Can a divorced spouse claim rights to a premarital primary residence?
A court can, in exceptional circumstances, award a spouse some or all of your premarital and separate property that is clearly not a marital asset. In the jurisdiction where I practice family law (Utah), the rule in caselaw is:
Dunn v. Dunn, 802 P.2d 1314 (Utah Ct.App. 1990):
The general rule is that equity requires that each party retain the separate property he or she brought into the marriage, including any appreciation of the separate property. Burt v. Burt, 799 P.2d 1166, 1168 (Utah Ct.App.1990) (separate property, in this case inherited property, includes “its appreciated value” during the marriage). Exceptions to this general rule include whether the property has been commingled, whether the other spouse has by his or her efforts augmented, maintained, or protected the separate property, and whether the distribution achieves a fair, just, and equitable result. Id.; Noble v. Noble, 761 P.2d 1369, 1373 (Utah 1988).
Elman v. Elman, 245 P.3d 176 (Utah Ct.App. 2002):
In distributing property in divorce proceedings, trial courts are first required to properly categorize the parties’ property as marital or separate. See, e.g., Kelley v. Kelley, 2000 UT App 236,¶ 24, 9 P.3d 171. Generally, trial courts are also required to award premarital property, and appreciation on that property, to the spouse who brought the property into the marriage. See Dunn v. Dunn, 802 P.2d 1314, 1320 (Utah Ct.App.1990); see also Mortensen v. Mortensen, 760 P.2d 304, 308 (Utah 1988).
6¶ 19 However, separate property is not “totally beyond [a] court’s reach in an equitable property division.” Burt v. Burt, 799 P.2d 1166, 1169 (Utah Ct.App.1990). The court may award the separate property of one spouse to the other spouse in “ ‘extraordinary situations where equity so demands.’ ” Id. (quoting Mortensen, 760 P.2d at 308); see also Rappleye v. Rappleye, 855 P.2d 260, 263 (Utah Ct.App.1993) (“ ‘Exceptions to this general rule include whether … the distribution achieves a fair, just, and equitable result.’ ” (quoting Dunn, 802 P.2d at 1320)).
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