Gift Money

[JU89]

May wifes father gifted a large amount of money to us as a couple to purchase our house. The marriage only lasted a year, she claims she wants it all back. I feel I am entitled to 1/2 the money as it was a gift to both. She is now claiming that her father only gave it to her.

[m_t]

Maybe it's me, but I think the moral thing to do is to give the money back to Dad.

[TC]

What proof do you have that the gift occurred?  And if even if you can show that the two of you received a gift....can you prove it was to be for the both of you?

More than likely she will walk into court and claim the gift was a wedding gift to her only from her father...without proof, it will be her word against your word. 

If you were the court under this situation, who would you believe.....especially if her dad is going to support her side of the story.....and I'll bet you dollars to doughnuts he will.

TC

[livealittle]

if he gifted a large sum of money to you, he would have been required to fill out a gift tax return, so he would have a record. The thing about a gift, you don't get to ask for it back.

the other thing, once it's used to purchase marital property - like the marital home - it becomes joint property and you both have legal right to it.

[chill]

Yep what Live said.  You see, I put my name on a loan when I went to remarry.  I sold my old house after marriage.  It was considered mine.  But..........I mixed it with marrital stuff.  So, I said goodbye to what I had before marriage.

I would say that the gift is marital property.

[m_t]

However, with a < one-year marriage, a judge is entirely likely to do little more than make each of them "whole". OP shouldn't count his money just yet.

[Lee Borden]

I'm with m_t on this one. Judges have a distressing tendency to be fair in cases like this and not to get too hung up with some kind of mathematical "poof" theory. I don't know about ALL the money, but if I were a judge, I would want to get most of the benefit of that nice gift back to the wife.