The married way of life can also be the usual for Pendente Lite Alimony | Fox Rothschild LLP

Under the guise of “living in two houses costs more than one” or “if the parties live separately, both can no longer enjoy the marital way of life”, the judge will decide in favor of pendente lite (ie provisional) applications for support try to arbitrarily cut the budget of one or both parties in order to set a temporary support figure. Well, for the most part, these concepts are not necessarily wrong. But there are extreme income / high net worth cases where this may not be the case (except perhaps for the parties’ ability to save at the same level as they did during marriage during the pending divorce). Vacation expenses (“they don’t have to go on vacation” during divorce), housing, food, entertainment, car repairs, savings and investments, charitable donations, etc. when a judge cuts a budget to justify a number. If a judge makes this arbitrary budget cut in extreme income / high wealth (or any case) cases, can that be changed at the time of the trial, and if so, what standard should a court use?

This question was answered in the unreported (non-precedent) appeal procedure Weidel versus Weidel decided on November 18, 2021 per month in vehicle costs. The parties also agreed that the husband would pay an additional benefit of at least $ 3,000 per month or more than $ 10,000 per month retrospectively as of February 1, 2015, which will be quantified in the process. Your consent order also provided for the following:

… The parties agree that [p]Plaintiff’s Pendente Lite budget cannot be less than $ 10,000 per month or more than $ 17,000 per month and will seek to reach an agreement in the final settlement of the case. If the [c]Ours is required to resolve the matter at the time of the final hearing, [p]Plaintiff’s total Pendente Lite budget must not be less than $ 10,000 per month or more than $ 17,000 per month, including expenses on Lists “A”, “B” and “C”. This budgetary determination by the parties or the court will take effect on February 1, 2015, with [d]Defendant receives credit for all payments that
he made. . . .

After a 20-day trial, the trial judge found that the wife needed $ 18,007 a month to be somewhat comparable to the marital lifestyle. However, the judge first reduced that amount to $ 17,000 in accordance with the consent order, then reduced the amount by the $ 7,000 per month the husband had paid, and concluded that the wife would be retroactive to Jan. February 2015 should receive an additional 9,000 US dollars After her supplementary opinion, the judge changed her decision on her own initiative. Specifically, the judge awarded the wife an additional $ 163,184 grant, equivalent to $ 3,472 per month for the forty-seven months of pendente lite, $ 7,000 husband agreed to pay pendente lite, and $ 2,900 in income attributed to the claimant. This decision, which may be compatible with the Consent Order, ignored the marital lifestyle.

The Appeals Chamber lifted the disregard of marital life when calculating the loan. The rationale started with the general rule in a case called Mallamo, Pendente-Lite assignments can be changed after the exam as they are usually determined through the submission of certifications and without the benefit of an exam. The justification was continued with an introduction to the lifestyle topic:

The Supreme Court has emphasized the goal of spousal maintenance to “help the supported spouse achieve a lifestyle that is reasonably comparable to that enjoyed during the marriage with the supporting spouse”. Crews vs. Crews, 164 NJ 11, 16 (2000), see also NJSA 2A: 34-23 (b) (4). Since spousal support is so closely linked to marital life, even after the parties have resolved their divorce, they must address the marital life in the settlement. See R. 5: 5-2 (e) (with a number of options including maintaining the means of calculating the marital standard of living and agreeing that the marital lifestyle will be satisfied by the comparison). The marital lifestyle is the yardstick by which to measure and establish adequate spousal support, be it pending or after the judgment. See SW versus GM, 462 NJ Super. 522, 532-33 (App. Div. 2020) (the opinion that the structure of the spousal support from the pendente lite lifestyle is a mistake because it disregards the legal mandate to take into account the marital lifestyle and does not record how the parties actually have lived) .

Although the consent order was in place, the Appeals Division stated that it was not convinced that the wife waived the applicability of marital life in the calculation of the maintenance claim. The court also found that:

The plaintiff filed for alimony and convinced the trial judge that she needed $ 18,007 per month to maintain herself in accordance with the marital lifestyle. Therefore, the judge was required to start with the marital lifestyle in calculating the fair and reasonable amount of the Mallamo loan. For these reasons, we are reversing the calculation of the Pendente-Lite loan and instructing the court to use the marital life value of $ 18,007 per month to determine the reasonable and equitable Pendente-Lite budget for the plaintiff who Must not exceed $ 17,000 per month.

Aside from the deviation from the consent ordinance, the application of actual lifestyle as opposed to what the court arbitrarily reduced is fascinating because it is happening all the time. This is the second case that I blogged about a retrospective adjustment to Pendente Lite support this year – but in this case about a retrospective savings component. In any event, in high income cases, whether through legal proceedings or settlement, a second look at the appropriateness of the pendente lite support with regard to the marital life may be appropriate.

[View source.]