spouse's contribution to the acquisition of, or enhancement of the value of, the existing marital assets; each party's contribution to the existing marital assets; each spouse's contribution as a homemaker to the family unit; and whether a spouse dissipated the marital assets.
- A court that divides marital assets according to the community property standard takes none of these factors into account. The court simply splits the marital assets 50-50. California is a community property state. Therefore, if a couple divorce in California, the court should split all marital property 50-50. The 50-50 split may not be possible, however, if one party hides assets from the court or the other spouse. A spouse may attempt to hide assets. In such a case, the other spouse does not truly receive half of the marital assets in a community property state, such as California. The spouse would only receive half of the marital assets that have not been hidden.
