Is California Spousal Support Or Alimony Tax Deductible

We’re not Divorce attorneys. We’re not Tax Accountants or Tax Lawyers or anything like that. So don’t consider any of these advices.

But we are going to be providing information today from the Franchise Tax Board specifically about issues of alimony and spousal support in California.

And I want to provide that information in video format so it’s more easily found. And today’s video is about can I deduct alimony paid?

Can I deduct alimony or spousal support?

So when you’re making the payments to your spouse for alimony or spousal support it can be a tax deduction for you.

So let’s talk about what the Franchise Tax Board says specifically about that. So this is titled can I deduct alimony paid?

Says the law requires alimony payments to be reported as income by the recipients.

So your spouse would have to report the income she receives or he receives as alimony or spousal support in California.

The person who pays the alimony may take a deduction for these payments. So the payors spouse payee or payor, I forget how that works the payors spouse will deduct or can deduct the spousal support or alimony payments.

And the person receiving has to report that as income. Alimony payments you make are deductibles.

So that’s the advantage here, if all of the following requirements are met.

So, here’s the requirements to be able to take that tax deduction or included as income.

Number one, you pay in case, checks or money orders.

Number two, the divorce or separation instrument does not say that the payment is not alimony.

Let me read that again. The divorce or separation instrument does not say that the payment is not alimony.

Okay, so it has to say a specifically alimony. God, I love how they write this.

Number three, you and your former spouse are not members of the same household when you make the payment.

Okay, that’s interesting. So if you’re a lot of my clients going through divorce are still living in the same house, so, if that’s the case according to this if you’re living with your spouse through the divorce and you’re paying alimony or spousal support that would not qualify you to do this.

Number four, you have no liability to make any payment after the death of your spouse of former spouse.

Number five, your payment is not treated as child support. So that’s obvious.

Child support is not tax deductible. Alimony is, if you meet these five criteria.

And one criteria, because one of the other criteria that they left out is it’s on here but it’s not under this particular question is there has to be a court order in place for that spousal support or alimony payment.

So you can go back and look at that video in this series. So that’s what has to be in place.

That has to be the requirements if you’re going to deduct alimony or spousal support that you pay in California.

Tim Blankenship specializing in California Divorce, I hope this video was helpful.

Please give us a call for a free consultation 661-281-0266 specializing in California Divorce anywhere in California.

 

Divorce Mediation Service Chatsworth | Chatsworth Divorce Service

Today, I want to talk about Divorce Mediation in Chatsworth.

So if you live in the jurisdiction of the Chatsworth Courthouse for your Divorce that’s anywhere in most of the Northern part of the San Fernando Valley and Santa Clarita Valleys, you’ll be filing in the Chatsworth Courthouse.

And I want to talk to you about some of your options when it comes to Divorce and specifically mediation in those cases.

So when you go through Divorce and if you have an amicable case or it’s starting off amicable that’s great.

You can get through your Divorce. You can even use a service like ours in most cases for any Divorce circumstance.

And we can help prepare your forms and get you through the court process and complete your Divorce case with no additional third party services.

But sometimes where the parties have disagreements or they’re unable to come to an agreement on certain areas.

Be it a single issue or multiple issues Divorce Mediation can be very helpful.

What mediation does is there are different varities of mediation. It could be a solo mediator helping you guys just with issues of communication.

It could be a co-mediation where you have an attorney or maybe two attorneys in a room sitting there and helping you guys work through your issues.

But Divorce Mediation it comes in different types of mediators. I guess that is what I want you to know.

And each type of different mediator it really depends on your circumstances.

Some of our clients just have difficulty in communicating with their spouse.

And they need someone to be there to provide let’s say if environment for communication, so, they can get through these agreements and don’t have to spend the money on costs of the attorneys.

Sometimes you may have a super complicated case and you need an attorney in the room, that’s a Mediator Attorney.

They can help you with your divorce and answer legal questions as you guys are going through mediation.

But regardless before mediation you don’t have to have your all answers put together before you file for divorce.

What we encourage folks to do is to give us a call so we can get your Divorce case started.

Most people don’t understand that you don’t have to have all your agreements in place.

In fact, to file for Divorce you only need a very limited amount of information.

It’s mostly statistical in nature as far as the party information and the children’s name and so forth.

But you don’t have to have any agreements or property known or disclosed at that time to get the case filed.

In some very broader point of information and what we encourage is get people file their case and get it serve so you start the clock on the sixth month divorce process.

So I hope that was helpful regarding mediation.

If you want to get your divorce case started, give us a call.

We’ll be happy to assist with preparing and filing your Divorce case at the Chatsworth Courthouse.

Tim Blankenship Divorce661.com or give me a call at 661-281-0266 for a free phone consultation.

What Does Not Qualify As Alimony Payments For Tax Deductibility

Today, we’re talking about alimony and spousal support in California. And specifically this video is about what types of payments do not qualify as alimony.

Doing a series of videos where I found a publication put up by the Franchise Tax Board that’s talking about somebody’s specifics.

They’re interesting because they go the effective tax as opposed to you know what it is necessarily but how certain items of spousal support and alimony and what alimony is considered to be and what they’re not.

And this particular and types of alimony payments that do not qualify as alimony and the reason that’s important because alimony payments are tax deductible.

So if it’s established in a different way it wouldn’t be tax deductible. And I want to give you what the Franchise Tax Board is saying would not qualify as alimony therefore would not be tax deductible.

Property settlement payments even if required by the divorce to clear other instrument will agree.

So this is just a distribution of property. Let’s say you guys split up an assets sold the house and so forth that from written this that perhaps would not be considered alimony.

Of course, you don’t want to talk to tax advisors talk to an attorney about the specifics of this.

We’re not giving tax advice or legal advice. We’re just trying to get these informations out there more easily readable and findable way.

Retirement benefits that the other spouse’s entitled to received based on division of a community property.

Okay so what that I’m referring to is if let’s say the working spouse we have two spouses one that’s working, one is not working.

The one whose working let’s say they have created a $100,000 pension. The pension because it’s community property according to the Franchise Tax Board would be divided.

Let’s say they’re married 10 years. They’re in the pension system 10 years so it can be divided 50-50.

That’s $50,000 that, that spouse would receive as a distribution from this community property asset would not be considered alimony.

It will just be a division of a community asset. So that $50,000 wouldn’t be tax deductible and it wouldn’t be counted as alimony for the Franchise Tax Board.

Any voluntary payments made before they are required by Divorce Decree or written agreement.

I will read that again, any voluntary payments made before they are required by a Divorce Decree or written agreement.

So this is interesting. I made you a separate video all together on these.

So without a court order there is no order. Therefore you can’t get the benefit of the alimony.

So if you are going through divorce and you are you set let’s say you’ve separated and you’re living in a separate residence but you’re giving your spouse money on a monthly basis which a lot of people do.

And it’s recommended of course for variety of reasons but not the topic of this discussion.

Any money you’re giving your spouse, so, let’s say you’re separated, you’re giving your spouse a $1,000 a week or $4,000 a month you cannot get a credit for that.

So you can’t deduct that off your taxes at the end of the tax year because there’s no court order. You need to get what’s called a temporary order.

So you’ll have a court order so from this date forward you’re paying these much you can always amend that in the final judgment but you’re not going to get accredit for those nor you’ll be able to deduct that.

So the benefit or the idea would be to get a temporary order as soon as possible. So it is tax advantageous to you.

And I am going to do a separate video right after this one that talks specifically about that because it’s very important.

And then the last one they have here is child support payments. Child support payments are not alimony.

Obviously, they’re not spousal support. And they’re also not tax deductible nor does the other party receiving it have to claim it is as income.

Tim Blankenship with Divorce661.com, we specialize in California Divorce. I hope this information was helpful.

Please call us if you like us to help you with your divorce in California. We work out flat fee pricing.

I’d be happy to take care of that for you. The number is 661-281-0266.

Feel free to give me a call for a free consultation.

Chatsworth Pension Division QDRO Preparation Service Chatsworth CA

Today, we’re talking to the folks in Chatsworth, California about QDRO Prep Service.

QDRO stands for Qualified Domestic Relation Order otherwise know as a QDRO or QDRO.

This essentially is something you will need to prepare or have prepared if you’re going through a Divorce in Chatsworth and you need to divide your pension, 401K, 403 (b) and many other investment type investments.

If you contact your pension company or 401K 403 (b), etc and you’re going through a divorce, ask them if you need a QDRO or Qualified Domestic Relation Order to divide that specific investment.

If you do you’re going to need a service to provide that QDRO Prep Service. It’s something that runs along side your divorce.

It’s something you can do after your divorce but if you’re going to divide the pension it needs to be noted in your judgment.

And it has to be noted specifically in your judgment. And then you’re going to need a service like ours to prepare the QDRO.

Now the reason I did this video is we are one of the most affordable QDRO Prep Services.

Attorneys charge upwards of $2,000 for the same service we provide. We do the exact same service that the attorneys would do.

So if you’re looking to have a QDRO Prepared for your Divorce case in Chatsworth or anywhere in California, feel free to give us a call.

I’ll be happy to talk about the specifics of the QDRO Prep Process as far as preparing the jointers and serving the pension company, filing it with the court, drafting the QDRO language and then getting that pension divided for you.

My name is Tim Blankenship specializing in California Divorce or you can go to Divorce661.com for more information or feel free to give me a call at 661-281-0266.