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Submitted by DakotaLegal on
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Submitted by DakotaLegal on
Because the process of closing can take so long, and even be so stressful, it’s surprisingly common for a couple to split up, or formally separate, before their new home closes. So if getting affordable legal help is an important issue, you can try signing up for low-cost legal aid through this link…http://www.lawhelpnc.org/. Also, here’s a useful place with several brochures about your legal rights in buying a home, including information from the North Carolina bar: http://www.lawhelpnc.org/issues/housing/buying-a-home.
The first place to look at your home closing requirements is in your loan documents, regarding the obligation to disclose or even resubmit new documents for a loan review. Separation is one common condition requiring disclosure...which often results in new credit scoring.
I’m not sure why you wanted to file the separation agreement before closing, and add the complication of titling (the home closing) to the separation decree. I assume it’s due to a desire on your part to have a legal agreement about the new home settled before the closing. So we’ll also discuss this strategy, since a Court is going to want to review the value of the home and the fairness of the property division, whether it occurs now or after the closing.
Your Obligations To “Third Parties
Generally, the part of law dealing with “fairness” in contracts is often called equity. In this case, there are some equity rules that expect people going through a separation to clarify any misconceptions that “go to the heart of the deal.”
North Carolina also has a specific set if rules, requiring parties on both sides to disclose all relevant and important facts:
“(I)t shall be unlawful for any person in the course of any mortgage loan transaction:
“To misrepresent or conceal the material facts or make false promises (1) likely to influence, persuade, or induce an applicant for a mortgage loan or a mortgagor to take a mortgage loan, or to pursue a course of misrepresentation through agents or otherwise.
To engage in any transaction, practice, or course of business that is not (8) in good faith or fair dealing or that constitutes a fraud upon any person, in connection with the brokering or making of, or purchase or sale of, any mortgage loan.” N.C. Gen.Stat. § 53-243.11(1) and (8) (2007).
But Courts also recognize the fundamental unfairness of passing the burden of this kind of financial loss solely onto a legally separated couple. After all, there may be no real change in your overall abilities to meet the terms of the titling and purchase of the home. In working with a lawyer, however, the likely answer will be in how the separation and loan servicing is dealt with in your proposed separation.
Your Duties To Each Other…
North Carolina has a law that requires judges to divide all property “equally” between the both of you, either through a legal separation or in a final dissolution. http://law.onecle. com/north-carolina/50-divorce-and-alimony/index.html.
To try and get separating couples to also end up with fairly equal amounts, including post-separation acts (which in this case includes your post-separation closing), the North Carolina legislature passed the Equitable Distribution Act in 1997, and added a category of “divisible” property. As a result, trial courts were made to “classify, value and distribute certain real and personal property received after the date of separation, including increases or decreases in the value of marital property, and certain increases in marital debt. These debt increases should include your closing. That law can be found by using this Code: 50-20(b)(4) (1999).N.C. Gen.Statatutes.
There are, though, twelve specific instances where a judge does not have to divide property right down the middle, or equally. Here’s a case where one spouse received much more than half the property, after he showed how he’d put more money into the property after the separation: http://caselaw.findlaw.com/nc-court-of-appeals/1084638.html.
Because the process of closing can take so long, and even be so stressful, it’s surprisingly common for a couple to split up, or formally separate, before their new home closes. So if getting affordable legal help is an important issue, you can try signing up for low-cost legal aid through this link…http://www.lawhelpnc.org/. Also, here’s a useful place with several brochures about your legal rights in buying a home, including information from the North Carolina bar: http://www.lawhelpnc.org/issues/housing/buying-a-home.
The first place to look at your home closing requirements is in your loan documents, regarding the obligation to disclose or even resubmit new documents for a loan review. Separation is one common condition requiring disclosure...which often results in new credit scoring.
I’m not sure why you wanted to file the separation agreement before closing, and add the complication of titling (the home closing) to the separation decree. I assume it’s due to a desire on your part to have a legal agreement about the new home settled before the closing. So we’ll also discuss this strategy, since a Court is going to want to review the value of the home and the fairness of the property division, whether it occurs now or after the closing.
Your Obligations To “Third Parties
Generally, the part of law dealing with “fairness” in contracts is often called equity. In this case, there are some equity rules that expect people going through a separation to clarify any misconceptions that “go to the heart of the deal.”
North Carolina also has a specific set if rules, requiring parties on both sides to disclose all relevant and important facts:
“(I)t shall be unlawful for any person in the course of any mortgage loan transaction:
“To misrepresent or conceal the material facts or make false promises (1) likely to influence, persuade, or induce an applicant for a mortgage loan or a mortgagor to take a mortgage loan, or to pursue a course of misrepresentation through agents or otherwise.
To engage in any transaction, practice, or course of business that is not (8) in good faith or fair dealing or that constitutes a fraud upon any person, in connection with the brokering or making of, or purchase or sale of, any mortgage loan.” N.C. Gen.Stat. § 53-243.11(1) and (8) (2007).
But Courts also recognize the fundamental unfairness of passing the burden of this kind of financial loss solely onto a legally separated couple. After all, there may be no real change in your overall abilities to meet the terms of the titling and purchase of the home. In working with a lawyer, however, the likely answer will be in how the separation and loan servicing is dealt with in your proposed separation.
Your Duties To Each Other…
North Carolina has a law that requires judges to divide all property “equally” between the both of you, either through a legal separation or in a final dissolution. http://law.onecle. com/north-carolina/50-divorce-and-alimony/index.html.
To try and get separating couples to also end up with fairly equal amounts, including post-separation acts (which in this case includes your post-separation closing), the North Carolina legislature passed the Equitable Distribution Act in 1997, and added a category of “divisible” property. As a result, trial courts were made to “classify, value and distribute certain real and personal property received after the date of separation, including increases or decreases in the value of marital property, and certain increases in marital debt. These debt increases should include your closing. That law can be found by using this Code: 50-20(b)(4) (1999).N.C. Gen.Statatutes.
There are, though, twelve specific instances where a judge does not have to divide property right down the middle, or equally. Here’s a case where one spouse received much more than half the property, after he showed how he’d put more money into the property after the separation: http://caselaw.findlaw.com/nc-court-of-appeals/1084638.html.