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By LegalMatters Staff • Marriages appear to be another victim of the pandemic as so-called “coronavirus divorces” become a reality, says Toronto family lawyer A. Julia P. Tremain.
Tremain, partner with Waddell Phillips Professional Corporation, says the pressures of the COVID-19 shutdown and self-isolation have left an increasing number of couples contemplating the end of their relationships.
“Many are anticipating an increase in the divorce rate because the pandemic is causing stress that I don’t believe people have ever experienced before,” she tells LegalMattersCanada.ca. “For some couples, the self-isolation was too much to handle.”
Trapped in their homes
She said for months people were trapped in their homes except for brief forays outdoors for such things as groceries, so there was little alone time for many couples.
Working from home in close quarters can also take a toll, Tremain notes.
To exacerbate the problem, some people lost their jobs or had their hours significantly reduced, she says, leaving many facing financial uncertainty.
“Certainly, that adds to the pressure,” she says. “What makes that financial stress even worse is that nobody knows when this health crisis is going to end. That is a tremendous part of the stressor.”
As well, many couples are also faced with the responsibility of caring for children, says Tremain.
‘Division of labour’
“If parents are working from home they also have to look after their children and had to be their teacher for part of the school year so there’s added burden of childcare,” she says. “Then it goes back to the old division of labour. Who does what and when? These are more stressors that nobody anticipated or knows how it’s all going to play out in the end.”
Of course, there are also those relationships that were in trouble before the coronavirus changed our way of life, Tremain says.
“If things were not great beforehand and you add these pressures, it can be a disaster,” she says. “It may be that the stresses of the pandemic opened up cracks in the relationship that were already there, so you are going to see more separations.”
Couples who are contemplating the end of a relationship can face many decisions that may not have thought about before, Tremain says.
Date of separation
For example, she says, determining how much your assets are worth can be tricky since the value is determined by your date of separation.
“If you separated the day after the stock market crashed and you have investments your assets are going to be very different than if you separated three weeks later when the market rebounded,” Tremain says, adding the date of separation can be a contentious issue where asset values are concerned. “Determining the value of assets and when you are going to value them can be problematic.
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“The same thing goes with house prices, which have been relatively stable,” she adds. “If you separated at the beginning of March your home might have been worth $800,000. But if you separate in December and we are into a second wave of the pandemic and the economy is in even worse shape, the house may be worth a lot less.”
Seek legal advice
Tremain says it is often prudent to seek legal advice before separating.
“If there are assets that are going up in down in value significantly, couples may want to talk to a lawyer to discuss their options,” she says. “They should have a sense of what their income is and what their assets include.”
Tremain says there are “two general areas that people talk about when they first come to my office.”
“The first deals with the actual procedure and how they get through the process. ‘How do we separate? What are the options? Do we use mediation?’ The other part of the discussion involves be dealing with such things as property issues, child support, child custody and access,” she says.
Tremain says some couples may have a clear idea of what they want but finding a resolution can be difficult.
Valuable assets
“Sometimes people don’t think there are issues. For example, they might say they don’t think spousal support is an issue, but it is something we should discuss anyway,” she says. “There are things they may have overlooked such as pensions or RRSPs, which can be quite valuable assets, and you have to figure out the value of those as well. That’s going to be the part they need help with.”
Tremain says courts are slowly reopening and facing a backlog of cases so working toward a solution in a separation only makes sense to avoid battling it out before a judge.
“The process will take more time when there are issues that need to be contested,” she says.
