Does Alimony Stop If You Remarry in Missouri?
Generally yes. Under Section 452.370.3 RSMo the obligation to pay future maintenance ends when the party receiving it remarries, unless the parties agreed otherwise in writing or the judgment expressly says otherwise.
Section 452.370.3 RSMo is one sentence. “Unless otherwise agreed in writing or expressly provided in the judgment, the obligation to pay future statutory maintenance is terminated upon the death of either party or the remarriage of the party receiving maintenance.”
The important word is future. Installments that already came due are a judgment debt and remarriage does not erase them. What ends is the obligation going forward.
That is the short answer. The reason this page is longer than one paragraph is that Missouri has a second statute on the same subject, the two are worded differently, and the difference decides who has to do what. The threshold findings that produced the award in the first place are in Section 452.335 RSMo, and our FAQ on alimony in Missouri works through them.
What Are the 2 Ways to Change That Result?
An agreement in writing, or an express provision in the judgment. Those are the only two, and both have to exist before the remarriage.
The Supreme Court of Missouri set the structure out in Cates v. Cates, 819 S.W.2d 731. A separation agreement promised seven thousand eight hundred dollars payable at three hundred and twenty five dollars a month, the decree was entered in May 1988, and the recipient remarried just over a year later. The Court read Section 452.370 as setting up a presumption that the obligation ends, and then named both ways to rebut it.
“The statutory presumption is rebutted by an agreement in writing that the obligation to pay statutory maintenance extends beyond remarriage or death. The presumption is also rebutted by a decree of dissolution expressly extending the obligation to pay future statutory maintenance beyond the death of either party or the remarriage of the receiving party.”
Cates also gave the policy behind the rule. “Section 452.370.2 expresses a legislative determination that the remarriage of the receiving spouse ends that spouse’s time of dependence support.” The subsection was numbered .2 in the statute Cates was reading and is .3 today. Older opinions citing .2 are correct for their vintage and should not be tidied up.
Where Does the Written Agreement Route Come From?
Section 452.325 RSMo, which is what lets parties build their own maintenance terms.
Section 452.325.1 RSMo allows a written separation agreement “containing provisions for the maintenance of either of them”, and subsection 6 allows the decree to “expressly preclude or limit modification of terms set forth in the decree if the separation agreement so provides.”
If maintenance surviving a remarriage matters to either side, it is a drafting decision, not a later argument. Our FAQ on alimony modification covers what an agreement can lock down and what it cannot.
Is There a Second Missouri Statute That Says This?
Yes, and almost nobody cites it. Section 452.075 RSMo is a 1957 provision headed “Remarriage of former spouse ends alimony” that survived the 1973 rewrite of the chapter.
Section 452.075 RSMo provides that where a court has ordered alimony and maintenance, “the remarriage of the former spouse shall relieve the spouse obligated to pay support from further payment of alimony to the former spouse from the date of the remarriage, without the necessity of further court action”, and that the remarriage “shall not relieve the former spouse from the provisions of any judgment or decree or order providing for the support of any minor children.”
Set the two side by side, because they are not the same sentence.
- Section 452.370.3 RSMo carries the opt out, “Unless otherwise agreed in writing or expressly provided in the judgment”, and uses the modern vocabulary of maintenance and judgment
- Section 452.075 RSMo carries no opt out, uses the older vocabulary of divorce and alimony, and adds the phrase “without the necessity of further court action”
The practical reading most people take from that pair is the cautious one. Where the judgment and any agreement are silent, remarriage ends future maintenance and nobody has to file anything to make that happen. Where the judgment or an agreement says otherwise, that language is what Section 452.370.3 RSMo was written to honor.
Does Alimony Stop If You Remarry Without Anyone Filing?
Read the judgment first, and get the remarriage documented, before anything stops.
The risk sits entirely on the payor. If the judgment or an agreement did extend the obligation past remarriage, payments that stop are arrears under a live order, and Section 452.370.6 RSMo allows modification “only as to support or maintenance installments which accrued subsequent to the date of personal service.” A marriage certificate costs a few dollars. Guessing wrong costs a great deal more.
What If the Judgment Language Is Ambiguous?
Then a Missouri court can look outside the document to work out what the parties meant.
In LaBarge v. Berndsen, 681 S.W.2d 441 a separation agreement said maintenance would be paid “for as long as she shall live” and would continue after the husband’s death. She remarried and the payments stopped.
What made it ambiguous rather than silent is the detail worth carrying away. The same agreement did use a remarriage condition, but in a different clause, providing that health insurance would continue only “until such time as she may remarry.” The drafters knew how to write the condition. They wrote it once and not twice. The Supreme Court of Missouri held the maintenance language ambiguous on remarriage and allowed the court to go further. “Since the agreement is ambiguous regarding its effect in the event of remarriage, resort may be had to extrinsic evidence, including parol evidence, to determine the true intent of the parties to the contract and resolve the ambiguities.”
Cates distinguished LaBarge rather than overruling it. In Cates the Court searched the agreement for an ambiguity and found none, describing it as simply silent. Silence and ambiguity are not the same thing. A document that conditions one benefit on remarriage and says nothing about another invites the question. A document that says nothing at all anywhere leaves the statutory presumption standing.
The practical lesson is a drafting one. Does alimony stop if you remarry under your judgment is a question that should have a one line answer in the document, and very often does not.
Does the Paying Spouse’s Remarriage Change Anything?
Not automatically. The statute names the remarriage of the party receiving maintenance, not the party paying it.
That said, a payor’s new household is not invisible. On a motion to modify, Section 452.370.1 RSMo requires the court to consider “all financial resources of both parties, including the extent to which the reasonable expenses of either party are, or should be, shared by a spouse or other person with whom he or she cohabits”.
So a payor’s remarriage does not end anything, and it can enter the analysis in either direction. New income in the household is a resource. New obligations are not, at least not as a reduction in the ability to meet a court order.
What About Living Together Instead of Remarrying?
Cohabitation is not a terminating event in Missouri and it never has been.
It is evidence in a motion to modify, and it can reduce maintenance where it demonstrably reduces the recipient’s expenses. It does not end the obligation on its own, and the difference is worth understanding before anyone plans around it. Our FAQ on cohabitation and alimony covers what Missouri courts have done with it.
Does Death End Maintenance the Same Way?
Yes, on the same sentence, and it works on either party’s death.
Section 452.370.3 RSMo names “the death of either party” alongside the recipient’s remarriage. So a payor’s death ends the obligation as surely as a recipient’s remarriage does, and with the same two exceptions available.
That is a planning problem rather than a relief. A recipient whose support ends with the payor’s death is left with nothing, which is why life insurance is a standard subject in maintenance negotiations and why the written agreement route exists.
What Does the Remarriage Rule Not Decide?
Three things, and each one gets assumed away.
It does not decide arrears. Amounts that accrued before the remarriage remain owed and remain enforceable as a judgment. Under Section 452.325.5 RSMo, terms set out in the decree are enforceable by all the remedies available for enforcing a judgment, and contempt is among them.
It does not decide child support. Section 452.075 RSMo says so expressly, providing that a remarriage does not relieve the former spouse from any judgment or order “providing for the support of any minor children”. Our FAQ on child support in Missouri covers that side.
And it does not decide the property division, which is final under Section 452.330.5 RSMo and does not reopen because somebody remarried. Our FAQ on how marital property gets divided covers the difference between a property award and a support award, which is exactly the distinction that decides this question.
What Should You Check Before Stopping or Demanding a Payment?
Six things, in this order, and the first three are reading rather than lawyering.
- Read the dissolution judgment end to end rather than the maintenance paragraph alone
- Read every separation or settlement agreement the judgment incorporated, because that is where the opt out lives if there is one
- Look for the words remarriage, death, modification and nonmodifiable anywhere in either document, including clauses that have nothing to do with maintenance
- Separate future installments from installments that came due before the remarriage, because only the first group is in play
- Get a certified copy of the marriage certificate and keep the payment history
- Have unclear language read before payments change, not after somebody files
Item three is the one people skip, and LaBarge is the reason it belongs on the list. A remarriage condition sitting in an insurance clause was enough to make the maintenance clause ambiguous and open the door to evidence about intent.
Who Can Help Work Out Whether Alimony Stops on Remarriage?
The answer to does alimony stop if you remarry in Missouri is usually yes, and it is usually in the judgment rather than in the statute. Both sides are better off knowing which before anyone plans a wedding or stops a payment.
Bardol Law Firm practices only family law, in St. Louis County, St. Louis City, St. Charles County and Jefferson County. We read maintenance judgments and separation agreements for exactly this, and we draft them so the question has an answer on the page. You can read more about how long alimony lasts, about alimony in Missouri generally, and on our spousal support and alimony page. The rest of our family law questions and answers covers the surrounding ground.
You should not have to guess whether an obligation is still running. Every client here has a named paralegal on the file, and we generally return calls within one business day.
Family Law, Simplified.
Before a remarriage or a stopped payment, have the judgment read. Contact Bardol Law Firm or call 314.918.0100 and we will tell you what your order actually says.
This page is general information about Missouri law and is not legal advice. Every case turns on its own facts. The choice of a lawyer is an important decision and should not be based solely upon advertisements.