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Originally Posted by martian51  What is the name of your state (only U.S. law)? Washington
My wife and I have been married 24 years. We are 51 years of age. I make 2/3 of our current income. She has worked 57.5% time for 20 years. We will need to sell our house to get divorced. She has diagnosed depression and diabetes. She is also a talented word processor. We have one large credit card debt. Is a 70/30 split on the house proceeds within the law so that I do not have to carry an alimony payment?
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The two of you can agree to anything that you want to agree to as far as the property settlement is concerned.
However, you need to be aware that marital assets (that must be split) include real estate, cars, bank accounts, retirement accounts (the amount that accrued during the marriage), stocks, bonds and any other assets.
You also need to be aware that alimony paid periodically, is tax deductible and property settlements absolutely are NOT. In other words, the IRS isn't going to let you deduct "lump sum" alimony, because they are going to consider it part of your property settlement, and they also are not going to let you pay off the property settlement in installments and call it alimony either.
Therefore, giving her a greater share of marital assets, in lieu of alimony, would actually cost you more money in the long run, than paying the
same amount of money in alimony, over time. However, since you have been married for 24 years, permanent alimony is a possibility, therefore it might be wiser to give her a bigger property settlement rather than risk paying alimony for 30 or 40 years.
At the same time, if she marries again (and the divorce decree states that alimony ends upon remarriage or cohabitation) you would be off the hook for alimony too...so there is that factor to consider.
Your marginal tax bracket is probably going to jump up once you divorce.
Basically, you need to consider all of the factors before you decide...including the stability of your industry and job.
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