Simply put, commingled assets are those that have been mixed together or combined. During a divorce case, this can affect their status.
This is primarily an issue for assets that were separate assets initially, such as a person’s inheritance. If your parents left an inheritance to you individually, it may not need to go through property division during a divorce because you own it exclusively.
But mixing that inheritance with other family funds can turn it into a marital asset. If you deposited the inheritance check into your shared bank account with your spouse, for example, that could make it a marital asset that then does have to go through property division, meaning your spouse is entitled to a portion of the inheritance.
Joint purchases with individual funds
It is also important to remember that buying something with your spouse, even if you use a separate asset to do so, does not mean that the item you purchase is still a separate asset.
For instance, maybe you use the inheritance as a down payment on a house that you and your spouse bought together. During the divorce, you decide to sell the family home. Your spouse likely still has a right to that house, which they own jointly with you, meaning you cannot claim that the home is a separate asset because it was bought with the inheritance. It is likely still a marital asset that you have to divide between the two of you.
Often, couples who are going through a divorce end up in disputes over the status of certain assets, which is why it is so important to know how the law works and what legal options you have.