Divorce in late fifties, onwards, pension.
Hello, this is Song Law Firm. The drama ‘Mom is Mad’ was popular. The main character in this drama, played by Hye-ja Kim, has lived as someone’s daughter-in-law, wife, and mother for decades. Living her whole like that, she lost her own sense of life. There was nothing left of her sole identity. Her children insist on marriages shedo not understand, and even the husband does not understand her well. The protagonist decides that she can’t live like this any longer and runs away. The protagonist gets a room not too far from home, despite running away. She then begins to feel a sense of freedom and freedom that she has never felt in her life. She regret why she couldn’t live like this earlier. This drama, which aired about 10 years ago, won the sympathy of many middle-aged female viewers at the time and caused a great reaction in society.
Korean society’s perspective of middle-aged people has changed. I used to worry about how I would end my life well when I retired or reached middle age. But these days, more and more people are thinking about how to start a new life. Behind these changes are the improved health of middle-aged people and increased life expectancy. That is why the number of twilight divorces is also on the rise. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the average number of divorced people per 1,000 people was 5.3 in 1981, compared to 3.2 in 2016. However, the proportion of those aged 50 and over increased from 8% to 25%, which is a surprising change.
When children are divorced when they are young, custody and child support are usually the main issues in the divorce. However, in the case of a twilight divorce, when children have grown up and become adults, the focus is usually on the division of property. Among them, today we will look at the division of pensions.
First, a retirement pension like a 401(k), like any other property, is subject to division in the event of a divorce. How the property will be divided can be decided by agreement of the divorced parties. If the parties cannot reach an agreement, the court will decide the division of the property. When negotiating a property division that includes retirement benefits, you will need the advice of an attorney with experience in divorce and tax law. Let’s take the case of a female customer in her 60s, whom we previously divorced. This client has never worked during the marriage. On the other hand, my husband has been working before marriage, and my 401(k) pension has come in even before marriage. The couple had a house in the common name. When negotiating the division of the property, my husband suggested that the 401(k) pension be split 80:20 and the house sold and sold 40:60. It takes a lot of calculations to see how fair this offer is to our customers. Since only the pension accumulated after marriage is subject to division, it is necessary to determine how much the husband paid before marriage and how much interest income was generated. Also, since you pay income tax when you receive an annuity, you need to know the tax rate to estimate your real income. And when you receive your pension, you must decide whether to receive it as a lump sum or a small amount each month depending on your circumstances. In the case of the above customer, after completing these calculations, he was able to meticulously calculate the expenses related to the estimated selling price of the house he was owning, resulting in the most favorable negotiation for the customer.
In the case of a retirement pension, as important as drawing up such a favorable agreement is to amend the pension-related documents according to the agreement after the divorce is finalized. Let’s give an example of why this process is important. A husband had an employer-backed retirement pension. The husband designated his wife as the beneficiary of the pension. After that, the two divorced. During the divorce process, the wife agreed to renounce all rights related to pensions and even signed an agreement. So the divorce was finalized and the settlement agreement was submitted to the court. However, the husband forgot and did not edit the pension documents after the divorce, and his ex-wife’s name was still listed as a beneficiary. And her husband died. The husband’s employer paid his ex-wife a pension as stated on the pension papers. Upon learning of this, her daughter, the legal heir to her husband, filed a lawsuit against her employer. This is a real case that went all the way to the US Supreme Court in 2009. Here the Supreme Court ruled in favor of the employer. In other words, no matter how much a pension agreement was reached during the divorce, the entire procedure would be completed only when the pension-related documents were actually revised.
It’s not just a regular retirement annuity like a 401(k) that you need to keep in mind when you get divorced at dusk. You should also look closely at Social Security. This is because, if the following conditions are met, you can receive 50% of your ex-spouse’s Social Security pension after divorce. First, you must be at least 62 years old, you must have been married to your ex for at least 10 years, you must have been divorced from your ex for at least two years, and you must not have remarried.
In addition to the pensions discussed today, there are many different types of property that can be divided in the event of a divorce. Therefore, we recommend that those who have decided to start a new life through Dusk Divorce, hire a divorce attorney with experience in various types of divorce to ensure that they protect their rights.