If you divorce after retirement, you may have fewer chances to replace assets you divide with your spouse. Your pension, retirement accounts and savings may already provide most of what you use to pay your bills. Living in separate homes also means those resources now have to support two households.
Illinois divorce law still applies to property you and your spouse acquired during the marriage. That includes the marital part of many pensions and retirement accounts. For you, the main issue is how dividing those assets could affect the resources you rely on now.
Review the income you rely on
Illinois generally treats property that you or your spouse acquired during the marriage as marital property, with some exceptions. This rule also covers the part of many retirement benefits that either of you earned while married. If a judge divides your marital property, Illinois law calls for fair proportions rather than an automatic 50-50 split.
If retirement income pays most of your bills, dividing those assets might affect what you have available each month. You may want to compare what you receive now with what you expect to receive once the divorce ends.
Look at the cost of your home
Your home may make up a large part of the property you share with your spouse. Keeping it also means paying the mortgage, taxes and upkeep from your own retirement income.
You could compare those costs with the price of another place to live. This may help you judge how much of your monthly income the home would use and what you would have left for other expenses.
Focus on your finances after the marriage
Once you stop working, rebuilding savings often becomes harder. It might help to compare the assets you expect to keep with the bills you expect to pay after your marital split. You may also want to look at how the proposed property terms would affect the funds available for your regular expenses in retirement.