As a stay-at-home parent who looks after your children, financial concerns will likely dominate your worries about divorce. What will you do after the split, when you can no longer rely on a two-income household to support your current lifestyle?
Fortunately, you might have an entitlement to not only a share of marital assets, but you will likely receive child support as well. On top of this, you might also get spousal support or alimony payments.
Financial resources and marriage length
SAS For Women looks into alimony for stay-at-home parents. Courts will look at several different aspects of your life in order to determine their answer to your petition for alimony as a stay-at-home parent.
First, they will look at the financial resources of both you and your co-parent. This will include all of the divisions and changes made during the course of asset division during the divorce itself.
The length of the marriage will also affect alimony. The longer you and your ex-spouse stayed together, the more financially dependent you likely grew. The court will usually award those from longer marriages with more alimony for this reason.
Marital contributions and employability
They will look at the contributions to the marriage from both spouses. If you gave up your career to raise your children, for example, they will likely view this as a valuable contribution.
Finally, they will look at your earning capacity and employability. They will look at your qualifications, skills, previous work experience and potential earning capability. They will also factor in rehabilitation and retraining that you may need to reenter the workforce.
Together, courts will look at all of these factors when deciding whether or not to award you with spousal support, and in determining how much you will receive.