The court held that "it would be inequitable to require he name the Wife as a beneficiary of his retirement benefits and thereby precluded him from sharing those benefits with any other person," and pointed out that "the
marital portion of the pension is small [and] the parties relatively young."
As part of the property settlement, Wife was awarded a one-half interest in the
marital portion of Husband's PERA account.
(43) In all of these questions, however, Boyett determined that for defined benefit pension plans, the higher salary earned after the cutoff date is nonmarital property when it is used to determine the
marital portion of benefit.
The appellate court first determined that absent personal efforts by the wife, the increase in value of the nonmarital portion remained nonmarital but the increase in the
marital portion is marital property.
The amount of the
marital portion could also swing wildly.
In any event, the funding clause would also provide that the amount of any such
marital portion should be reduced by any property includable in the estate that passes directly to the surviving spouse as a result of the grantor's death (e.g., a specific gift of personal effects, life insurance or jointly owned property).
Dejesus argued that the
marital portion of the stock plans should be determined using a time rule fraction similar to that used in the context of pension rights in Majauskas v.
Discount the goodwill value to reflect only the
marital portion.
(41) Had the proposed legislation passed, in a case such as Kaaa in which a mortgage on nonmarital property was paid down during the marriage with marital funds and said property had passively appreciated during the marriage, the
marital portion of equity in the former marital home would have consisted of two components: paydown of the principal balance of the nonmarital mortgage and an equitable portion of the passive appreciation in the property.
The
marital portion is that which accrued after the marriage.
First, if a management expense relates to assets allocated to another portion of the estate, payment of the expense from the
marital portion will reduce the marital deduction; payment of the expense from the charitable portion will reduce the charitable deduction.
More specifically, the courts were wrestling with how to value and properly determine the
marital portion of retirement accounts.