Can You Keep Your House in a Divorce?

If you’re getting divorced and you and your spouse live in a home that you bought together, that means it’s a marital asset. You both have a right to it. In order to keep it, you may need to surrender other assets.

For instance, perhaps you and your spouse have an investment portfolio that’s worth as much as the home. Rather than dividing both, you could work together and agree that you get to keep the house if they get to keep the investments. You both get a similar asset and move forward, with your spouse cashing out part of their investment portfolio to buy a new home.

Do you need a new mortgage?

One important factor to keep in mind, though, is that you probably need a new mortgage. Though there are exceptions, the odds are high that your spouse is not going to want to be on that mortgage with you once they become your ex. If they stay on it, then they would be liable for your payments if you failed to make them, even years after the divorce.

This means that you will have to refinance. Do you qualify on your own? What will the change in cost be? Can you also afford taxes, maintenance and other bills? It’s important to ask all of these questions when dividing assets to make sure that you’re actually retaining something you want, not a home that you’re going to regret because it’s actually unaffordable without two incomes.

The answers to these questions, of course, are different for everyone. Just be sure you know exactly what steps to take as your divorce moves forward.