Court Must Determine Value Before Dividing Property

Tennessee case summary on valuation of marital property in divorce.

Romey Green III v. Kasandra Cherry Green

The husband and wife in this Tipton County, Tennessee, case were married in 1984, and the husband filed for divorce in 2013. The parties had two adult daughters, and at the time of trial, the husband was 63 years old, and the wife, 53. After a long pretrial process, the case finally went to trial in 2018. Their main assets consisted of their marital home, two other unimproved lots, and various retirement and financial accounts.

The trial court divided the parties’ assets, but assigned value only to the home and two unimproved lots. The marital home was awarded to the parties jointly, but with the husband being allowed possession. The adjoining property was also awarded to the parties jointly, but subject to a lien for their attorneys’ fees. The third property was awarded to the wife alone. The retirement accounts were also distributed, but without a value being placed on them.

The wife appealed the judgment to the Tennessee Court of Appeals. She first argued that the trial court had erred in granting the husband exclusive use of the marital home during his lifetime. She also argued that the trial court should have granted her a one half interest in one of the husband’s retirement accounts. The husband argued that the lower court’s division had been equitable.

The appeals court, however, did not reach either of the parties’ arguments. Instead, it noted that the prerequisite for the trial court to make its determination was to classify and value all of the property. In this case, while the lower court had set valuations for the real property, it had made no findings as to the value of the various retirement accounts. For this reason, the Court of Appeals stated that it was compelled to vacate the lower court’s property division. It noted that some of these assets had significant value, and this information was necessary to making a determination of an equitable distribution.

For these reasons, the Court of Appeals vacated the lower court’s ruli8ng and remanded the case. The costs of appeal were assessed equally to the two parties.

No. W2019-01416-COA-R3-CV (Tenn. Ct. App. Apr. 12, 2021).

See original opinion for exact language. Legal citations omitted.

To learn more, see Property Division in Tennessee Divorce.