Married 22 years. I’m 53. Wife is 46. Wife is stay at home but our kids are grown. I’m working now but I can retire now at 48K annually.
If I move and get another job after divorce, will that new income become part of the final alimony payments?
Future income and alimony
In California, except by agreement, the legal standard for retirement age is 65. That means that if you elect early retirement and deliberately decrease your income in doing so, your spouse can “impute” (attribute) your prior earning standard to you for purposes of determining the correct amount of alimony.
Hi Cristin,
I’m planning for retirement and am curious about support elimination/reduction.
I was married for 22 years and divorced my first wife in 2009, 11 years ago. I have since remarried and move out of California.
In the settlement my ex was awarded alimony and the family house we shared, I was awarded my 401k retirement. We could not agree on an end date for the support payments. She also later sued me and won for increased support.
I wish to retire in a little more than a year when I turn 65 and understand that California will allow me to do so but will have to petition the court for support modification due to my reduced income.
My desire is to use just enough of my 401k income to get buy until I get full Social Security benefits at 67½. To do so I will need to have the support greatly reduced or terminated.
My ex-wife is 4 ½ years older that I am, always worked low wage secretarial jobs, is eligible for Social Security now. Since I have no contact with her I do not know her current employment status.
My questions are:
- How soon before retirement should I start the process of requesting support modification?
- How will the support be calculated? Since I was awarded my 401k in the divorce, in my mind my income should be zero for support calculation purposes.
- I need to find a new attorney. The one I used prior has since retired and wasn’t really on his “A” game on our last encounter. How do I go about finding a good “man friendly” attorney in my area?
- What can I expect when I go back to court?
Thank you
Hello–I’m trying to figure out if I have to pay alimony. married 20 years, wife will have $1.5 stock/cash and I’ll have about $400,000 after divorce, plus we have rental income which will be split. I made quite a bit of money during covid, but now I’m 64 and my self employed business is off 90% so income close to zero for work. I actually don’t have income to pay her spousal support and she has a part time job. If you add in a factor/$ for her assets she makes as much as I do or more. Her attorney wants 25% non taxed if my business starts making money in the future until I die and 25% of any business that I open in future. I thought a court would base it off my current income or last 2 years, but since its zero now I don’t know how they could calculate it. I may make $25-$50k in 2024 hopefully. If I make $50k would I have to give her 25% of that? Or if I make $10,000- a year, she wants $2500? Also thought it odd that someone is asking for a future percentage of a business that I own/operate. Its a small mortgage company so I’m basically self employed.
Hello Cristin,
I had a judgement ordered to pay spousal support in 2007. I am getting ready to retire in 2024 and will only have income from pension and social security. I also have a 401k savings plan. With my reduction in income due to retirement, can the money in my 401k, which is my sole property as agreed in the judgement, be used to calculate my monthly income when I ask the court to change the spousal support order? And if so, how is that calculated since 401k is a draw as needed savings? TYIA.