It can be tempting to move out as soon as you decide to get divorced, even if your divorce isn’t finalized.
If you file your divorce paperwork today, and your former partner signs off on everything, your divorce will still take at least three months to be finalized due to Washington’s cooling down period. And the reality is that many divorces take more than 90 days to settle. Disputes about division of property, parenting, debts, and other issues can take months to resolve. It’s understandable to not want to continue living with your partner once you’ve decided it’s over.
But there can be serious consequences to moving out before your divorce is finalized if you don’t take legal steps to protect yourself. Before you move out of the family home, you’ll want to consider how taking this step might impact your financial goals, child custody goals, and your goal to have an amicable divorce.
If you have children or pets, moving out without a visitation or custody plan can lead to issues. And if you co-own your home, have a mortgage, or share a lease, you may be legally responsible for ongoing payments and expenses, and liable for any damages. If you and your partner have shared debts, those will still need to be paid. Living apart before your divorce is finalized can also make communication more difficult and can lead to additional conflict.
The good news is that there are legal and formal ways you can protect your custody rights and your property–and still choose to move out before your divorce is final. Yet, you might want to speak to a divorce lawyer in Washington state at Truce Law before you take this major step.
In this article, we’ll explore some key issues that can come up when you move out before your divorce is final, and ways you can prevent problems.
- How Does Child Custody Work if I Move Out Before My Divorce is Final?
- How Does Child Support Work if I Move Out Before My Divorce is Final?
- What Happens if I Move Out of a Co-Owned Family Home Before the Divorce is Final?
- What Happens if I Move out of an Apartment when I’m on the Lease if I’m Getting a Divorce?
- What Can I Do if My Ex and I Share a Car and We’re in the Process of Getting Divorced?
- How Can I Ensure I Have Access to Shared Property if I’m Moving Out Before Our Divorce is Finalized?
- What Happens to Pets if I Move Out Before Our Divorce is Finalized?
- How Can I Protect My Credit and While Waiting for my Divorce to be Finalized?
- Next Steps
How Does Child Custody Work if I Move Out Before My Divorce is Final?
If you are planning to move out before your divorce is final and you have children, you and your former partner may need to make child custody decisions sooner rather than later.
The choices you make will depend on your long-term parenting goals. Ideally, you’ll want your temporary custody arrangements to reflect the custody plan you hope for post-divorce. If your custody case ends up before a judge, judges typically favor custody arrangements that minimally disrupt the children’s routines and current lives.
The process of filing for divorce and finalizing your divorce can take months. The routines you establish before your case goes to court can have an impact on your children and your child custody case.
If you’re planning to move out of the family home and have children, you’ll want to take steps to establish a written temporary custody plan and visitation routine as soon as possible. One way to do this is to work with your former partner to create a temporary parenting plan before you move out. Your divorce lawyers or a mediator can help you do this. This temporary plan can be submitted to the court when you file for divorce.
When you move out, you can also file a Motion for Temporary Family Law Order and Restraining Order, where you submit a proposed parenting plan to the court. This is usually used in situations where both parties can’t agree about temporary custody or when co-parents are high-conflict or aren’t on speaking terms. While divorce papers and final parenting plans can take months before they are finalized by the court, this motion moves through the court system more quickly, usually within a couple of weeks.
Finally, when you move out of the family home, it’s important to consider where you’ll be moving to. If your new living arrangements don’t include a room for the children to stay, or if you plan to live with roommates, family, or even a new partner, you could face additional challenges when seeking temporary or permanent custody, especially if your former partner raises questions about the children’s safety.
When considering living arrangements, consider seeking a living arrangement that would accommodate visitation or custody with your children—whatever your goals might be.
Finally, if you are moving out of the family home because you are concerned about your safety or your children’s safety, you might have more options and rights, including the right to seek immediate custody orders that will allow you to take the children with you. You may also have access to additional community resources to secure safe living arrangements for your children and pets. You can find a list of domestic violence resources here.
How Does Child Support Work if I Move Out Before My Divorce is Final?
Both parents are required by law to support their children. If you will move out before your divorce is final, you might be required to pay child support.
A parent who files a Motion for Temporary Family Law Order and Restraining Order that involves child custody will include child support worksheets in the paperwork. And if your partner has moved out of the family home, you have the right to seek child support.
Alternatively, co-parents can work with a mediator or their collaborative divorce lawyers to help them work out a temporary child support agreement that works for both parties while the couple works to finalize their divorce.
What Happens if I Move Out of a Co-Owned Family Home Before the Divorce is Final?
While moving out of a co-owned family home won’t affect your ownership of the property, it could impact your finances. For example, if you and your partner have a mortgage, you’ll still be responsible for paying your share of the mortgage, even if you move out.
You may also still be responsible for paying your share of the utility bills, homeowner’s insurance, property tax, and repairs. And if you are the primary earner in your household, you could be responsible for covering all, or nearly all, of these expenses.
For many individuals, paying both a mortgage (and the upkeep of a co-owned home) and paying for other accommodations isn’t financially feasible. This is why many couples choose to continue to live together in the family home the while they figure out whether to sell, refinance the family home in one person’s name, or co-own the family home after their divorce.
Moving out before your divorce is finalized can also impact your access to property that remains in the home and documents you might need to file for divorce.
If you still plan to move out, here are some things you can do:
- Consider speaking to your partner to work out a temporary arrangement that includes access to property. You’ll also want to work out a temporary budget or financial plan. For example, if you will move out of the family home, will you expect your former partner who continues to live in the home to pay the full mortgage or a greater share of the mortgage?
- If you and your partner cannot negotiate a temporary arrangement outside of court with a mediator or your divorce lawyer, consider seeking a Motion for Temporary Family Law Order where you can formally make requests through the court. In the motion you can ask to stay in the family home, formally note that you’ll be moving out, formally itemize personal property and ask for access and protection for this property, and even formally divide debts and household expenses, including your mortgage.
Alternatively, you can speak to the divorce lawyers in Washington state at Truce Law, who can help you find an amicable path forward.
What Happens if I Move out of an Apartment when I’m on the Lease if I’m Getting a Divorce?
If your name is on the lease, you could be liable for rental payments and your credit could be affected if your partner breaks the lease, fails to pay rent after you move out, or damages the property.
The Landlord-Tenant Act only allows you to break a lease for specific reasons, including military service, or when a landlord plans to change a rental policy to exclude children (RCW 59.18.200), failure of the landlord to make repairs in a timely manner (RCW 59.18.090), domestic violence (RCW 59.18.575), and threats from a neighbor or landlord with a firearm that result in arrest (RCW 59.18.352 and RCW 59.18.354).
Before you move out, you may want to speak to your partner and your landlord about the possibility of re-drafting the lease only in your partner’s name if your former partner plans to remain in the apartment. And if both of you want to move out, you’ll want to speak to your landlord to see if they are willing to work something out with you.
Some landlords might be willing to work with couples if they agree to find another tenant. Breaking a lease on a shared apartment can create credit issues for both parties on the lease. And leaving your partner to pay the rent when they can’t afford it on their own can be a recipe for financial chaos.
However, if you need to leave the apartment or break the lease because of domestic violence or sexual assault, you may have additional legal protections when it comes to breaking your lease or moving out. However, you may need to provide supporting documentation (the restraining order) and inform your landlord in writing.
If you cannot work out an arrangement with your partner or landlord, you can make a formal request in a Motion for Temporary Family Law Order asking the judge to formalize who will be responsible for paying rent or lease payments before your divorce is finalized.
However, it is important to keep in mind that if your name is on the lease, you could still end up on the hook if your partner doesn’t pay. In some situations, it might be best to wait for the lease to end, or for your divorce to be finalized, before moving out.
What Can I Do if My Ex and I Share a Car and We’re in the Process of Getting Divorced?
If your car was purchased while you were married, the car might be considered marital property and therefore a shared asset, even if your name isn’t on the title. If you and your partner need to share the car, and plan to live apart, things can get complicated.
If you can work out an agreement about who will use the car or create a schedule for use, this is the best-case scenario. Other options include selling the car to your spouse or agreeing to use marital funds to purchase a second vehicle. If only one spouse will be driving a co-owned vehicle, you might want to speak to your family law attorney about taking additional steps to protect the non-driving partner from liability.
If you and your partner cannot decide who gets the car or can’t agree about a schedule for use, you can ask a judge to issue an order through a Motion for Temporary Family Law Order.
Most couples choose to maintain the status quo when it comes to co-owned vehicles. Especially if the family has two cars. If one spouse typically used one car more than the other, that spouse will usually keep the car. Yet, you might want to speak to your divorce lawyer in Washington state about how to go about titling, insurance, and protecting both parties from liability, if only one person will be using the car.
How Can I Ensure I Have Access to Shared Property if I’m Moving Out Before Our Divorce is Finalized?
Sometimes the decision to move out happens so quickly that property and important documents might accidentally get left behind in the shared home. The best way to avoid this situation is to avoid moving out without taking steps to protect your property or important documents. This can include making a list of important items and making copies of important documents. It can include seeking a Motion for Temporary Family Law Order that can protect your property from being destroyed by an angry or vengeful ex.
If you cannot agree about who owns what, you can either ask a judge to make a temporary order to ensure your continued access to the property until your property is formally divided in your divorce. For example, if you both own a boat, or other recreational properties, you can either work out a schedule on your own or ask a judge to decide in a Motion for Temporary Family Law Order.
If you and your partner are on relatively good terms, working out an agreement about property is sufficient in most cases. The amicable divorce lawyers in Washington state at Truce Law can help.
What Happens to Pets if I Move Out Before Our Divorce is Finalized?
Many pet parents choose to work out an informal pet custody agreement if one partner plans to move out before the divorce is finalized. Yet, if you and your partner cannot agree about anything, it’s important to note that in Washington state, pets are considered property.
If one partner files a Motion for Temporary Family Law Order and includes the pets as requested property, one partner can lose custody or visitation with their pets. And there’s always the risk that the partner making the request could lose their petition, meaning their former partner might end up with ownership of the pets.
The best-case scenario for all involved, is for both parties to sit down and work out a pet custody and visitation agreement. If you and your partner can’t agree, a divorce mediator or the collaborative divorce lawyers at Truce Law in Washington state can help.
How Can I Protect My Credit and While Waiting for my Divorce to be Finalized?
If you and your partner share credit cards, lines of credit, have a mortgage, or monthly payments for co-owned property, it’s important that you work out how you and your partner will continue to pay these debts, especially if you plan to move out of the family home. Even if you move out, you’ll still be legally responsible for any shared debts and shared expenses. Miscommunication and misunderstandings can lead to missed payments, damaged credit, and ongoing disputes during divorce.
Instead, if you and your partner are on relatively good terms, you’ll want to make a list of all shared debts and work out how you’ll continue to pay these debts if you’ll be living apart. In some cases, debt reconsolidation approaches, or refinancing options could help you more formally divide responsibility for debts.
These approaches tend to offer the greatest legal protections, especially if they remove the non-paying partner’s name from promissory notes. You may need to continue to pay shared debts for big ticket items like your mortgage until you work out a final divorce agreement, sell the home, or refinance the home in one partner’s name. A temporary agreement can help you plan financially.
A divorce lawyer can help you work out a debt division plan that works. The key thing to keep in mind is that you may still be legally responsible for any debt in your name, even if a judge orders the other spouse to pay the debt. The best-case scenario is to work with your divorce lawyer, financial planner, and even with a bankruptcy lawyer, if needed, to ensure that debt is in the name of the party who will be responsible for paying it.
Next Steps
The breakdown of your marriage can be unexpected and sudden, especially if there is the discovery of infidelity, if arguments become unsustainable, or if communication stops. In some circumstances, it may be necessary to move out of a shared home immediately, especially in situations where there has been domestic violence. In this case, you may have additional protections. However, in most circumstances, you might want to take steps to protect your rights and finances before you move out, especially if you have children.
The divorce lawyers in Washington state at Truce Law can help. Our divorce attorneys can help you and your partner find out of court solutions to issues that can arise if you plan to move out.
This article is for educational purposes only and does not constitute legal advice. Every situation is unique. For guidance specific to your circumstances, consult a licensed family law attorney in your area.