WHERE CAN I LIVE AFTER MY DIVORCE?

After your divorce becomes final you may wish to move but are unsure if there are any restrictions. The answer is, if there are no children then there are no restrictions. In fact, you may move anywhere you wish. Even out of the country. If you do have children, the answer is not as clear. The reason being is that both parents are to have meaningful time with their children.  However, realistically in order to have meaningful time with your children both parties need to live relatively close to each other.  The question then becomes how close you would have to live to each other for your children to have meaningful time with each parent. 

There is no concrete rule as to how far you can move away but the Courts will generally deem twenty to thirty minutes apart reasonable. The starting point is the marital residence where the children reside. This restriction is placed on the residential parent.  The non-residential parent can essentially move to wherever he or she wants. Please keep in mind that if you do move too far away then the residential parent is not required to make any special arrangements to help facilitate your parenting time.

Additionally, once the non-residential parent moves out of state or clearly out of the area, then, unless there is a provision in the Agreement, the residential parent will more than likely not be bound to stay within a certain radius to the marital home. Once you start moving further than twenty or thirty minutes away from each other, the issue will also become how the distance will affect the children.  If you are forty-five minutes away, this means that your child will be in the car forty-five minutes each way.  That may not be in your child’s best interests.  If long distance between the non-custodial parent occurs you can suggest extra time during a specified school break, such as an extra week of time during the summer.