The prospect of ending your marriage can leave you fearing for your financial future. Fortunately, Florida law makes allowances for this. It acknowledges that one partner may struggle afterward, especially if they sacrificed their career to bring up children or run the household. It uses alimony to even things out.
Alimony payments are a payment from one partner to the other once a marriage is over. These are the five ways in which a court can award alimony in a Florida divorce:
- Lump-sum alimony: A one-off payment designed to allow both sides a clean break.
- Bridge the gap alimony: It costs money to go from being in a marriage to being single again. This payment aims to ease that process.
- Rehabilitative alimony: This payment aims to help a partner who sacrificed their earning potential back into the world of work so that they can support themselves financially. There needs to be a set plan defining the education or training that the alimony is to fund.
- Durational alimony: This is awarded this for a set amount of time only. A judge will take into account how long you have been married in determining how long the payment lasts.
- Permanent alimony: The financially better off spouse pays the other a regular amount until death. A judge needs to have an excellent reason to award this, usually that someone cannot provide for themselves ever again. There have been various attempts to remove this from the list of options available to Florida courts.
To learn more about how alimony may be awarded in your Florida divorce, consult a divorce attorney.
