You were the owner before the marriage, and you thought you would recover your entire property? Have you received an inheritance and think you don’t have to share it? In reality, the rules are more complicated than that. Me Chloé Belloy, family law lawyer, tells us that there are a lot of legal subtleties that can disrupt divorce.
Even incorrigible romantics know it: when you get married, you have to consider the possibility that one day you could divorce. Couples know the unfavorable statistics, and the big questions that will then arise, from child custody to the division of property. But contentious or not, a divorce is often synonymous with unpleasant surprises. Firstly emotional of course, but also legal and administrative, especially when we know that most couples are very little informed about their marital rights and duties.
And even when you know the ins and outs of your matrimonial regime, certain subtleties remain unknown to the general public… and it’s a cold shower when you discover them in the middle of a divorce procedure that has already started. And this, even in a separation where the spouses agree. But there is one unpleasant surprise in particular, which seems to be the most frequent during a divorce, according to Maître Chloé Belloy: “It’s really a big point of tension.”explains the lawyer specializing in family law. And for good reason, (almost) no one knows this mechanism, which can nevertheless be applied.whatever the matrimonial regime” of the couple. This is the system of claims and rewards, namely “transfers that there may be between the different masses”.
Under the regime of community reduced to acquets, which is the default regime in France when a marriage contract is not signed, the common assets are distributed equally between the two spouses: “Basically, everything you had before marriage remains your own property, and everything you have after marriage is shared 50-50, except what you receive by inheritance or donation. Except that in fact, there are lots of subtleties.” Indeed, if the masses mix, everything becomes complicated. “For example, you sell real estate that you had before the marriage, then you spend these funds in your life together. You will not be able to ask to recover this money, because it will be impossible to differentiate one euro from another euro”explains Me Belloy.
To try to get it back, you then have to prove where every penny went: “a lot of people are disillusioned” faced with these meticulous calculations, which require tracing years of expenses throughout the duration of the marriage. Of the “mixtures of money that we don’t think of”and which can therefore create great frustration for couples, whether at the time of divorce or even death. “People say, ‘I had this before marriage, so I’ll get this back.’ Be careful, it’s not that simple.”warns the lawyer.
In the case of a couple in which one of the two spouses had an apartment before getting married, this is effectively separate property. But where the subtlety comes in is that “if this apartment is rented, all rents that fall after the marriage enter the community and will therefore be divided in two.” Same if one of the spouses does work or repays a real estate loan on their own property: “If you pay for it with your salaries, you are going to owe a recompense to the community because you financed your own property with common funds.” Reward means repaying the money invested by the community, and therefore compensating the other spouse. And the amounts can very quickly climb without us having planned it.
For Me Chloé Belloy, this lack of information poses a problem and can generate very unpleasant surprises. But “beyond understanding the legal mechanisms, there is such a taboo on money in the couple and on these subjects that we do not consider romantic, that it is always complicated when sharing”. Besides, as the saying goes, shoemakers are not the best shod: “With our lawyer clients who are divorcing, things don’t necessarily go better. They don’t discuss it either.” If you find out about “all these super complicated little subtleties” remains very important, the main thing seems rather to address the issues that irritate a couple… before it is too late.
