How is our property divided once our annulment becomes final?

Division is part of the decree, not a separate case afterwards

The single most useful thing in this article is the word shall. The final judgment has to deal with liquidation, partition and distribution; it is not a decision about the marriage that leaves the property to be sorted out later by agreement or by a second lawsuit. The same judgment also has to cover custody and support of the common children and the delivery of their presumptive legitimes. The only carve-out is for matters already adjudicated in previous judicial proceedings. Couples who assume the decree ends the case and that the house can be argued about afterwards have misread the structure of the remedy.

Creditors are notified before anything is divided

Liquidation is not a private division between two people. All creditors of the spouses, and of the absolute community or conjugal partnership, must be notified of the proceedings. The reason is straightforward: a property regime carries debts as well as assets, and spouses who split the assets between themselves while leaving the liabilities unaddressed would be doing so at the creditors' expense. This is why the process asks for an inventory rather than a list of what each side wants, and why an honest accounting of the couple's borrowings is worth more at this stage than an aggressive claim to a particular asset.

The conjugal dwelling has its own rule

The family home is usually the asset everyone actually cares about, and Article 50 does not leave it to a straight halving. In the partition, the conjugal dwelling and the lot on which it is situated are adjudicated in accordance with the liquidation rules for the regime that governed the marriage — the absolute community rules in one case, the conjugal partnership rules in the other. Those rules run an ordered procedure: inventory, payment of debts, return of each spouse's exclusive property, then division of what is left. The dwelling is dealt with inside that sequence, which is why a spouse's claim to it cannot be assessed in isolation.

Which marriages the article actually covers

A point that trips up readers: the article applies the property consequences of Article 43 and Article 44 to marriages declared void under Article 40 and to those annulled under Article 45. It is not a universal rule for every void marriage. Where a union falls outside that description — some void marriages are governed by different provisions entirely — the property consequences are found elsewhere in the Code and can differ materially. Before assuming this article governs your situation, establish precisely which ground the petition was based on. That single fact, not the label ‘annulment’, determines which liquidation regime applies to your property.

Cases citing this provision

These Supreme Court decisions cite the provision above. We list them so you can read them yourself; the summaries of what each decided are not ours to give.

• Eric U. Yu vs. Hon. Judge Agnes Reyes-Carpio, et al, G.R. No. 189207, June 15, 2011 — read the decision on LawPhil →
• Alain M. Diño vs. Ma. Caridad L. Diño, G.R. No. 178044, January 19, 2011 — read the decision on LawPhil →
• Eric Jonathan Yu vs. Caroline T. Yu, G.R. No. 164915, March 10, 2006 — read the decision on LawPhil →
• Antonio A. S. Valdez vs. Rtc, Branch 102, Quezon City, et al, G.R. No. 122749, July 31, 1996 — read the decision on LawPhil →

Related provisions

• Family Code, Article 50 — Effects of Nullity and Annulment on Property and Children