Kentucky Case Law Review by Topic: July 1, 2025 through August 31, 2025

Davidson v. Davidson, Nos. 22-CI-500511, 2024-CA-0578-MR (Ky. App. 2025)

Marital Property: dissipation, equalization, investment account, status quo order, valuation

Dated: July 11, 2025
Affirming
Not to be Published

The parties separated in 2021, and Wife began dissolution proceedings in 2022. A hearing followed, wherein the parties, their children, and an accountant testified. Both parties argued the other had dissipated marital assets, but the trial court made no such finding, concluding instead that each had continued the lifestyle established during the marriage. In its decree, the trial court reserved final division of the marital accounts, pending the parties’ submission of proposed valuations.

“United we stand, divided are our giblets.”

Husband appealed, arguing the trial court: (1) erred in finding Wife had not dissipated marital assets; and (2) improperly required the parties’ submission of proposed findings concerning the value of their investment accounts, instead of making those determinations itself.

Reviewing Husband’s first assignment, the Court noted its deference to the trial court as factfinder and its assessment of witness credibility, as well as the burden of proof on claimants to establish dissipation. After separation, and during the pendency of the dissolution, both parties maintained their lifestyles using retirement funds, and Wife obtained and furnished a new residence. Husband claimed that Wife’s expenditures amounted to an attempt to deprive him of his marital property, citing his expert witness testimony of withdrawal of ~$150,000 from Wife’s investment accounts, and the rental of a storage unit. He argued Wife’s withdrawals were in contravention of an agreed order prohibiting such transfers.

The Court disagreed. Wife, the Court wrote, had been both the earner and spender during the marriage, and her purchases after the parties’ separation merely continued this pattern. Wife’s withdrawals had primarily paid off her use of credit cards, the use of which fell within her estimated monthly expenses, and were primarily for living costs. The trial court’s findings thus could not be deemed clearly erroneous.

Turning to Husband’s second assignment of error, the Court again affirmed. The parties had agreed that all property was marital and subject to equal division, and the trial court’s request that both parties furnish values for their accounts merely sought input from the parties to inform its decision.

Lyons v. Lyons, Nos. 22-CI-00357, 2024-CA-0507-MR (Ky. App. 2025)

KRS 403.190: presumption increase in value is marital
Marital Property: appreciation (home), division, house, source of funds
Witness: expert

Dated: July 25, 2025
Affirming in Part, Vacating in Part, and Remanding
Not to be Published

Following the parties’ marriage in 2020, they cohabitated in a residence owned by Wife, which they sold in June of that year, using proceeds to purchase a new home where they resided until their separation in April 2022. During her testimony, Wife alleged she paid a downpayment of $51,000 from the proceeds. After the separation, the parties sold their second residence at a profit of $151,727.

Wife’s expert testified that the home’s increase in value was solely attributable to the rise in area home sale prices during the time from its purchase to sale. The parties purchased the second home in June 2020 for $393,000, and sold the residence in April 2022 for $525,000. Husband offered testimony alleging that improvements he had made to the property, including painting and refinishing, had increased its value. His payments to the mortgage had likewise increased the parties’ equity.

The trial court was persuaded by Wife’s expert witness’ testimony, and assigned $50,108 of the first home sale proceeds as Wife’s separate property, deeming the remaining $893 the parties’ marital property. It found that the increase in value of the second home was attributable to market forces, and not Husband’s improvements, and applied the Brandenburg formula to calculate the respective marital and non-marital interests in the proceeds from its sale. Wife was awarded the bulk of the proceeds, Husband’s motion to alter, amend, or vacate was overruled, and he appealed.

In his appeal, Husband argued that the trial court erred when it: (a) failed to recognize Wife’s downpayment contribution as a gift; and (b) incorrectly found that Wife overcame the KRS 403.190 presumption whereby increases in value of property obtained during a marriage are marital.

The Court applied a standard of review in which the trial court’s factual findings are scrutinized for clear error only, while its legal characterization of property as marital or non-marital is reviewed de novo. While Husband contended that Wife’s contribution to the marital estate was analogous to Barber v. Bradley, 505 S.W.3d 749, 754-55 (Ky. 2016), the Court disagreed, noting that in Barber such contribution had been made expressly as a gift. No such evidence existed in this case, nor had Husband raised this argument during the proceedings. Thus, the Court affirmed.

As for the increase in property value, while it is true that a claimant seeking to overcome KRS 403.190’s presumptions carries the burden of proof to establish their separate property claim, Wife’s expert testimony cited undisputed data showing similar increases in nearby home prices and sales. Husband’s improvements had been modest, the trial court found, and made no significant contribution to the home’s eventual value. Under such circumstances—the Court wrote—the trial court correctly determined Wife had overcome her burden of proof, and committed no error in its application of the Brandenburg formula and assignment of the majority of the proceeds to Wife.

Notwithstanding these findings, the Court noted a $400 discrepancy in the mortgage reduction, and a $1,000 misstatement of Wife’s non-marital contribution. Because those errors affected the final allocation of proceeds, the Court vacated that portion of the order and remanded for corrected calculations.

Davis v. Davis, Nos. 21-CI-00067, 2024-CA-0513-MR (Ky. App. 2025)

Marital Property: debts, equitable distribution, house, real property
Remand

Dated: August 8, 2025
Affirming in Part, Reversing in Part, and Remanding
To be Published

The parties began divorce proceedings in February 2021. Relevant to this Opinion, both Wife’s petition and Husband’s response requested all relief due to them, but neither specifically requested child support. In a May 2021 trial court order, Husband was awarded occupancy of the marital residence during the proceedings, and made responsible for its mortgage payments. Neither party was awarded child support, based on their comparably adequate resources.

Husband motioned for child support in September 2021, and filed an amended response to Wife’s petition, requesting the same. Wife countered with a response and objection and argued her own entitlement to child support, noting his 6 days/month parenting time. But her response did not enumerate a specific amount for the support due to her. No award of temporary support was made to either party, and the question of child support was deferred to the trial court’s final hearing, in September 2023.

The trial court ordered the sale of the marital residence, with net proceeds to be split between the parties. Husband was ordered to make child support payments of $682/month retroactive to his September 2021 motion, with arrearages therefrom amounting to $21,819, to be paid from his share of the residence sale proceeds. Were his share insufficient for the award, Husband was ordered to pay an additional $100/month until the arrearage was satisfied. The trial court denied Husband’s request for an offset from the sales proceeds based on his $27,765 in payments toward the mortgage during the proceedings, throughout which Wife made substantially higher rent payments.

Husband appealed, arguing: (1) the trial court erred in not finding him entitled to an offset for his mortgage payments from the net sales proceeds of the marital residence; and (2) the trial court erred in its retroactive award of child support payments to Wife.

Assessing Husband’s first claim, the Court sought to discern whether the trial court’s determinations amounted to: the division of marital assets, the classification of property as marital or non-marital, or factual findings. It was not clear to the Court whether Husband’s appeal sought to: (a) challenge the trial court’s classification of the reduction in debt as marital (and not Husband’s separate) property; or (b) challenge the trial court’s division of the reduction of the mortgage balance, with such reduction (by virtue of the debt being incurred maritally) effectively a marital asset.

Finding no question in the trial court’s classification of the debt reduction as a marital asset, the Court addressed the trial court’s factual findings (reviewing for clear error), and division of marital assets (for abuse of discretion). For factual findings: there was no dispute that the debt was incurred maritally, nor that Wife paid substantially more for rented housing during the same period. The Court found no clear error. During this period, Husband denied Wife access to the residence, even to retrieve personal belongings and children’s clothes. Reviewing the trial court’s division of marital assets, the Court found no abuse of discretion, given the aforesaid findings, Husband’s exclusive use of the residence, and trial courts’ broad discretion in determining equitable distributions of marital property.

In his second assignment of error, Husband did not dispute the amount of Wife’s child support award. He disputed its retroactive application, and argued that it should have commenced as of the April 2024 decree. Though under KRS 403.160(2)(a) awards of temporary child support are retroactive to the date of the requestor’s motion, Wife never specifically motioned for support. Husband further argued that neither his September 2021 motion nor Wife’s response could revoke or modify the trial court’s May 2021 order, in which no support was awarded. A hearing should have occurred to determine if a change in circumstances merited modification of the 2021 order, and Wife’s failure to assert a change in circumstances constituted her waiver of temporary support. The trial court, Husband alleged, acted sua sponte, awarding Wife temporary support without her motioning for the same.

Wife countered that neither party had requested child support as of the trial court’s May 2021 order, which thus could not be deemed a ruling on temporary support. Wife further noted Husband’s non-objection to her request for child support during the September 2023 final hearing. In her response to Husband’s 2021 motion, and in her 2023 pretrial memorandum, Wife claimed entitlement to child support (the latter claiming entitlement retroactive to Husband’s 2021 motion). Thus, she argued, the trial court did not act sua sponte. Finally, Wife pointed out that KRS 403.160 contains no specific requirement that retroactive relief be granted from the date of a requestor’s motion, or payor’s.

The Court, however, found KRS 403.160 did not govern. Neither Husband’s 2021 motion, nor the record thereafter, indicated that temporary child support was an active issue during proceedings prior to the final hearing. During the final hearing, the trial court orally noted a pending motion for child support, but made no mention of a request for temporary support it later, confusingly cited in its decree.

The Court turned to KRS 403.213, concerning non-temporary awards of child support, and whether the trial court’s award—as Husband alleged—improperly modified its 2021 order. Moreover, the trial court’s decree failed to cite KRS 403.213 as a basis for the award, and included no findings whether a change in circumstances occurred which would justify modification of the prior order. The Court disagreed with this application of KRS 403.213, finding it generally inapplicable to temporary orders like the May 2021 order.

Ultimately the Court found that, because Wife never filed her own motion or made a clear request for child support prior to the final hearing, her award of retroactive support was inappropriate under KRS 403.211. Further, Supreme Court of Kentucky precedents dictate that a retroactive award of non-temporary child support may only date as far back as the requestor’s motion. Not only was the trial court’s award of retroactive payments inappropriate, the Court wrote, it created a sudden arrearage owed by Husband which it deemed a manifest injustice. The Court thus reversed the trial court’s retroactive award of support payments, and remanded the matter for additional proceedings.

Wright v. Wright, Nos. 21-CI-00025, 2024-CA-1233-MR (Ky. App. 2025)

Civ. R. 52.01: findings of fact
KRS 403.190
Marital Property: burden of proof, final hearing, gift, house, separate property, source of funds
Witness: credibility, lay

Dated: August 29, 2025
Affirming
Not to be Published

During their marriage, the parties received financial support and gifts from Wife’s mother and stepfather, including payment of $236,660 made out to Husband in 2008 for the purchase of a home. The property was titled jointly, and sold by the parties in 2014 with proceeds deposited in a joint bank account. After purchasing a new home, the parties retained $54,000 which they used for renovations and farm equipment. As with the prior residence, the property was titled jointly in both parties’ names.

The parties separated in 2018, and Husband filed for divorce in 2020. In the proceedings that followed, Wife and her mother/stepfather argued that the 2008 payment constituted a gift made solely to her, and was an advance on her future inheritance. A 2021 Domestic Relations Commissioner ruling deemed the farm marital property, and recommended its sale and the equal division of proceeds therefrom. The trial court adopted these findings over Wife’s objections, and ruled that there was sufficient evidence for the marital property designation of the parties’ home, and its being subject to equal division.

Wife appealed, but in the proceedings that followed, the Court found that no decree had been entered. A later nunc pro tunc decree entered by the trial court in December 2022 was rejected by the Court, due to the trial court’s lack of jurisdiction after the notice of appeal had been filed. Without a final appealable order, Wife’s appeal was dismissed.

Wife filed a second notice of appeal, but this was rejected by the Court as untimely and not filed within 30 days of the 2022 nunc pro tunc order. Wife sought discretionary review from the Supreme Court of Kentucky, which granted her motion. The Court, the higher court found, should have dismissed Wife’s second appeal as interlocutory, not untimely, because the nunc pro tunc order was invalid and thus there was still no final appealable order. The trial court entered a final decree in September 2024, which incorporated its 2021 findings, including the designation of the parties’ farm as marital property. Wife appealed, arguing that the trial court erred by not awarding the farm to her as separate, non-marital property.

Reviewing Wife’s appeal, the Court utilized a two-tier approach whereby factual findings were reviewed for clear error, and the classification of marital/non-marital property was reviewed de novo. To overcome the presumption that property acquired during a marriage is marital, a party claiming non-marital interest and a gift exception under KRS 403.190(2)(a) bears the burden of proof. Claimants must provide clear and convincing evidence for trial courts’ evaluations under four factors: (1) the gift’s source; (2) the donor’s intent at the time, and the gift’s intended use; (3) the status of the marriage when the gift was received; and (4) whether any valid agreement excluded the gift from the marital estate. When the gift is from a third-party, precedent also requires consideration whether a donor received any compensation in return.

The source of funds in this case was undisputed. No agreement was made designating the gift as Wife’s alone at the time of its receipt. Nor had Wife’s mother/stepfather received any compensation in return for their payment to the parties. Likewise, the intended use of the funds—to purchase a family home both parties would live in—was undisputed.

Turning to donative intent, the Court cited Sexton v. Sexton, 125 S.W.3d 258 (Ky. 2004), writing: “although donor testimony is highly relevant to determining intent, the intention of the donor may also be inferred by reviewing the surrounding facts and circumstances, the relationship of the parties, and the conduct of the parties.” Wife’s mother’s/stepfather’s testimony was undermined by facts and circumstances (e.g. the check made out to Husband alone, joint titling of both houses, etc.), that support inference against their claim that the gift was intended solely for Wife. Noting trial courts’ broad discretion both in dividing marital property and assessing witness credibility, the Court thus affirmed.

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