When a marriage is disintegrating, a spouse may start removing marital property before an impending divorce. Spouses who do this are often motivated by anger, spite, or greed, but their real intentions are to conceal the property from the property division process in divorce.
Sometimes they destroy or use up the property,
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What Is Marital Property?
How Is The Dissipation Of Assets Addressed In Texas Divorce Cases?
Any property you acquire during the marriage is marital property except gifts, inheritance, and personal injury compensation. Property spouses acquire during marriage includes cars, boats, houses, jewelry, artwork, furniture, and investment properties. All this has to be divided if the spouses want to get a divorce.
A court can divide the property but spouses are allowed to amicably divide the property fairly and equitably during divorce. But it’s not unusual for couples to engage in a drawn-out battle for property.
Removing Marital Property Before Divorce
What Is Wasteful Dissipation Of Marital Assets In Texas?
A spouse may sell or destroy valuable marital property if they are about to file for divorce. They sell the property so that the other spouse does not get a share of the property during the divorce process. This is likely to happen if one spouse is wealthy and is the breadwinner of the family because the breadwinner may believe that all the marital assets belong to the breadwinner.
A spouse may prevent the other spouse from accessing certain property by removing or dissipating marital property from the house or from the other spouse’s business. In some instances, spouses drain the bank accounts or sell the marital property and hide the proceeds.
- Here are signs your spouse may be dissipating your marital assets
- Your spouse becomes secretive or unusually controlling when handling family finances
- Your spouse develops a taste for gambling
- Your spouse starts using drugs or is addicted to drugs
- Your spouse is spending down cash balances in a business
- Your spouse seems to always go on vacations
Your spouse is spending money on a relationship with a third party
How To Protect Your Assets
What Is An Example Of Dissipation Of Marital Assets?
After you determine that your spouse is out for revenge and is trying to remove marital property, you need to take steps to protect your assets before the divorce process begins. Protect assets by doing the following:
- You can put personal property items in storage somewhere safe before you inform the other spouse that you are thinking of filing for divorce
- You can open a separate bank account and transfer your money to it. Ensure that you only transfer your fair share or you might be accused of dissipation of assets.
- You can always seek a protective order that stops the other spouse from dissipating assets to third parties if protecting them by yourself is not an option.
How Do You Prove Asset Dissipation?
You will need the services of a forensic accountant to help you prove that your spouse is dissipating marital property. A forensic accountant investigates by sifting through your financial records to identify anything suspicious. The amount has to be substantial for you to have any chance of success in court.