Your loved one may have worked meticulously on their estate plan to ensure that your inheritance went directly to your hands without outside interventions. Well, you may want to fulfill your loved one’s wishes and protect your inheritance with everything possible. That is, you do not want to lose it in a future divorce. With that being said, please follow along to find out how to keep your inheritance in a divorce and how one of the proficient Somerset County property division lawyers at the Law Offices of Kisha M. Hebbon, LLC can help ensure this protection.
In short, yes, it is very much possible to keep your inheritance in a divorce. This is because your inheritance may be considered a separate property owned solely by you. This is true regardless of whether you received this inheritance when you were already married to your spouse. Therefore, your inheritance may not undergo equitable distribution with the marital property owned by both you and your spouse.
However, this is so long as you did not accidentally comingle your inheritance with your marital property. For example, if you temporarily placed your inheritance funds in a joint bank account shared by you or your spouse. Or, if you inherited real property and added your spouse’s name to the title soon after. This is all to say that it is important not to combine your inheritance or any other separate property with your marital property throughout your marriage.
As an extra precaution to protect your inheritance, you may make a certain clause in your prenuptial agreement. Or if you are already married, you may include it in a postnuptial agreement. Within this clause, you may state that any inheritance you receive before or during your marriage will be considered your separate property. Thereby, it will not be subject to equitable distribution in a divorce.
It is also worth mentioning that you may make a similar clause for assets you anticipate possessing in the future. For instance, you may be aware that your loved one has set up a trust for you. With this, you may expect to receive these funds at some point during your marriage.
In the end, for such a clause to be legally-binding, it must be signed off on by both you and your spouse. This is not to mention the entire document must be considered valid and enforceable by the New Jersey family court. With this in mind, please contact one of the talented Somerset County prenuptial agreement lawyers to gain the emotional and legal support you require during this pivotal time. Our team at the Law Offices of Kisha M. Hebbon, LLC looks forward to helping you.
