You and your spouse are thinking about divorce, and the most complicated situation that has arisen is that you are not sure what to do with your home. It seems easy to divide the financial assets that you have – bank accounts, investments, etc – but you’re not sure what happens with the house. It’s also one of your more valuable assets, so it’s important to get it right.
The good news is that you do have a few different options. Let’s explore what they are and the benefits they might provide.
Keeping the house together
First off, in rare cases, couples will keep a home together after they get divorced. They may do this because they have children who do not want to move, for instance, and keeping the home allows the kids to stay in their school and near their neighborhood friends. Couples may also choose to keep the house if the value of that property is increasing and they would prefer to sell it at a later date.
Selling the house
Speaking of selling the home, this is the most common solution that couples will choose. As noted above, dividing financial assets may be easy because they can simply be split between the two of you. A home is more complicated, but selling it means that you can split the proceeds from the sale. You convert that tangible asset into a financial one.
Buying the other person’s share
If one of you wants to keep the house and the other does not, selling it to a third party isn’t optimal. However, the spouse who does not want to keep the house will still want the money that they would have gotten in that sale. This means that the other person will usually have to buy out their share and refinance the mortgage. In this way, it is possible for one spouse to keep the house and the other to move on.
Exploring your options
No matter what you’d like to do, be sure, you know exactly what legal steps to take.
