GLASTONBURY, CONNECTICUT · FAMILY LAW + FAMILY-VIOLENCE DEFENSE
This is the most common reason people call about a marital agreement, and Connecticut law is the reason it matters more here.
Under C.G.S. §46b-81, a Connecticut divorce court may assign to either spouse any part of the other’s estate. There is no protected category — a business you built before the marriage, a family company you hold an interest in, an inheritance from your parents, are all within the court’s reach.
Whether any of it is actually divided depends on the judge. That is a materially weaker position than people assume when they read national articles about separate property.
Its own account or entity, in one name, never mixed with marital funds. The cleaner the separation, the stronger the argument.
Being able to trace an asset back to its source, and to show its value at the date of marriage.
Paying a business’s expenses from a joint account, or renovating an inherited property with marital money, creates exactly the entanglement that makes division more likely.
A business owner who takes an artificially low salary and leaves value in the company builds an argument that the marital estate was shortchanged.
All of this improves your position. None of it removes the court’s discretion.
A prenuptial or postnuptial agreement can fix in advance how a specific asset is treated, including how growth during the marriage is handled. That takes the question out of a judge’s hands.
For a business with other owners, this often matters beyond the marriage. A divorce that puts a company’s ownership in play affects partners and employees who are not parties to it, which is why operating agreements increasingly require owners to have marital agreements in place.
A postnuptial agreement can do similar work, on a stricter standard.
Connecticut courts can reach inherited and premarital property. What that means in practice, and what actually protects an asset.
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Connecticut recognizes postnuptial agreements under case law, on a stricter standard than prenups. What Bedrick v. Bedrick requires.
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Connecticut prenup and postnup attorney Daniel M. Morton on what makes an agreement enforceable — and why Connecticut’s property rule makes one worth having.
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Every case starts with a conversation about what you’re facing and what it would take to handle it.
