Alimony and Spousal Support in Colorado

Colorado calls alimony maintenance and has advisory guidelines for marriages of at least three years where combined annual adjusted gross income is $240,000 or less. When maintenance is taxable to the recipient, the guideline amount is 40 percent of the spouses' combined monthly adjusted gross income minus the lower earner's income (zero if negative); for non-taxable awards, the amount is reduced to a set percentage of that figure depending on income. The guideline term for marriages of 3 to 20 years comes from a statutory table; for marriages over 20 years, maintenance may be for a set term or indefinite. The guidelines are not presumptive: the court considers factors such as each spouse's financial resources, the marital lifestyle, the property division, income and employability, and age and health.

Colorado uses equitable distribution. The court sets apart each spouse's separate property and divides marital property, without regard to marital misconduct, in proportions it finds just, considering each spouse's contributions (including as a homemaker), the value of each spouse's separate property, each spouse's economic circumstances (including awarding the family home to the parent the children mainly live with), and changes in the value of separate property during the marriage. Marital property is everything acquired during the marriage except gifts and inheritances, property exchanged for pre-marriage or gifted property, property acquired after a decree of legal separation, and property excluded by valid agreement.