The income you earned before you filed for divorce is considered marital property, which is part of the division of property. Your income after your divorce is used to calculate child support and spousal maintenance but is otherwise yours to keep. The structure of your pay has little consequence on your divorce if you receive a straightforward salary or hourly wages. With other forms of compensation, the timing of your divorce could determine whether your spouse can claim a portion of that income:

1. Bonuses: In most cases, a work bonus qualifies as marital property if you received it before you filed for divorce. You must make sure that your spouse does not double count the bonus by claiming it as marital property and including it as part of your income when calculating support. An exception may be a bonus with a clawback provision, which states that you must return the bonus if you are no longer with your employer before a set date. You could argue that you should not include the bonus in the division of property because you could lose it. If it is part of the division of property, you should include a section in your agreement stating that your spouse must repay their share of the bonus if you are forced to return it for reasons beyond your control.
2. Commissions: Some employees receive a commission for work completed in place of or in addition to their salary. If you know that commission pay is coming, you can try to file for divorce in advance so that it is not marital property. However, your spouse may argue that the commission is marital property because you completed the work related to the commission while you were still married. If you cannot agree with your spouse, a divorce court will need to decide whether the commission is marital property.
3. Stock Options: Illinois divorce law states that stock options that you receive during your marriage are assumed to be marital property, regardless of whether they are vested or if you know their actual value at the time of the divorce. A divorce agreement can set a provision that you will pay your spouse a share of these stocks when you exercise your option on them. Stock options are not marital property if they were a gift or part of an inheritance, which does not apply to stock options you received through work.

Contact a St. Charles Divorce Attorney

Much of your negotiating during divorce will focus on identifying your marital properties, determining their value, and dividing them between you and your spouse. A Kane County divorce lawyer at Goostree Law Group can ensure that your division of property is accurate and meets your needs. To schedule a free consultation, call 630-584-4800.

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Divorcing parents in Illinois do not negotiate child support payments in the same way they may negotiate spousal maintenance. With spousal maintenance, you may need to decide whether payments are necessary and how long they should last. With child support, those issues are predetermined. Child support is mandatory and will last until all of your children have turned 18 or graduated from high school. The formula for calculating child support is also set because the income shares table will tell you the base child support obligation that you share. However, there are still factors regarding child support that you can control.

Establishing Your Income

When calculating child support payments, parents may disagree on their respective incomes. Your income level affects the total child support obligation between the two of you and how much of that obligation you will pay. You need to accurately report your income while making sure that your spouse is not underreporting their income. Your spouse may accuse you of misrepresenting your income. If you cannot agree on each other’s incomes, a divorce court will examine your case and decide for you.

Division of Parenting Time

The child support formula changes if you have what Illinois classifies as a shared parenting arrangement, which is each parent having at least 146 nights with the children. This is a 60-40 division of parenting time. The revised formula increases the overall child support obligation but expects both parents to pay for most of their own child-related expenses. As a result, the child support payments between parents are less than with parents who do not meet the requirements for a shared parenting arrangement.

Addiction comes in many forms, whether it involves alcohol, drugs, sex or other excessive behavior. People dealing with addiction can become abusive towards the ones they love and betray their trust. It is commendable if you have recovered from an addiction, but your spouse does not have to forgive you for your past actions. You may end up divorcing despite your efforts to improve yourself. While this may be a devastating turn of events, you cannot let yourself relapse into your addiction.

Addiction and Divorce

Your marriage and your family may have been your primary motivations during your recovery. You want to be someone that your spouse and children can rely on, and that idea gave you the strength to seek help and change yourself. The divorce takes away your spouse as a pillar of support. It is also possible that the divorce court will view your history of addiction as a potential danger to your children, which could affect the allocation of parental responsibilities. Divorce is a stressful and sometimes frightening process for anyone. You may be tempted to return to your addiction because it feels comfortable and will take your mind off your anxiety. A relapse would be disastrous for yourself and your divorce. It would likely limit your parenting time with your children and distract you from what you need to accomplish in your divorce.

Preventing Relapse

You should realize the risk of relapse during your divorce and take steps to protect your health:

Most properties that you obtain during your marriage are classified as marital properties in the event of a divorce, such as items you have purchased and the income you have earned. Gifts and inheritances are the exceptions to this rule. Inheritances are assets given to you through an estate planning document, such as a trust or will, or after the probate process. Even if you inherit an asset while you are married, it is usually a nonmarital property as long as you can prove that the person who gave it to you intended for you to be the sole owner of the property. However, your decision on what to do with a property after you inherit it can make it marital property.

Commingling and Transmuting

An inherited property can become marital property if you commingle it with other marital properties or involve your spouse in its ownership or management. For instance:

• Inherited money becomes marital property if you put it into a joint account with other marital money; or
• Inherited real estate becomes marital property if you refinance the property and your spouse cosigns on the agreement.

In these situations, your inherited properties are either transmuted into marital properties through your actions or become indistinguishable from your martial properties because they are commingled. As marital property, your inheritance could be divided between you and your divorcing spouse or given to you in exchange for other marital properties. As nonmarital property, your inheritance would not count towards the equitable division of property.

A prenuptial agreement is a useful document to have in the unfortunate event that you ever decide to divorce. With all of the turmoil in a divorce, it can be a relief to have some of the negotiation work already complete. However, a prenup should not be a static agreement that you do not examine unless a divorce occurs. Your financial means and needs have changed since your marriage began. At worst, you may discover that your agreement is obsolete once it comes time to use it. You should periodically check your prenuptial agreement during your marriage and update it if necessary.

Division of Property

A prenuptial agreement can list which items will be included in your division of marital property and who will receive them. Many of the properties listed in your original prenuptial agreement are nonmarital properties because you owned them before your marriage. When modifying your agreement you can:

• Add major properties that you have accumulated since the start of your marriage;
• Remove properties that you no longer own; and
• Update the value of the properties that were already in the agreement.

For instance, it is common for a spouse’s business to increase in value since the time when they created the agreement. The division of property in the agreement may now be unbalanced because of that change in value. The spouses can renegotiate whether they will share ownership of the business if they divorce or agree to give the other spouse more properties as compensation.