TN Wife Gets $4,000 Monthly Alimony After 19 Year Marriage

Tennessee alimony divorce case summary after 19 years married.

The husband and wife in this Cumberland County, Tennessee, divorce case were married in 1993 and had no children. In 2012, the wife, who was 58 and had a degree in finance, filed for divorce. At the time of trial, she worked as an accountant for a construction company and earned $23.85 per hour. She had some back problems and had neck surgery in the past, but her medical conditions did not prevent her from working.

The husband was 64 and had a degree in communications. He was an insurance agent at the time of trial. His income in 2013 was about $360,000.

The trial court divided their property, and awarded the wife transitional alimony in the amount of $2,200 per month for forty months. It denied her an award of attorney’s fees. The husband then appealed to the Tennessee Court of Appeals.

Among the issues on appeal was the amount of alimony. The appeals court began by reviewing the statutory factors a court uses in making an alimony determination. In this case, the wife argued that those factors called for a larger award, and asked for $6,000 per month.

The appeals court agreed with her the amount awarded was too low. It first noted that she had health issues. Even though they did not prevent her from working completely, they did impact her earning capacity. Also, while she had received a portion of the property settlement, the amounts she had received were not liquid, since they consisted of retirement assets. After looking at the shortfall in the wife’s income, the appeals court concluded that $4,000 per month for 40 months was appropriate, and raised the award.

The court also looked at the need for attorney’s fees, and concluded that the wife was entitled to an award to cover those fees. The appeals court noted that the husband was in a better economic position, and that the wife would need to liquidate most of her liquid assets to pay her fees. Therefore, it sent the case back to the lower court to determine the amount of fees, and to award that amount as alimony in solido.

For these reasons, the Court of Appeals remanded the case to the lower court.

No. E2014-02069-COA-3-CV (Tenn. Ct. App. Jan. 28, 2016).

See original opinion for exact language. Legal citations omitted.

To learn more, see Alimony Law in Tennessee.