Marital property

What it means

Marital property is the category a state creates for what a couple acquires during a marriage. Its opposite is separate property, which is generally what each person brought to the marriage and what came to them individually by gift or inheritance.

The two big systems name it differently. Community-property states call it community property and treat it as owned equally from the moment it is acquired. Most other states call it marital property and divide it on a fairness standard if the marriage ends.

Which category an asset falls into is not always fixed at the start. It can change through how the asset is handled during the marriage.

Why it matters

It decides what is divided if a marriage ends, and it contributes to what a surviving spouse can claim when one of them dies.

Where a state presumes that what a couple holds is marital, the spouse claiming an asset was theirs alone is the one who has to prove it.

When you are likely to meet it

• Before a marriage, when deciding whether the default characterization is the one you want.
• When one spouse's separate asset has been improved or paid for with married earnings.

How this varies by state

Whether a state is a community-property state, what falls into the marital category, and what standard of proof it takes to show an asset was separate are all state law and differ.

Below is how the states Sahvelo has published describe it, in their own words, each linked to the guide that sources it.

Related terms

• ComminglingMixing separate property with shared property so thoroughly that it stops being possible to tell them apart.
• Community propertyIn some states, most of what a married couple acquires during the marriage belongs to both of them equally, whatever the paperwork says.
• Elective shareA surviving spouse's right to claim a minimum portion of the estate, even if the will leaves them less or nothing.
• Postnuptial agreementThe same kind of agreement, made by a couple who are already married.
• Prenuptial agreementA written agreement signed before a marriage that changes some of the financial and property rules the marriage would otherwise bring with it.
• Separate propertyIn a community property state, what belongs to one spouse alone — usually what they brought into the marriage, and what they inherited or were given.
• Spousal supportMoney one spouse pays the other after a marriage ends. Some states call it alimony, some maintenance.
• Right of survivorshipA form of shared ownership where the survivor automatically takes the whole thing.

Sahvelo guidance that uses this

• What a prenup decides, and what your state decides without one