-12- This Court looks to the following factors which indicate that payments are in the nature of a property settlement rather than a support allowance: (1) The parties in their agreement (or the court in its decree) intended the payments to effect a division of their assets; (2) the recipient surrendered valuable property rights in exchange for the payments; (3) the payments are fixed in amount and not subject to contingencies, such as the remarriage or death of the recipient; (4) the payments are secured; (5) the amount of the payments plus the other property awarded to the recipient equals approximately one-half of the property accumulated by the parties during marriage; (6) the needs of the recipient were not taken into consideration in determining the amount of the payments; and (7) a separate provision for support was provided elsewhere in the decree or agreement. Benedict v. Commissioner, 82 T.C. 573, 577-578 (1984); Beard v. Commissioner, supra at 1284-1285. Failure to satisfy one or more of the factors articulated herein may tend to indicate that the payments in question are more in the nature of a support allowance. See Beard v. Commissioner, supra at 1285. Applying the above factors, we conclude that Dr. Ibach's payments to petitioner were in the nature of alimony. Our analysis of the factors in reaching our conclusion is as follows. With regard to the first factor, we believe the agreement was intended to be a comprehensive and final settlement of all issues regarding custody, support, visitation, alimony, and property settlement between petitioner and Dr. Ibach. Paragraph 9 providesPage: Previous 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 Next
Last modified: May 25, 2011