In Debt, Do They Part?

Breaking up is hard to do, but during a recession, it's even tougher.

Throughout Central Florida, couples who want to split up are handicapped: by the high cost of attorneys' fees, because they can't sell their homes or can't afford to set up two households.

So some of them are stuck living together -- miserably.

"Some are agreeing to be roommates and stay at separate ends of the house," said Clermont, Fla., attorney J.J. Dahl, who handles about 65 divorce cases each year. "And we have some who have gotten divorced and they're staying in the house together until the market improves and they can sell it."

This is new territory for Dahl, who says that none of her clients was doing this two or three years ago. But today, she finds that 25 percent of her clients are living together to make ends meet until they sell the house -- and another quarter have given up and are losing their homes to foreclosure because they couldn't stand living together anymore.

Nationwide, the divorce rate appears to be the lowest since 1970, according to preliminary numbers from the National Center for Health Statistics.

In Orange County, Fla., the number of divorce filings dropped 4.5 percent from 2007 to 2008. And that drop is accelerating. In the first half of this year, divorce filings are down 9 percent from the same period in 2008.

"There is a lot of fear, so people are staying put," said Gary Nickelson, president of the American Academy of Matrimonial Lawyers. "People look at their assets and their liquidity, and they realize they don't have any."

At Orange County family court, Judge Janet Thorpe said the mood has changed dramatically.

"Back when I started in 2006, we were dealing with the peak of the real-estate boom," Thorpe said. "Divorce is usually devastating, but when the home was being sold for a large profit, people were walking out with dollar bills hanging off them -- and they were smiling."

Now, she said, many divorcing couples view their homes as a liability.

"People are saying, 'You take the house,' while the other says, 'No, you take the house.'"

Many couples are stuck living together until they can sell the house.

Living under the same roof -- with all the tension that led to separation -- is difficult, however. One of Dahl's clients tried to stay in the same home with his ex-wife while it was for sale. After a year with no nibbles on the house, he moved in with his parents.

That scenario, though unpleasant, is becoming more common.

Real-estate agent Gerri Gallo said one of her clients, a couple who divorced in December, cannot sell their 7,000-square-foot Windermere, Fla., house because the market has caved for such high-end homes. So the couple, in their early 60s, are stuck living together.

Now, they get up at different times of the morning and eat at different times to avoid each other.

"And when friends come to see her -- they're really their friends -- it's pretty awkward," Gallo said.