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November 21. 2008 Susanne Wherry joins law firm of Cooley & Handy Susanne M. Wherry has joined the Doylestown law firm of Cooley & Handy. The firm concentrates in personal injury and family law in Bucks, Montgomery and Philadelphia Counties. Ms. Wherry graduated from the College of Charleston in Charleston, South Carolina. She received her law degree from the Temple University School of Law in Philadelphia. While attending Temple University she received the Barrister’s Award for Outstanding Performance in Oral Advocacy. Prior to joining Cooley & Handy, Ms. Wherry worked for a Philadelphia area civil litigation firm where she successfully argued a precedentsetting case to the Superior Court of Pennsylvania relating to the right of a third-party biological father to challenge an acknowledgement of paternity. While not the official law of Pennsylvania, the Bucks County Divorce Master’s Office most often applies a very fair formula for equitably distributing premarital assets contributed to the marriage, which is known by Bucks County divorce attorneys as the “vanishing credit,” because the contributing spouse’s credit essentially “vanishes” over a twenty-year period. In short, the Bucks County Divorce Master’s office |
will consider 5% of a premarital asset converted to a joint marital asset or “contributed” to the marriage per year and subject to equitable distribution. The remaining percentage will be deemed a separate asset and returned to the contributing spouse in full. For example, suppose a spouse contributes $100,000.00 of premarital funds to purchase a jointly owned marital residence. Further, assume that the marriage is a ten-year marriage and the marital residence was purchased and the premarital funds contributed two years into the marriage. To calculate the marital component of the contributed funds, the Bucks County Divorce Master’s Office will multiply the number of years elapsed between the contribution of the funds and the date of separation, in this example 8 years, by 5%, which equals 40%. Therefore, The Bucks County Divorce Master’s office will recommend that 40% of the $100,000.00 be considered as martial property subject to equitable distribution. The Bucks County Divorce Master’s Office will further recommend that the remaining 60% of the $100,000.00 be returned to the contributing spouse as separate property. Of course, if one (or both parties) does not accept the Bucks County Divorce Master’s recommendation and takes the issue of equitable distribution to trial before a judge, a judge will likely not apply the vanishing credit (at least explicitly), since that is not the official law of Pennsylvania. However, the ultimate decision on equitable distribution by the judge may practically be very similar in result. |
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