New Jersey has many laws that may affect your divorce. But four areas will usually have the greatest impact on your children, income and property:
These are different from the legal grounds used to obtain a divorce, such as irreconcilable differences or adultery. These laws determine what may happen after the divorce begins.
New Jersey law makes the physical and emotional welfare of children the court’s highest priority. The law encourages children to maintain frequent and continuing contact with both parents when doing so is safe and in their best interests. It also provides that mothers and fathers have equal custody rights.
Custody has two parts:
A court may order joint custody, sole custody with appropriate parenting time for the other parent, or another arrangement serving the child’s best interests.
Judges consider factors including:
New Jersey does not currently require judges to award 50/50 parenting time. Equal parenting time may be appropriate in some families, but there is no automatic schedule. The result must be based on the individual child’s best interests.
Unlike alimony, New Jersey does have formal Child Support Guidelines. The guidelines use financial and parenting information to estimate how much each parent should contribute toward the child’s needs.
The calculation may consider:
The parent with more parenting time does not necessarily pay all the child’s expenses. Both parents remain responsible for supporting their children.
The guideline calculation is an important starting point, but it may not resolve every expense. Parents may also need to address activities, unreimbursed medical expenses, college costs and other needs. A judge may approve a different amount when the guidelines would be inappropriate, but the reason for the deviation must be explained.
New Jersey does not have an official alimony calculator. A judge must evaluate the circumstances of the marriage using the factors contained in the alimony statute.
Those factors include:
New Jersey recognizes four types of alimony:
For marriages lasting less than 20 years, alimony generally cannot continue longer than the marriage unless exceptional circumstances exist.
That does not mean alimony will automatically last as long as the marriage. The amount and duration depend on the facts. Informal calculations may be used during negotiations, but they are not New Jersey law.
New Jersey divides marital property through a process called equitable distribution.
“Equitable” means fair. It does not necessarily mean that every asset and debt must be divided exactly 50/50.
The court generally follows three steps:
Marital property may include:
Property does not automatically belong only to the spouse whose name appears on the account, title or deed.
Assets owned before the marriage and certain gifts or inheritances may be excluded from distribution. However, tracing, commingling and increases in value can make the analysis more complicated.
Judges consider factors such as the length of the marriage, each spouse’s economic circumstances, contributions to the marriage, income and earning capacity, tax consequences and the need of a parent to occupy the marital home.
Custody, support, alimony and property division should not be negotiated in isolation.
A parenting schedule may affect child support. Keeping the marital home may affect the amount of cash available to divide. Receiving substantial assets may affect each spouse’s financial position during an alimony negotiation. A settlement that appears favorable in one area may create a problem somewhere else.
That is why you need to understand the complete financial and parenting picture before accepting a deal.
You do not need to memorize every New Jersey divorce statute. But you should understand the basic rules governing:
After 38 years of practicing New Jersey divorce law, I can tell you that informed clients are usually better prepared to recognize a reasonable agreement and avoid expensive mistakes.
My free Divorce Smarter Course explains these issues and the rest of the New Jersey divorce process in plain English.
Steve