Hello!
I’ve been digging through the forms and I haven’t seen this question so hopefully this will help other people. My wife and I are trying to come up with a marriage settlement agreement in a uncontested divorce. We are trying to figure out spousal support and how that relates to the division of our debts. I understand it’s tricky getting this in a settlement because since property is involved they usually end up non modifiable once written in the agreement. She isn’t able to take on her full half of the debt (half of 12000 so about 6000 in debt) and she needs monthly spousal support of around 350 a month since she’s minimum wage. We’ve been married a little under 6 years. I’m the higher earning spouse (nearly 40,000 compared to her 25000).
The first option that I can think of is to divide debt so as higher earning spouse (me) takes almost all of debt in the form of a buyout which the recipient owes back to the payer in the form of a lump sum that get’s subtracted out of the total alimony. Since property is mixed with alimony this will be a set agreement and non modifiable. What I don’t like about this agreement is the payer is locked into the agreement even if the supported spouse has a change in income and makes more money. How would the debt and alimony be separate if the supporting spouse has to take most of the debt and is expected to pay alimony? This creates allot of burden on the payer which is why the only option I can think of is to have the alimony reduced by the buyout of debt. Would it just end up being the payer takes most of the debt and only offers a smaller amount in alimony because of the pressure the debt puts on? Seems like a tricky subject when it comes to a diy divorce situation. People shouldn’t back themselves into a corner by getting stuck holding all the debt and paying alimony and not being able to modify the monthly payments should they lose their job or the recipient has a life change that puts them in a better position than the payer. What are your thoughts?