Article: First Comes Love, Then Comes Marriage: Cohabitation as a Framework for Conflicts Between Community Property and Common Law Marriage

Ana Mitchell Córdova, a law student at Texas Tech School of Law recently published an article entitled, First Comes Love, Then Comes Marriage: Cohabitation as a Framework for Conflicts Between Community Property and Common Law Marriage, Estate Planning Journal, Vol. 14 Issue 1, 2022.

Provided below is the abstract to the Article: 

In 2015, the Supreme Court of the United States legalized same-sex marriage. This occasion was momentous, but the decision also led to numerous other issues related to marriage and property. A big question was whether Obergefell would apply retroactively or prospectively because both options would have significantly different impacts on property distribution. In the intervening time, precedent has indicated that Obergefell is applied retroactively, but this precedent does not resolve all issues related to the interplay between marriage and property. Texas happens to be the only state in the entire United States that possesses both community property and common law marriage systems, which can complicate property distribution. Obergefell’s impact raises even more thorny issues to consider.