During a divorce, your business may be put at risk. If you run it alongside your spouse, you may end up fighting over who will obtain the business or how to stay in business together.
The reality is that around half of all marriages end in divorce, and the number of divorces grows for second and third marriages. If you have a business and are married, you have to take steps to protect it and your interests.
How much of a business is your spouse entitled to upon divorce?
A spouse may be able to seek 50 percent or more (in some cases) of your business, depending on how much they participated in the business’s day-to-day operations and other factors. There are protective measures you can take, but you need to put them in place long before a divorce is in the cards.
How do you protect a business in divorce?
To start with, Georgia is an equitable distribution state. That means that you and your spouse will split marital assets equitably, not necessarily equally. Another key thing to remember is that you only have to divide marital property. If you owned your business before marriage and your spouse was not involved, funds were not intermingled and your finances remained separate, your business may still retain its status as separate property. You may still have to divide the profits made during the time you were married.
These are a few things that you should keep in mind about divorcing with a business. Your attorney can help you prepare to protect your investments.
