Navigating Connecticut Divorce: Residency Requirements You Need to Know

For some people, they don't know what state to file their divorce in. Maybe they've recently moved to Connecticut from out of state. Maybe they live in one state and their spouse lives in Connecticut. This question comes up a lot: What's the right state? I know I want a divorce, but where should I file it?

There are three ways that someone can meet the residency requirement in order to have a Connecticut divorce. The first way is by far the most common. It requires that one or both spouses—just at least one—has lived in Connecticut for 12 months preceding the filing or the finalization of the divorce.

You know what that means, right? Before I file for divorce, I've lived here at least 12 months. Super clear. But what about the second part of that—12 months before my divorce becomes final? Well, how do I know how long it will take for my divorce to be finalized? This is a question we answer a lot. People move to Connecticut, know they want a divorce, and have been here five or six months. What they want to know is: Can I file in Connecticut now? We're happy to work through this with you, give you a sense of how long your divorce will take, because what matters most in this way of achieving residency in Connecticut for divorce purposes is when that divorce is likely to become final.

That's the date that we need to ensure it was 12 months before. We help people through this all the time. A less common way to achieve residency in Connecticut happens in certain circumstances. It’s when you lived in Connecticut at the time you married, then moved away, and later moved back to Connecticut intending to live here permanently.

For example, say 20 years ago, you got married in Connecticut where you lived, then moved for a while to New York. Your marriage started to break down, things weren’t going well, and you decided to relocate to Connecticut. You came back here intending to live here permanently. In that case, you meet the Connecticut residency requirement. You don’t need to have lived here a new 12 months because you lived here when you got married, left, and then returned intending to reside here permanently.

The third, and I would say least common, way to achieve residency in Connecticut for divorce purposes is when the marriage broke down after you moved to Connecticut. This option doesn’t require you to be here 12 months before the divorce is final. All that’s required is that the marriage broke down after you moved to Connecticut. It might seem straightforward at first, but it’s uncommon because it's challenging to prove exactly when a marriage broke down. Generally, it doesn’t make sense to go this route. Most people wind up using the most common way to achieve residency in Connecticut, which requires that you’ve lived here a minimum of 12 months before your divorce becomes final.

Most of our divorces here at Freed Marcroft take about 9 to 12 months. That’s generally what we see happening in Connecticut. So most people will qualify under the most common way to achieve residency: living in Connecticut for 12 months continuously before their divorce is finalized. When you're trying to figure out whether Connecticut is the place where you can get divorced, you might think, 'What is my domicile?' It's a legal term that comes up in the context of establishing residency. Courts consider multiple factors to determine domicile.

Maybe you own property in multiple states, so it's unclear where your permanent residence is. Courts might look at things like: Where do you consider your home? Where’s your driver’s license? Where do you vote? Things that signify you live in a certain place. How many days of the year do you spend in a place? Do you spend 190 days in one place and less time in another? Courts will weigh multiple factors to figure out your true domicile.

But remember, in Connecticut, only one of the two spouses needs to meet the residency requirement for a Connecticut court to hear your divorce. A common misconception is that you have to live in Connecticut for 12 months before filing for divorce. It’s really important to know that if you’re using this route to establish residency, you only need to live in Connecticut for 12 months before your divorce is finalized.

If you have a question about whether you're eligible to file in Connecticut and you’d like to start the process, please give us a call to work through these issues early. Many people think they have to wait longer than they actually do to begin moving forward.

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