If your spouse is selling property, emptying accounts, or moving money while your marriage is ending, Florida law gives you real options, and they work better the sooner you use them.
It also helps to know that the law here is narrower than most people expect. Florida calls the serious version of this dissipation, and not every purchase you disapprove of qualifies.
What Florida counts as dissipation
Property division runs through section 61.075 of the Florida Statutes. The court sets apart each spouse's nonmarital property, then divides what is marital. The statute is direct about the starting point: the court must begin with the premise that the distribution should be equal, unless there is a justification for an unequal distribution based on all relevant factors.
One listed factor is the one that matters here. Section 61.075(1)(i) lets the court weigh the intentional dissipation, waste, depletion, or destruction of marital assets after the filing of the petition or within two years before the filing. Two pieces do most of the work. The conduct has to be intentional. And the two year lookback means a judge can consider money that left before anyone filed.
Where a court finds dissipation, the remedy usually works inside the division rather than by undoing the sale. The missing value is accounted for, so the spouse who spent it is treated as having already received part of their share. That is the argument for an unequal split within equitable distribution.
Ordinary living expenses are not dissipation
Here is the part that surprises people. Florida appellate courts have held that the misconduct required for a dissipation finding does not include mismanagement, or the simple squandering of marital money in a manner the other spouse disapproves of. A spouse can be careless or invest poorly, and neither on its own meets the standard.
Hillsborough's standing order says something similar in plainer words: the parties may spend their incomes in the ordinary course of their personal and family affairs. The mortgage, groceries, a car repair, keeping a business running, a retainer paid to a lawyer, supporting the children. Ordinary, even when one spouse resents it.
What supports a claim looks different. Courts respond to marital money used for one spouse's own benefit, for a purpose unrelated to the marriage, at a point when the marriage was already breaking down. In practice that means transfers to a relative for safekeeping, spending tied to a new relationship, gambling losses, unexplained cash withdrawals, or an asset sold well below value. Anger about a purchase is understandable, and the question a judge asks is intent and purpose.
What already applies once your case is filed here
Tampa family cases are filed in the Hillsborough County Circuit Court, Family Law Division, at the George Edgecomb Courthouse, 800 E. Twiggs Street. It issues a Standing Temporary Order for Family Law Cases, served by the petitioner with the petition. It binds the petitioner at filing and the other spouse upon service, and lasts until a further order or final judgment. Its provisions on assets:
- Neither party should conceal, damage, or dispose of a marital asset, or dissipate its value, and neither should conceal or waste jointly held cash, bank accounts, or other liquid funds.
- Family records and records of income or debt may not be concealed or destroyed. Insurance policies in effect at filing may not be terminated, allowed to lapse, borrowed against, or encumbered, beneficiaries may not be changed without agreement or a court order, and premiums must keep being paid.
- Neither party may incur additional debt that would bind the other or tie up assets. Joint credit cards are for necessities, and a party using one after separation should expect to justify the charges.
- Both parties must file and exchange financial affidavits and mandatory disclosure under Florida Family Law Rule of Procedure 12.285.
Not every Florida circuit uses a standing order of this kind, and those that do word them differently.
When the standing order is not enough
A standing order is the floor. If money is actively moving, you can ask for more.
A motion for temporary injunctive relief asks the judge to restrain specific conduct: freezing an account, blocking a sale, requiring notice before a transfer. Courts do not grant this casually. The moving party generally has to show a substantial likelihood of success on the merits, irreparable harm, the absence of an adequate remedy at law, and that the injunction serves the public interest. Specific facts, tied to particular accounts and dates, give a court something to act on.
Section 61.075(5) offers a route people overlook. On a sworn motion showing good cause and a specific factual basis, a judge may enter an interim order identifying, valuing, and partially distributing particular assets before the final hearing.
Where an order is in place and gets violated, the response is a motion to enforce, and in some circumstances contempt. What follows depends on the facts, so no one can tell you in advance.
One process note. In this circuit, mediation is required before a temporary relief hearing and again within six months of the final hearing. The mediator is a neutral who represents neither spouse, so the attorney sitting with you is the one advocating for your position. It is a normal stage of the divorce process in Florida, not a detour.
What actually proves a dissipation claim
These claims are built on documents:
- Complete account statements, covering the whole period rather than only the months you suspect. The ordinary pattern is what makes the change visible.
- Tracing. A withdrawal with no known destination carries less weight than one followed into a specific purchase, account, or person.
- A timeline of the breakdown, because the standard turns on spending at a time when the marriage was failing.
- Third party records obtained by subpoena: bank, brokerage, credit card, business.
- Deposition testimony, often where an explanation either holds together or comes apart.
- A forensic accountant, in larger or business heavy cases.
In a contested case, section 61.075(3) requires the court to support its distribution with factual findings based on competent substantial evidence. That runs both directions: a judge cannot simply accept an accusation, and a well documented claim has to be addressed on the record.
If the selling happened before anyone filed
Money that moved before a petition was filed is not automatically out of reach, which is what the two year lookback in section 61.075(1)(i) is for. Under section 61.075(7), the cut off date for classifying an asset as marital is the earliest of a valid separation agreement, a date that agreement expressly sets, or the date the petition is filed. The date used to value an asset is whatever the judge determines is just and equitable, and different assets may carry different valuation dates.
What to do now
- Save statements for every account you can lawfully reach, today, while your access lasts. Delete nothing.
- Write down dates, amounts, names, and what was said about each transaction.
- Do not respond by moving money yourself. Mirroring the conduct weakens a claim and can put you on the wrong side of the same order.
- Keep paying the ordinary bills. A lapsed mortgage or policy creates a second problem on top of the first.
- Speak with a family law attorney early. Timing is most of what makes injunctive relief useful.
If you are looking at transactions you cannot explain, the next step is a lawyer who can read the actual statements and tell you which of three things you have: a dissipation claim worth pleading, a temporary relief motion worth filing now, or ordinary spending in a hard year. Rechel & Associates has served Tampa Bay families since 1992, focused exclusively on divorce and family law.