Marriage of Davis

Summary

The wife told the husband on June 1, 2006 that she was done with the marriage. She gave him a ledger splitting household and personal expenses, and the couple kept separate accounts. Both stayed in the marital home until July 2011, and both incomes rose sharply in 2006. The trial court set separation at June 1, 2006, and the Court of Appeal affirmed. The Supreme Court held that separate residences are an indispensable threshold, along with at least one spouse's intent to end the marriage, objectively shown. It reserved whether separate residences under one roof could ever qualify. Reversed and remanded.

What it means for the financial analysis

The separation date is the cutoff for community accumulations, so a dispute over it can move a lot of income across the line. Separate bank accounts, expense ledgers, and cancelled credit cards no longer fix the date if the spouses still share a home. Build the tracing schedule around the date one spouse actually moved out, and show alternate cutoff scenarios when the other side argues for an earlier date.

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