What is the name of your state?New Jersey. My wife and sister re-opened a restaurant that their parents ran years ago 3 months after we got married. The restaurant was not running for over 7 years because the father never paid the sales tax to the state. That was eventually taken care of and the mother tried but couldn't sell the building or the restaurant for those 7 years. My wife and I, as well as her sister, put in a significant amount of money to restock and renovate but now we're getting a divorce. The restaurant was re-opened under the existing corporation that the mother is the sole share holder but they structured it verbally as if the girls owned it. They only paid the mother a fixed small rent every month and they kept the profits. The girls do not own any shares. The running restaurant has increased the value of the building at least 200k since openening and makes a profit. In my divorce, am I entitled to something here? Shouldn't this restaurant be included as a marital asset even though it's structured as a corp? Any help would be appreciated. They're saying that I'm not entitled to anything, even the initial investment. I ordered the food for them every Monday for the first year, I setup and kept the books, I negotiated discounts with vendors, I setup and did the payroll, I bartended and washed dishes, basically did every job except cook. My 'paycheck' from the corp was put back into the business to help pay off some of the other debt.
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