How do I hide or get rid of my 401k before I divorce?

Answer 1

You can't. It is regarded as part of your (combined) estate.

Answer 2

You might have a running chance if the divorce papers are not submitted.
You have to move really quick though maybe you can gift it to someone. it takes awhile before a 401K sends the money.
Ask a lawyer.
It's kind of not good karma to burn someone you once loved. Kinda dirty tricks don't you think?

Answer 3

My ex husband quit his job and cashed out his 401K just b4 divorce was filed. A supboena was done during the divorce and this was discovered. My bad lawyer Dorothy Carfrae in Downey did not do anything about this during the divorce and gave my large 401K to him and he was allowed to keep his that he hid. I dont think so. I marched back to court myself and got this corrected. My ex even lied about our marriage date stating we were married longer than we were to try and get the $ from my prior employer. Then he tried to get the money after the separation date trying to get $ that I had earned in my 401K 3 yrs after the separation date. The judge was wonderful put a stop to it and awarded me my whole 401K as my sole property. Yeh! This was the biggest victory of my divorce.

Answer 4

You can't. Her attorney, or the court, can subpoena the documented records of the amount from your employer. The laws vary in every state so it may be different where you are. If there is a paper trail of your 401K, which there always is, there really isn't much you can do about that if she knows about your 401K. If you are caught, you could suffer severe consequences.

Answer 5

I really don't think your spouse can touch your 401K after the divorce, but you'd better ask an attorney first. I think that money is not considered a part of your assets. Technically it's still the government's until you draw it out, then they take taxes out of it.

Answer 6

Most of the time 401K is considered joint in a marriage even though only one spouse contributes to it. It will depend on how much of it was contributed during the marriage what was the worth amount prior to the marriage and the worth amount after the marriage ended. Sometimes it isn't considered at all, unless the other spouse wants part of it.

Answer 7

You can give it to a VERY trusted family member of friend (at your own risk) so that it no longer belongs to you, technically speaking. After the divorce you can ask for it back. This is inadvisable, because when it comes to money, you can't trust people to be honest, but it's your best bet if you don't want to share it with your ex.

Answer 8

You can't your wife's lawyer will do what is called a "discovery" and all financial holdings under your social security number will be exposed. If you try to hide it you can be charged with contempt of court, go to jail and her lawyer can file for and possibly get her the entire lump sum of the 401.

Answer 9

That's a question you should ask your lawyer or accountant. There could be repercussions if you try to hide money, so you want to be sure you're on the up and up.

Answer 10

WHY do u wnat to hide it. A marriage is supposed to be an institution where husbands and wifes share . If it didn't work out do the right thing. I think it is very selfish of u.

Answer 11

Courts are always screwing the male population out of our hard-earned money. Wants to get rid of your money? Simple; marriage is like a corporate company structure, rid yourself of your cash just in time for settlement...

This really depends on how much money you have but if you've got a problem one great way is to make a bad investment which the beneficiary is somebody you are family with or friends with that you CAN TRUST!

What a lot of people in insider traders do to pay somebody giving them insider information without being caught is short-sell a small penny stock with no volume and get the beneficiary to long the stock for twice or three times your volume.

So I need to get rid of ~1 million dollars, but let's make it believable... to do so we'll trade on a leverage (most houses will let you trade ~1:2) our goal is to get "Margin-Called". Or called on for settlement.

For example XYZ company is trading at $1 per stock and has 5,000,000 units outstanding. I come into the market and short-sell 2,000,000 units (worth 2m - on a margin). This immediate "Increase" in stock (though shorting is inevitably borrowing selling and rebuying and giving back... hard to explain... ) will technically make the value of the stock drop for the time being.

So 'technically' the stock will become worth ~$0.71 but since its a low volume stock you probably won't have any buyers... Next step is to get your beneficiary or trusted friend/family member to buy. So your Dad would Long the stock for 4,000,000 units making it now worth ~$1.67.

At this point your house will call you and say "Mr/Mrs. (Insert name) your trade has been automatically closed for settlement/a margin call" because you had 2,000,000 unit short worth $2,000,000 which is now worth only $340,000.

Where did the money go? Well your Dad bought 4,000,000 stock now 'valued' at 1.67. He can now cash out his long and the 'value' of the stock will return to $1 (if there are any buyers - if not than you need to long the stock when he shorts it to reverse what happened to get your money back preferably in another stock so your brokers don't call each other and start short-siding you..

(and yes I'm aware the example is somewhat unrealistic but still relevant)

The only problem is the spreads you pay but this can also be done with private stock or any sort of similar investment scheme in which your beneficiary basically creates a paper-trail thorough the stock market.. brilliant ey?

You can also do this in currencies, commodities, etc. for example if both of you and your dad opened accounts trading for example EUR/USD and you sold 1m units and he bought 1m units and you wanted it to go against you, technically your dad bought it off you and when you both submit your trades your dad would be the winner in the trade, if not then congratz your dad lost money and you made money, just give him the cash from your profitable trade back and repeat, usually you can tell which way a currency pair is going though.. anyways losing money in the stock market/forex market to your trusted friend/family is a great way to get rid of money that your blood-sucking ex doesn't deserve.