Opinion ID: 2805792
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Division of Property in This Case

Text: The ICA held that the family court clearly exceeded the bounds of reason by awarding a non-existent asset valued at $538,200 to one spouse, necessitating remand to the family court for re-division of the property. Despite the award of a property that had been sold several years before the divorce, the ICA found that the “family court was able to identify and value marital assets without a property division chart.” The record, however, indicates otherwise. Thus, we also consider whether the record in this case is adequate for review of the equities of the family court’s division of the marital estate. The family court divided the real estate properties of the marital estate into three groups: (1) properties to be distributed to Susan (three); (2) properties to be distributed to Ira (ten); and (3) properties to be sold with the proceeds to be divided between Susan and Ira (four). In its division of the real properties into these three groups, the family court did not list any of the properties’ outstanding mortgages or net market values either at the date of marriage or close of evidence at trial. The family court also did not assign net 20 FOR PUBLICATION IN WEST’S HAWAIʻI REPORTS AND PACIFIC REPORTER market values to each property according to the categories of the partnership model. While the family court made several findings regarding Susan’s pre-marital capital contribution and the valuation of her properties, these findings were incomplete. The court found that the funds Susan used to purchase the marital residence constituted a pre-marital capital contribution to the partnership. The family court also found that the liquidation of one of Susan’s Texas properties constituted a pre-marital capital contribution to the partnership. However, the family court did not specify the value of the marital residence or the Texas property on the date of marriage or the increase in value of the properties during the marriage. With respect to the other two Texas properties, the family court found that the properties were encumbered by a mortgage and were sold during the marriage, but the court did not determine the proceeds of the sales or assign values to the property. Additionally, it is not clear whether the court credited Susan with the proceeds of the sales of these properties as pre-marital capital contributions. With respect to the family court’s findings regarding Ira’s pre-marital capital contributions, the court found only that Ira “brought numerous real properties into the economic partnership and marriage” and that the best evidence of this was 21 FOR PUBLICATION IN WEST’S HAWAIʻI REPORTS AND PACIFIC REPORTER the divorce decree and separation agreement from his previous divorce. The family court found that these properties “were not unencumbered by debt,” but the court did not include in its findings the net market values of any of Ira’s “numerous real properties” on the date of marriage or the increase in value of the properties during the marriage. As a result, the family court’s findings do not reflect that the court credited Ira with any pre-marital capital contributions. The absence of such findings renders it infeasible for the parties and the reviewing court to understand the basis for the property division. Further, in the absence of determinations of pre-marital net market values of assets at the date of marriage and the close of evidence at trial and a categorization of the marital assets, the reviewing court is not able to discern whether or not the family court correctly calculated its overall property division.