Title: Blair v. Blair

State: vermont

Issuer: Vermont Supreme Court

Document:

NOTICE:  This opinion is subject to motions for reargument under V.R.A.P. 40
as well as formal revision before publication in the Vermont Reports.
Readers are requested to notify the Reporter of Decisions, Vermont Supreme
Court, 111 State Street, Montpelier, Vermont 05602 of any errors in order
that corrections may be made before this opinion goes to press.
 
 
                                No. 89-071
 
 
Stanley Blair, Jr.                           Supreme Court
 
       v.                                    On Appeal from
                                             Rutland Superior Court
Karen Blair
                                             November Term, 1989
 
 
Arthur J. O'Dea, J.
 
DeBonis, Wright & Winpenny, P.C., Poultney, for plaintiff-appellee
 
Peter F. Langrock and Deborah L. Markowitz of Langrock Sperry Parker & Wool,
  Burlington, for defendant-appellant
 
 
PRESENT:  Allen, C.J., Peck, Dooley, and Morse, JJ., and Springer, D.J.,
          (Ret.)., Specially Assigned
 
 
     MORSE, J.  This appeal involves a dispute over whether an award to
defendant of $25,000 as a property distribution, plus $5,000 for attorney's
fees, is an abuse of discretion.  Defendant-wife claims that the total
amount of money awarded to her represents only 20% of the marital assets, a
decidedly unjust result given the evidence of battering she endured over the
course of this four year marriage.
     We need not reach the issue of abuse of discretion, because the oral
findings of fact issued extemporaneously at the conclusion of the trial are
sufficiently ambiguous and incomplete to warrant another hearing on property
distribution.  In particular, two evidentiary areas cause us to reverse and
remand.
                                    I.
     Plaintiff-husband acquired the marital residence before the marriage.
At trial, he evaluated its worth at about $65,000.  The court did not
believe this testimony, stating in findings issued orally from the bench,
"[Plaintiff] tried to tell us that the house was worth sixty or sixty-five
thousand dollars which is . . . ridiculous.  His own expert witness reported
to us a value of $125,000, and that is what he thinks it's worth."  The
mortgage balance of about $15,000 on the house was undisputed.  Therefore,
the equity in the house was somewhere between $50,000 and $110,000.
     Putting aside the value of the considerable personal property awarded
to the husband, an award of $30,000 (including $5,000 in attorney's fees) to
the wife was about one quarter of the equity in the house if it is valued at
the high end.  We assume the court -- as evidenced by the above remarks --
was persuaded more by the $125,000 opinion, but it made no finding
concerning the value of the house.  Sullivan v. Sullivan, 147 Vt. 407 408,