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Just because hiding assets during a divorce is illegal in most states, that doesn't mean that the activity doesn't take place. In fact, it happens a lot. It's unfortunate, but there are a myriad of methods that your spouse can use, and that many do use, to try and hide assets during a divorce proceeding to lower your settlement amount. While divorce is generally a very negative time in your life, you still should try to get as much out of it, financially, as you can so that you can start your new life on the right foot.
In order for you to find assets that your spouse may be hiding from you, you need to understand some of the tactics that they might be using to hide those assets. Here are some common asset-hiding tactics that married individuals use to minimize the verifiable value of their marital assets.
Setting up new accounts / utilizing unused joint accounts
One common way, that is fortunately easy to identify, that your spouse may use to hide assets during a divorce is to either setup new accounts in their name, or to use abandoned joint accounts and to remove your name from them. Oftentimes, they'll slowly withdraw money from their bank accounts, skim some money off their paycheck each week, or deposit funds from the sale of property they own to build up their hidden account's balance.
Selling or 'giving away' property
Another method that your spouse could use to hide assets from you is to sell, or even give away, property to a person in whom they trust. What happens is that they give up the rights to the property, and then once the divorce is finalized, they can regain ownership of the property from their friend or associate.
Repayment of fictitious debts
If your spouse sees a divorce in the future, they may create a fictitious debt to repay to try to hide some money. This could be to a trusted friend or associate, which would work much like the previous point does, or they could even go as far as setting up a company, and paying into accounts owned by that company. It's unfortunate, but people can be exceedingly creative, and that oftentimes makes it more difficult to locate assets that they're trying to hide.
How to locate assets your spouse is trying to hide
Because there are scores, if not hundreds, of tactics that your spouse could use to hide assets from you during your divorce proceedings, you really need some professional help to locate those assets. The services you need are called asset searches, and they are usually available through an attorney, but will likely be cheaper through a private investigation firm that offers a reasonable fixed rate for asset searches and investigation. While you could 'play detective' and identify some hidden accounts on your own, in most cases, you'll need a comprehensive asset investigation on your spouse to locate all of the assets that they're trying to hide.
We only share a few of the many methods that your spouse can use to hide assets from you, and from your lawyer, during your divorce proceedings. If you think that your spouse could be hiding money or property from you, you owe it to yourself to look into it more -- it could make a big impact on your end-result divorce settlement.
Opperman Investigation offers asset searches for those who need to find assets that their spouse may be hiding. Visit EmailRevealer.com to review their infidelity and asset investigation services.
