What You NEED to Know About Alimony Amount in NC

00:00:00.040 — 00:00:25.400
Unlike child support, alimony isn't determined by a simple formula. Instead of using a formula or a calculator, the court looks at the very individualistic nature of your expenses and your income. That means the court will look at your historical spending for your residence, travel, food, car expenses, and other items that are covered on a financial affidavit that we use in Wake County.

00:00:31.920 — 00:04:03.630
The court will make its best determination of what your lifestyle was by looking at historical expenditures for each major category of your life. Does the duration of the marriage have any impact on the duration of the alimony award? And the answer is yes. The longer the marriage, the longer we typically expect to see an alimony obligation.

How long might I have to pay alimony? Or how long might I be able to receive alimony? There's no hard and fast rule in North Carolina for how long the award is. Courts typically look at the duration of the marriage, and then make a longer award for cases where the marriage was of a longer duration. In marriages that are brief, only a year or two, there may not be very much of any of an alimony award.

Well, there are online tools that you can use to estimate your alimony award or obligation. It's important to understand that these are only estimates and that they are not based on your unique case. A lot of times when there's an alimony award, people will hear different stories, their neighbors or people that they've known that have gone through the divorce.

And it's important for you to speak with someone that has the objective information available to them from previous trials and the particular judge, if possible, assigned to your case. A lot of times when people are approaching retirement, there's a big concern about why I have to pay alimony beyond the point at which I retire.

The answer to that question is very complicated, and you should ask the advice of an attorney in North Carolina about how a potential retirement would impact your alimony obligations. Will I be allowed to retire? That question requires you and your attorney to sit down and have a serious conversation about the unique circumstances of your career path, and when the normal expectation was for you to retire.

What happens if the alimony award was entered for what we call a lifetime award? A lifetime award typically is construed to mean an alumni award that ends only upon the statutory factors of a death of either party, remarriage of the recipient, or cohabitation in a romantic relationship by the recipient.

Frequently, the party that's paying alimony gets to the end of their career and is ready to retire. At that point, it's important. In fact, it's critical that you speak with an attorney about how to handle your unique situation. When speaking with your attorney, we can look at various options about trying to renegotiate an end date.

It would be certain a lump sum buyout for the remaining portion or another option that suits your situation. How long would the alimony award last? The answer is it depends upon what the parties can agree to or what a court may decide. There are certain rules of thumb that are used in North Carolina. Specifically, we tend to think half the duration of the marriage prior to the separation would be an appropriate time, and then each side is free to argue for longer for shorter than that time period, based upon the unique circumstances of your case.

If you have questions about how much your alimony could be, or how long, it's important that you speak with a North Carolina attorney about your unique situation, we look forward to hearing from you either by calling us or contacting us online.