Bridges v. Bridges

• Decision Date: 25 February 1987
• Docket Number: No. 85-1752,85-1752
• Citation: 506 So.2d 1047,12 Fla. L. Weekly 631
• Parties: 12 Fla. L. Weekly 631 R. Shaw BRIDGES, Appellant, v. Beryl C. BRIDGES, Appellee.
• Court: Florida District Court of Appeals

Page 1047

506 So.2d 1047

12 Fla. L. Weekly 631

R. Shaw BRIDGES, Appellant, v. Beryl C. BRIDGES, Appellee.

No. 85-1752.

District Court of Appeal of Florida Fourth District.

Feb. 25, 1987.

Rehearing and Rehearing En Banc Denied June 1, 1987.

Edna L. Caruso of Edna L. Caruso, P.A., West Palm Beach and Wackeen & Cornett, P.A., Stuart, for appellant.

Thomas E. Warner of Warner, Fox & Seeley, Stuart, for appellee.

GLICKSTEIN, Judge.

Respondent/husband appeals a final judgment in a dissolution of marriage case. We affirm in part, reverse in part and remand.

Beryl C. Bridges filed a petition for dissolution of marriage on July 13, 1984. The parties, who had been married twenty-two years, had three children, only one of whom was at the time still under age eighteen. He was an adult by the time of the trial proceedings. Hence the child support and custody requests were moot. The wife otherwise sought exclusive possession of the marital home, alimony, attorney's fees and equitable distribution of marital property.

The husband answered the petition and filed a counterpetition. He denied that the wife was in need of support, attorney's fees, or the exclusive possession of the marital residence, in which he claimed to have a special equity because of the use of funds from outside the marriage. The husband sought partition and sale of the marital home.

Mrs. Bridges answered the husband's counterpetition. Primarily she opposed the requested partition of the marital home and denied that the husband had a special equity in that home.

On February 22, 1985, the trial court entered a temporary relief order awarding the wife exclusive possession of the marital home and $2,000 per month support while the action was pending.

The case went to trial May 8, 1985. On June 19, 1985, the court entered its final judgment dissolving the marriage. The court awarded the wife, as lump sum alimony, the husband's interest in the marital home, located at Hobe Sound, together with its contents except for certain specified personal property of the husband. The court ruled the wife had no obligation on the promissory note (of $212,000) the pair had given the husband's father when purchasing the marital home, which note had since been bequeathed to the husband.

The wife was to receive the contents of a New Jersey apartment and the husband the contents of a New York apartment. The parties were to retain their respective IRA's and bank accounts. The husband was to be responsible for a $40,000 debt to First National Bank of Palm Beach.

The husband was to retain full ownership of various named investments including his retirement funds with his employer, and his interests in the estates of his late parents.

The wife would not be reimbursed for real property taxes she had paid on the marital home for 1984.

The wife was awarded $7,500 as attorney's fees, and rehabilitative alimony of $2,000 per month for 24 months beginning June 1, 1985, unless she remarry or either wife or husband dies before that time expires.

The husband was to pay up $4,000 in unpaid temporary support. He was denied any special equity in the marital home and his motion for partition. The court reserved jurisdiction to award the wife costs on separate motion and hearing.

The husband unsuccessfully sought rehearing and timely filed notice of appeal.

The parties were married in Paramus, New Jersey, on September 1, 1962, and lived together as man and wife for about 22 years.

At the time of the marriage both were 22 years of age. The wife was beginning her senior year at Wheaton College and the husband was beginning his studies for an M.B.A. at Harvard Business School. Since 1972, the husband has been a securities analyst specializing in chemical companies. He is a financial analyst and vice president with a Wall Street firm.

During the completion of their schooling the couple lived on proceeds from a trust fund set up by the husband's parents. The trust fund contained $200,000, and supplemented the parties' income throughout the marriage. Ultimately the fund was entirely depleted.

During most of the marriage the wife served primarily as homemaker and mother. In 1977 she began a career of her own. She is now president of a paper importing company in the New York area.

The parties owned a series of homes beginning in 1964. The proceeds of sale of one home were--up to but not including the last purchase--used toward purchase of the next one. The last previous home was sold in 1981 for $337,000. This was not used to purchase the Hobe Sound home. The wife said she had done wallpapering and painting in two of the homes. She admitted the husband also did considerable work on renovation of the same two homes.

In spite of very substantial income, the couple always lived beyond their earnings, supplementing them with gifts from the husband's parents and money from the trust fund.

The husband's parents during their lifetime gave the husband (and his brother) annual gifts, usually by distribution of an asset such as stock or another investment. The husband's parents also made other gifts, such as paying for airplane fares and expenses of the couple so they could visit the husband's parents. According to the husband, the trust fund plus other gifts during the marriage totalled in value between $300,000 and $400,000.

In August 1981, the parties sold their then jointly owned marital home in Greenwich, Connecticut and moved to the Hobe Sound residence of the husband's ailing father so they could take care of him. The net proceeds of the sale of the Greenwich home were about $221,000. The money was put in a money market account in the name of the husband. A car and boat, purchased with money from this account, cost about $71,000. These assets were later sold for a total of about $48,500, which was returned to the same account. Without the wife's participation in the decision, the husband invested much of the money from the account in a business that failed.

The parties jointly bought the husband's father's home for $297,000. They paid him $35,000 in cash and gave him an unsecured note for the rest. At the time of the father's death in April 1983 the amount due on the note was $212,000. Under a codicil to the father's will, the note was devised to the husband on the father's death. The wife testified it was the father's intent to forgive both parties the amount of the note on his death. The husband never asked the wife for her share of the note until after she filed for divorce.

During the marriage the wife was in charge of household finances. The husband would turn over his paycheck to her, and she paid the bills. Large bills for capital purchases or the like were paid from the husband's bonuses or the trust fund. The wife ran the household, and helped the career by entertaining clients and business associates and frequently by typing reports for the husband on evenings or weekends.

In 1981 the wife took a leave of absence from her job to come to Hobe Sound and care for her mother-in-law during her final illness. The subsequent move to care for the husband's father involved resignation of the wife from her then position with a paper company, and the husband's taking a 50% cut in pay so he could work out of Florida. Later the wife went back to work part time for her former employer, and the husband went back to New York full time. The wife subsequently became president of another paper company.

Neither husband nor wife actually lives in the Hobe Sound home. The wife and the children feel a strong attachment to the home because of the time the family lived there, and because they used to visit the husband's parents there. The wife rented the house out for two months in 1985 because she had trouble maintaining it when the husband skipped some temporary support payments and she had a $5,000 tax bill to pay. She borrowed that amount from her employer. The wife testified that she had not rented out the house before or since the two months mentioned.

The wife testified, based on the parties' 1983 and 1984 tax returns, that in 1983 the husband's income was $149,473 and hers was $61,000. The next year the wife's income was $63,000. The husband's income reported in 1984 was $128,000. The wife's salary was raised to $65,000 in 1985. She also receives bonuses from company profits, if any. She formerly received money from the company, towards her living expenses but this ceased with the 1985 salary increase. She continues to have the use of a company car. She estimated a total 1985 income, including her bonus, at $80,000.

The children, all legally adults, are at college. They are largely supported by trust funds created by the grandparents, though the mother/wife claims she contributes to their support.

The husband has some income from a custodial account left to him by his mother in the amount of $115,845. He also felt the $212,000 note was wholly his. His listed assets owned jointly with the wife amount to $240,971. Included were stock, cash, IRA's, the value of the children's cars, and his funds in the employer's retirement and profit sharing programs. This does not include the Hobe Sound house, which he valued at $425,000, and the wife thought was worth $400,000. The husband owed $50,000 on notes. The wife listed as assets $16,000 in IRA's and cash.

The issues are as follows:

I. Whether the trial court erred in denying the husband's claim of a special equity in what had been the most recent marital home, because...