Modifications
Modifying Final Judgments: Child Support and Alimony Adjustments
Modification Of A Final Judgment
Even though a divorced couple cannot be put back together, modifications to support obligations and time-sharing arrangements are possible. However, securing a modification is not easy. Under Florida law, to modify a final judgment, you must demonstrate a significant and substantial change in circumstances that was not foreseen at the time the last order was made. This can be particularly difficult when children are accustomed to a specific Parenting Plan or a spouse has come to depend on a particular amount of support.
Modification Of Child Support
Modifying child support typically requires showing a substantial change, such as a significant increase or decrease in one parent’s income, changes in health insurance costs, reductions or eliminations of daycare expenses, or other economic shifts that warrant a new child support amount. As long as these changes are permanent and result in a 15% or greater increase or decrease in support, a modification request can be successful.
Modification Of Alimony
In the case of alimony, an increase in the paying spouse’s income alone is generally not grounds for increasing alimony unless the original award was insufficient to meet the recipient’s needs. A former spouse is typically not entitled to share in the payor’s increased standard of living post-divorce if that level of living was never experienced during the marriage.
Alimony modification cases often arise when the paying spouse seeks a reduction, particularly if the recipient has made significant career progress or achieved a higher salary than anticipated at the time of divorce, or if the paying spouse has retired.
Some recipients refuse to remarry, whether due to emotional difficulties stemming from the divorce or a desire to retain their alimony. Florida statutes provide a list of factors a court must consider in determining whether the recipient has entered into a “supportive relationship,” essentially a financial interdependence similar to marriage. These factors include:
- Whether the parties have presented themselves as a married couple (e.g., using the same last name or calling each other “husband” or “wife”).
- The duration of the alimony recipient’s cohabitation with the other person in a permanent residence.
- The degree to which assets or income have been pooled between the recipient and the other person.
- Whether there has been mutual support between the alimony recipient and the other person.
- Whether either party has performed valuable services for the other, including for the other’s company or employer.
- Whether the recipient and the other person have worked together to create or enhance valuable assets.
- Whether they have contributed together to the purchase of real or personal property.
- Whether there’s an expressed or implied agreement regarding property sharing or support.
- Whether either party has supported the other’s children, regardless of any legal duty to do so.
It’s important to note that these factors are not all decisive. Florida courts have some discretion in reducing alimony based on factors such as the recipient’s decreased need, the benefit they receive from sharing living expenses with a roommate, or if the recipient is avoiding remarriage to prevent alimony termination.