Vancouver Oral Marriage Agreement Lawyer 604-602-9000
A Top Vancouver Oral Marriage Agreement Lawyer knows parties can enter into marriage agreements that depart from the normal family property division regime in BC. People who plan ahead for how property should be divided in the event they break up, are smart enough to hire a Top Vancouver Marriage Agreement Lawyer before they marry or live together.
Home made agreements either oral (the hardest to enforce) or handwritten and signed but not witnessed (still bad but slightly better!) end up requiring a Vancouver Oral Marriage Agreement Lawyer to defend, decipher, enforce or tear apart. We recommend you pay a modest fee to a top Vancouver Marriage Agreement Lawyer to do a properly prepared, negotiated, and signed agreement made after full disclosure and at a time when there is no undue pressure on either spouse.
Meet with our top rated Vancouver family law firm today!
A recent BC Supreme Court dispute over a Vancouver oral marriage agreement provides a cautionary tale on what happens to parties who enter into oral agreements before marriage. It provides a lesson for parties who procrastinate and don’t reduce marriage agreements to writing who later can’t agree on if there was a deal or not when their relationship ended. Fortunately for the wife, the Judge upheld the Vancouver Oral Marriage Agreement but no doubt the husband was far less pleased with the result. In Brown v. Brown 2016 BCSC 1037 the court disbelieved the husband and completely believed the wife’s version of events on the Vancouver oral marriage agreement. As a result signifiant assets and the gain on them was excluded entirely from sharing while certain debts were shared equally.
Wedding season is now upon us. Don’t you and your spouse want to ensure your marriage is built on a sound financial plan in the event things don’t work out?
If you want to avoid the legal costs of an expensive trial to see if your version of the oral agreement or the other side’s is correct you should meet with us today and get a properly prepared written one at a fraction of the cost of a trial emotionally and financially.
Vancouver Oral Marriage Agreement Upheld
Ms. Brown told Dr. Brown that she did not want the Ross Street property to be regarded as family property. Dr. Brown had the monies from the settlement with his first wife and RRSP money that she agreed not to claim as family assets. In response, Dr. Brown said that he trusted her completely not to claim his RRSP monies and that he did not wish to make any claim to her property on Ross Street. As a result of this discussion, Ms. Brown testified that Dr. Brown agreed that they would each retain their own assets when they married and would keep their finances separate. They would each pay their own credit card debts and their own automobile expenses. They would have no shared bank accounts and all of their household expenses would be shared equally.
[34] Based on my assessment of the evidence, I find Ms. Brown’s version of the events regarding the oral agreement far more probable than Dr. Brown’s denial of any pre-marital arrangement. I thus accept her evidence entirely on this issue.
[67] First, s. 92 permits the parties to make agreements regarding property and the Court must divide property and debts in accordance with such an agreement unless it is set aside under s. 93. In this regard, s. 94(2) provides: “The Supreme Court may not make an order respecting the division of property and family debt that is the subject of an agreement described in section 93 (1) … unless all or part of the agreement is set aside under that section.” Although s. 92 is not expressly limited to written agreements, only written agreements may be set aside under s. 93(1) of the Act. In P.N.K. v. C.L., 2013 BCSC 1856, Punnett J. recognized that oral agreements are contemplated by s. 92 of the Act: at para. 86.
[78] Although the parties did not specifically refer to what would happen if their respective assets increased in value during the marriage, I find their agreement not to regard these assets as family property implicitly meant they intended the entire value of the asset to be excluded property. Their agreement was consistent with the definition of family asset in s. 58 of the FRA, which focused on the use of the property for a family purpose, and s. 84(2) of the Act, which renders an agreement that pre-marital assets remain separate property redundant if the increase in value over time is not regarded as a term of the agreement.
[79] I find the parties’ agreement regarding these specific assets, although an oral agreement, is certain and enforceable. Ms. Brown did not expressly plead an oral agreement regarding the division of assets; however, Dr. Brown was made aware of this claim in January 2016, months before the trial in late April 2016. His examination for discovery was postponed to enable Dr. Brown to prepare for questions about this agreement. Further, both parties claimed a reapportionment in their favour under s. 95 of the Act, which expressly refers to agreements between the parties. As a consequence, I find it is just and convenient that Ms. Brown’s notice of claim be amended to reflect the evidence at trial pursuant to Rule 8-1(8).
….Pursuant to s. 95(2)(b), an agreement between the parties that does not qualify as an agreement under s. 93(1), but which purports to establish a contrary division of family assets and debts, is a factor within the s. 95 division regime.
[80] Whether the Court applies s. 92 or s. 95(2)(b) to enforce the parties’ agreement regarding these assets, the result is the same. Neither party is entitled to claim a share in these assets due to the existence of their agreement that they are excluded property and because to grant an interest in these assets to the other party would create significant unfairness due to their pre-marital agreement. Under s. 95 of the Act, there is also the factor of a very short marriage and the expectations of the parties as demonstrated by their conduct during the marriage that favours a reapportionment of 100% of these assets consistent with their agreement.
Avoid A Vancouver Oral Marriage Agreement If You Want To Avoid A Huge Dispute When You Breakup
Please call our top Vancouver Marriage Agreement Lawyers before you enter into a new marriage or marriage like relationship so you can get a properly and fairly negotiated marriage agreement that will hold up if you separate.
It pays to plan during the good time for how you want things fairly divided if the relationship is one of the 50% that go sideways.
