Divorced by 2016

[adinva]

I thought I'd mention, for the record, something that contributed greatly to my fear and paralysis that turned out not so hard when I found the solution.

H asked for a divorce in June 2011.
May 2011 was the separation date he put in the draft separation agreement he gave me.
December 2012 was when he actually moved out.

Every year that went by after that I became more confused about whether it made a difference if the date was earlier (more support due) or later (more accurate)...or before the end of a year or after January 1...or before or after our 20th anniversary (November 2013).

And how would I possibly calculate what he owed me for back-support while he'd been underpaying and I was losing money?

Every time I thought about it I became more irrationally confused and worried but here's how it's ending up:

The date on which we divide all our assets is going to be the settlement date.
- That means I'm actually not down and he doesn't actually owe me, because we're splitting everything in half now. It's as if we've been paying everything out of joint funds all this time.
- Now that we're negotiating I haven't heard him (yet) say anything about his choice to leave me just a bit shy of our 20th anniversary (which it is said would impact spousal support)
- We decided on a settlement date just past January 1 so we can file taxes jointly one more year (tax savings).

This released me from the idea of having to go back over several years and figure out how to be sure I wasn't cheated.

***

Another thing that had me spinning was whether to sell the house while still married or after the divorce as suggested, in 2018. I wasn't sure if the capital gains tax would make a difference of $0, or $2,000, or $20,000, and couldn't sit down and try to figure it out, it just made me feel sick.

When I finally brought the question to a lawyer and also to the financial advisor, and they ran quick numbers, even though I'd say my house has appreciated quite a bit, almost doubled, once you deduct the improvements we made to it, and then divide the equity in half, what's left doesn't exceed $250K so there'd be zero tax. And if it did exceed it by say $1000, I'd only be taxed on that $1000. It's immaterial.

So again, my extreme fear of getting screwed somehow...is now gone. It'll be OK either way, there aren't any alligators hiding in the details.

I hope this may be helpful to someone else who's paralyzed over these questions.