Source: https://www.sarjilawfirm.com/2016/11/22/studentloandebt/
Timestamp: 2019-04-25 19:44:18+00:00

Document:
“Marital property” is defined as “all real and personal property which has been acquired by the parties during the marriage and which is owned as of the date of filing or commencement of marital litigation….” S.C. Code Ann. § 20–3–630 (Supp.2010). “For purposes of equitable distribution, ‘marital debt’ is debt incurred for the joint benefit of the parties regardless of whether the parties are legally jointly liable for the debt or whether one party is legally individually liable.” Hardy v. Hardy, 311 S.C. 433, 436–37, 429 S.E.2d 811, 813 (Ct.App.1993). Marital debt, like marital property, must be specifically identified and apportioned in equitable distribution. Smith v. Smith, 327 S.C. 448, 457, 486 S.E.2d 516, 520 (Ct.App.1997). In equitably dividing the marital estate, the family court must consider “liens and any other encumbrances upon the marital property, which themselves must be equitably divided, or upon the separate property of either of the parties, and any other existing debts incurred by the parties or either of them during the course of the marriage.” § 20–3–620(B)(13).
Id. at 610, 716 S.E.2d at 306 (emphasis added).
There is a rebuttable presumption that a debt of either spouse incurred prior to marital litigation is a marital debt and must be factored in the totality of equitable apportionment. Wynn v. Wynn, 360 S.C. 117, 600 S.E.2d 71 (Ct. App. 2004).
Courts in many states have ruled on the question of how to treat student loan debt in marital litigation, and their conclusions vary significantly.
Some states reason that because the resulting degree is almost always viewed as either an intangible asset belonging to only one party1 or non-marital property held by the degree-obtaining spouse, that the loan to obtain that degree should also be considered non-marital debt. See Van Bussum v. Van Bussum, 728 S.W.2d 538, 539 (Ky. Ct. App. 1987) (debt attendant to the acquisition of a non-marital asset such as a degree must be borne by the party who will reap the benefit from it). But see Roberts v. Roberts, 670 N.E.2d 72 (Ind. Ct. App . 1996) (even though husband’s degree was not marital property, student loan was still a marital obligation).
Most states look at how the loan proceeds were actually spent – that is, whether the proceeds were spent on living expenses or only for the tuition and fees associated with obtaining the degree. Those courts generally reason that to the extent that the student loans were used to pay family living expenses, they fall under the standard rule that debt incurred to pay living expenses during the marriage are always marital obligations. See In re Marriage of Speirs, 956 P.2d 622 (Colo. Ct. App. 1997); McConathy v. McConathy, 632 So. 2d 1200 (La. Ct. App. 1994); Hicks v. Hicks, 969 S.W.2d 840 (Mo. Ct . App. 1998); Forristall v. Forristall, 831 P.2d 1017 (Okla. Ct. App. 1992).
In general, the nationwide trend appears to characterize student loans as marital debt subject to equitable apportionment/division only where the other spouse benefitted substantially from the loan by use of the loan proceeds for family expenses.

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