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The Matrimonial StrategistLJN NewslettersNewsSections

Real Property Division for Unmarried Cohabitants

By MariaJose Delgado

Marriage-schmarriage, apparently. Family law practitioners, take note: According to a recent study by the National Center for Family and Marriage Research, the U.S. marriage rate is the lowest in over a century. Julissa Cruz, Marriage: More than a Century of Change, FP-13-13 (National Center for Family & Marriage Research) (2013) (available at http://bit.ly/1bv7OR6). Since 1970, the marriage rate has declined by almost 60% overall. The study details a less drastic decline among the educated, but nevertheless, a decline. Furthermore, family law attorneys in many states do not yet have the option of adding same-sex couples to their divorce practice. Same-sex couples in many states have no option but to cohabit unmarried, purchase property together, and intermingle their finances without the protections of an applicable divorce code.

Whether they cannot marry or choose not to marry, these unmarried, cohabiting couples embed themselves in years of financial entanglements only to find themselves in similar positions as our traditional family law clients: children in need of support, jointly titled property, mutual debt, and a desire to emerge from the relationship financially whole. They come to us for our expertise in child support, custody, and property division, as well as our saintly ability to maintain legal focus through the emotional minefields of the relationships' dissolution. Unlike our married clients who can opt to address custody, support, and property division under the umbrella of a divorce action in family court, unmarried cohabitants must litigate their property division through a separate, unrelated civil action.

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