What to Know About Divorcing After a Short Marriage

When it comes to divorce, the length of your marriage plays an important role in how easy or difficult the divorce process is. The longer you stay married, the more assets you accumulate, the more likely you are to have children, and the more dependent you become on one partner’s or both partners' finances. The average in the United States lasts 19.9 years, so most marriages are not short. Generally, a marriage is considered short if you decide to divorce less than two years after getting married. This shorter length may bring up different legal issues than one that is longer would but also may have fewer issues. If you’re unaware of how the divorce process changes for your short marriage in comparison to the longer marriages you’ve heard about, contact the family law attorneys at Lermitte & Lubin, LLC.

How Does the Length of Your Marriage Affect Divorce?

There are several ways in which the length of your marriage immediately affects your divorce.

Asset Division

First, if you were only married for a short amount of time, it may be easier to streamline the asset division process. When you’re first merging your finances, you don’t always necessarily accumulate wealth. Wealth – in the form of assets like houses, cars, retirement accounts, and the like – will form over the years. Unless one or both partners already had highly valued assets, they won’t have many assets to divide. Even if both partners have highly valued assets entering the marriage, two years is not a lot of time for them to become entangled in the other’s assets. Establishing ownership of assets after a short marriage will be much easier than a long one.

Alimony

Another important factor in divorcing after a short marriage is alimony. In most cases, couples who have been married for a longer time period are more likely to receive or be asked to pay alimony. They have become used to a lifestyle that the other’s income allows them to afford. However, in the case of a short marriage, it’s harder to argue that one or both of you have established and become accustomed to a new lifestyle.

Emotional Detachment

Finally, keep in mind that if you were married for a shorter time period, it may feel easier emotionally to divorce due to fewer shared memories and experiences. Additionally, if both partners are on the same page when it comes to getting divorced, it can make the process simpler to handle.

How Does Length Not Affect Your Marriage?

Several things are mostly unaffected by the length of one’s marriage. Some may be surprising, and others not so much.

Child Custody

If you end up having children or at least conceiving children by the time you file for divorce, your custody disputes will remain rather similar to that of a long marriage. The only significant difference is that in a long marriage, there is the possibility of one parent proving to be more distant from their children than the other, but that doesn’t always come out. In Pennsylvania, courts will assume anything from the outset. They only seek to do what is best for the child based on the information presented to them. This does not change based on the length of the marriage.

Annulments

Despite popular belief, the length of one’s marriage does affect your ability to get an annulment. An annulment is the cancellation of a marriage. This means the union is erased from a legal perspective to the point that it never technically existed and therefore has never been valid. You can get an annulment if your marriage was carried out under certain conditions, and none of them have to do with the length of your marriage. These conditions include:

• Bigamy: When one or both partners is already married at the time of their next wedding.
• Forced Consent: If one or both partners were forced to be married under threat by the other or a third party.
• Fraud: When one party consented to the marriage under false pretenses. This can mean that one partner lied about their identity, assets, financial status, or something integral to their character such as religion, sexual identity, and/or more.
• Marriage Prohibited by Law: Illegal marriages include those of an incestuous nature or where one or both spouses are under the age of 16 and receive no parental or court approval.
• Mental Illness: If one or both spouses suffered from a mental illness that affected their ability to make decisions at the time of their marriage.
• Mental Incapacity: If one or both spouses were under the influence of drugs when the marriage took place, it can be annulled.
• Inability to Consummate Marriage: Should the couple be unable to have sexual intercourse or prove impotent during the marriage, it can be annulled.

Contact the Family Law Attorneys at Lermitte & Lubin, LLC For Help Ending Your Short Marriage

It’s important to remember that even though divorce is never easy, being married for a shorter amount of time can be an advantage when going through the process. When handled correctly, you and your spouse should be able to come out of the divorce with a fair and equitable settlement so that you can both move on. You want to talk to a lawyer or other professional about what is best for your specific situation. With the right help and guidance, a short marriage doesn’t have to be any more difficult than a long one. In fact, it should be easier. Contact the attorneys at Lermitte & Lubin, LLC for more information on how we can help.