What If My Spouse’s Business Pays Their Personal Expenses?
It can matter a great deal, and Missouri has a written rule for it. Where a business pays expenses of a parent that are personal in nature and not business related, those payments may count as that person’s income for support purposes even though the tax return never shows them as salary.
This is one of the most common questions a non owner spouse asks and one of the least well answered. The household lived a certain way. The tax return says the owner earns far less than that life costs. Both things are true at once, and a business paying personal expenses is usually the explanation.
The rule is real. It is also permissive rather than automatic, and that distinction is where these arguments are actually won and lost. The governing statutes are public at the Missouri Revisor of Statutes and in the Chapter 452 index.
Where Does the Rule Come From?
From the Form 14 Directions, at Line 1 on gross income, in the comment headed Self-Employment Income.
The comment provides that “expense reimbursements or in kind payments by the business to pay for expenses of the parent that are personal in nature and not business related may be income to the parent”, and that gross income for support purposes “may differ from the net profit or net loss of the business for income tax purposes”.
That language survives the new form. The Supreme Court of Missouri repealed Form 14 and adopted a replacement effective January 1, 2026, by order dated 4 March 2025, and the self-employment comment reads the same in the current version as it did in the previous one.
The reason a worksheet comment carries weight is that the worksheet itself is mandatory. In DeArriba v. DeArriba, 100 S.W.3d 134, the Eastern District applied the rule, quoting In re Marriage of Harvey, 48 S.W.3d 674, that “the application of Supreme Court Rule 88.01 and Form 14 is mandatory” and that a trial court must calculate the gross income of a self employed parent as the rule and the form direct.
Note the phrase personal in nature and not business related. That is the test, and it is a factual question rather than a legal one.
Does the Rule Say Those Payments Are Income?
No. It says they may be, and a Missouri court has held that the word may means exactly what it looks like.
In Youngberg v. Youngberg, 194 S.W.3d 886, a salvage business paid a thousand dollars a month on a real estate loan covering the marital home. The trial court left that payment out of the owner’s Form 14 gross income and used his tax return figure instead. The other spouse appealed and lost.
The Southern District affirmed, reasoning that “the word ‘may’ in the Directions and Comments for Use for Form 14 indicates a grant of discretion to the trial court”, and finding no requirement that the trial court treat the payment as income.
Read that before you build a case on it. The comment gives a Missouri judge permission to count business paid personal expenses as income. It does not oblige one to. Which means the work is persuading a particular judge on a particular record, not citing a rule and waiting.
Does a Business Paying Personal Expenses Only Help One Side?
No, and DeArriba is the case that proves it, from the other direction than people expect.
The self employed father there won his appeal. The trial court had adopted an income figure without accounting for his ordinary and necessary business expenses, and the child support award was reversed and remanded for that reason.
So a business paying personal expenses is a two sided rule. Personal items can come in. Genuine business expenses have to come out. A non owner spouse who treats every dollar the company spent as income is going to be corrected, and an owner who treats a boat as a marketing expense is going to be corrected too.
What Counts as a Business Paying Personal Expenses?
Ordinary living costs that leave the company’s account rather than the household’s.
- Vehicles. A car titled to the company and used almost entirely for family driving, plus its insurance and fuel
- Phones and technology. Family lines, laptops and subscriptions carried on the business account
- Travel and entertainment. Trips, tickets and meals that are family activity rather than client work
- Housing costs. Rent, utilities or maintenance on a residence run through the company
- Employed relatives. Wages to a family member who does little or no actual work
- Insurance and memberships. Health, life or disability coverage and club dues paid by the business
- Owner loans that never come back. Advances recorded as loans with no repayment history
The general ledger is where a business paying personal expenses becomes visible, not the tax return. A return shows a net result. The ledger shows the individual transactions that produced it. Child support itself runs on Section 452.340 RSMo, whose first subsection lists six factors including “The financial resources and needs of the parents”, and on the Form 14 worksheet. Our FAQ on getting your spouse’s business records covers how a non owner reaches it.
What Is the Broader Principle?
That a court looks at resources rather than at a job title.
In Jung v. Jung, 886 S.W.2d 737, a professional corporation paid the husband office rent of $3,366 a month and equipment rent of $3,150 a month and provided his medical and dental insurance. Applying a rule it quoted from Sturgeon v. Sturgeon, 849 S.W.2d 171, the Eastern District stated that “All resources available to a party, not just salary, should be considered in determining the party’s ability to pay maintenance and child support”, and that nothing is exempt from that consideration.
That is the principle worth carrying. It is also worth noticing how it fits with Youngberg. Everything is available for consideration. Nothing is automatically counted.
Where Does the Argument Fail?
When the perks are historical rather than ongoing, and this is the case a non owner spouse needs to know about before relying on old spending.
In Schneithorst v. Schneithorst, 473 S.W.3d 239, a family business had paid for $40,000 in hockey tickets, $7,000 in other event tickets and travel expenses, charged to the father’s card. On any casual reading that is the strongest set of facts imaginable for an add back argument.
The modified award was reversed anyway, both the child support and the maintenance. The Eastern District recorded that “The payments were not considered ordinary and necessary business expenses but instead were considered advances to Father due to his personal overspending”, and then that “There is no substantial evidence in the record indicating Father accessed or directly received any funds from the family business after October 2013, and there is no substantial evidence in the record indicating Father would access or directly receive funds from the family business in the future.”
Read what did the damage. Not the size of the spending. The absence of evidence that it was still available. A history of perks does not establish future income once the person has lost access to the company, and the trial court’s contrary finding was described as speculation rather than substantial evidence.
So the evidence that matters is current and forward looking. What does the company pay for now, and can this person still cause it to.
What If the Company Is Not a Party to the Case?
Then the court’s reach over what the company owns is narrower than people assume.
In Hughes v. Hughes, 247 S.W.3d 59, the Western District applied a rule it quoted from Chen v. Li, 986 S.W.2d 927 , that “Unless a corporation is a party to the action, the circuit court has authority to divide and to dispose only the corporation’s stock, not its assets.” Where the corporation is a party, the same passage says the court may consider the corporate assets in the division.
That is a property division limit rather than an income limit, and it does not stop a court from looking at what the company pays for when it works out somebody’s resources. It does decide whether the company itself can be reached. Our FAQ on joining a business to a divorce covers when that step is worth taking.
Does This Change What the Business Is Worth?
It is a different question, and Missouri’s written rule addresses income rather than value.
Valuation professionals routinely normalize a closely held company’s earnings, adjusting for owner compensation above or below market and for personal items run through the business, before applying a valuation method. That is standard practice among appraisers.
It is worth being precise about what that is. It is expert practice convention rather than a Missouri holding. The Form 14 comment, DeArriba and Youngberg are about income for support. No Missouri decision found for this page squarely requires normalization when valuing a business for property division, and a page that claimed otherwise would be overstating it.
The practical consequence is that the same ledger entries can do work in two places, on different footings. Our FAQ on business valuation in a divorce covers the valuation side and our FAQ on the business valuation date covers when the measurement is taken.
What Should a Non Owner Spouse Actually Gather?
The household side first, because you already have it.
- Build the real budget. What the household actually spent each month, from your own bank and card statements
- Note what never appeared as an expense. Cars, phones, travel, insurance or dues that simply never came out of the family account, because a business paying personal expenses leaves a hole in the household budget rather than a line in it
- Keep the joint tax returns. Every year you signed, with all schedules
- List who else was on the payroll. Relatives, and roughly what they did
- Show that it is still happening. Schneithorst is the reason current evidence beats historical evidence
- Do not go looking through their systems. The company’s records come through the formal route, not through self help
That budget then goes into a sworn document. Our FAQ on the statement of income and expenses covers the form, and the gap between it and the reported income is often the clearest evidence in the case.
What Does This Question Not Decide?
Two things worth separating out.
It does not decide classification. Whether the business is marital or separate runs on Section 452.330 RSMo, and our FAQ on whether you are entitled to a share of your spouse’s business covers it.
And it does not decide maintenance on its own. Maintenance runs on the two findings in Section 452.335.1 RSMo and then on ten statutory factors, with income as one input among them.
Who Can Help When a Business Pays Personal Expenses?
A business paying personal expenses is the usual explanation for the gap between a reported income and an observed standard of living, and it is one of the most common issues in a divorce with a closely held company in it. It is also provable. It is provable from records rather than from impressions, and the records are reachable.
Bardol Law Firm practices only family law, in St. Louis County, St. Louis City, St. Charles County and Jefferson County. We handle income and support disputes where the numbers on a return do not match the life the household led, on both sides of it, and we work with your own accountant rather than replacing them. Bring your household statements and the joint returns. You can read more on our divorce for business owners page, our child support in Missouri page, and across the rest of our family law questions and answers.
You should not have to chase your attorney while you are trying to explain that the numbers do not add up. Every client here has a named paralegal on the file, and we generally return calls within one business day.
Family Law, Simplified.
Start with your own statements, because they are the half of the evidence you already hold. Contact Bardol Law Firm or call 314.918.0100 to work out what the rest of it needs to be.
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.