A Carluzzo Rochkind & Smith note: Following is an excellent article by Virginia Lawyers Weekly. We did not handle this case, but it brings up important points your divorce lawyers should be familiar with. For more than 30 years our divorce lawyers in Manassas have helped clients with such matters in Prince William County, Fairfax County, Woodbridge, and throughout Northern Virginia. If you have any questions or would like to schedule an appointment, please contact our law firm at (703) 361-0776.
Husband’s challenge to equitable distribution decision fails
By Virginia Lawyers Weekly – 11/10/2025
Where the record showed that the trial court properly considered the statutory factors in equitably distributing the property, the trial court did not abuse its discretion by awarding half the value of the two properties to wife.
Background
Appealing the portion of the trial court’s final decree addressing equitable distribution, James Douglas Yates claims that the trial court erred by failing to consider that he brought the disputed real property into the marriage as separate property. Hassie Regina Ward Yates assigns cross-error to the trial court’s valuation of husband’s cash assets and its refusal to award attorney’s fees.
Equitable distribution
Husband argues the trial court “refused to consider” that he “brought his families’ real property into the marriage as separate property.” The record belies this contention. Judge Patton’s letter opinion acknowledges that both houses were “originally owned by . . . husband prior to the marriage.” But husband deeded those properties to the parties’ children, who then transferred the properties back to the parties during the marriage as tenants by the entirety, retitled in both parties’ names.
And there were other factors that weighed in favor of giving wife half the value of both properties, including that both parties made “sacrifices” and paid money to improve them. Thus, the record shows that the trial court properly considered the statutory factors in equitably distributing the property, including that both houses started as husband’s separate property. The trial court did not abuse its discretion by awarding half the value of the two properties to wife.
Safe
Wife argues that the trial court should have used the parties’ separation date as an “Alternative Valuation Date” for the cash in husband’s safe. Had the court done so, she claims, it would have found that husband “committed a series of acts of marital waste,” diminishing the safe’s contents from $74,592 to the “$1,500-$2,000” testified to by husband. She further claims Patton relied too heavily on her testimony that she “never had access to the safe” and “that she had no idea how much money was in it.”
The April 1 letter opinion shows that the trial court grappled with how to classify and distribute the cash in husband’s safe. Relying on husband’s W2 form, wife argued at both trials that there was $74,592 in the safe because that figure reflected his total wages from the part-time county job, which husband always deposited into the safe.
Husband agreed that he deposited his part-time earnings into the safe, but he also testified that he would remove money from the safe as needed. Husband testified that “there was never more than $1,500.00 to $2,000.00 in the safe.” Without access to the safe, wife could not refute that testimony. Wife could not “confirm how much money, if any, was in the safe.”
Wife’s evidence did not warrant imposing an alternative valuation date; she failed to prove that $74,592 was ever in the safe. By contrast, the trial court credited husband’s testimony that there was at most $2,000 in the safe, including on the date of trial. This court cannot say the trial court erred in crediting husband’s testimony and using that as the basis for its equitable-distribution award.
Attorneys’ fees
Wife argues that the trial court should have awarded her attorney’s fees because she “suffers the financial inability to pay these fees and costs while [husband] clearly enjoys the ability to do so.” Even crediting the parties’ financial inequities, there were other factors that weighed in favor of denying wife’s request for attorney’s fees. Because the record shows that the court considered the relevant factors, including the amount of fees that wife incurred, this court cannot say it abused its discretion in declining to award wife’s attorney’s fees. The equities do not warrant awarding appellate fees to wife.
Affirmed.
Yates v. Yates, Record No. 1294-24-3, Oct. 28, 2025. CAV (unpublished opinion) (Raphael). From the Circuit Court of Buchanan County (Patton). Robert M. Galumbeck (Galumbeck Stiltner & Gillespie, Attorneys, on brief), for appellant. Robert J. Breimann (Street Law Firm LLP, on brief), for appellee. VLW 025-7-313. 10 pp.
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