How to Handle Your Arizona Home When Getting Divorced

By The Klaus Team

The Kenny Klaus Team is one of the most successful real estate teams in America. Since 2010, The Kenny Klaus Team has been consistently ranked in the Top 120 teams nationwide by Real Trends and the Wall Street Journal.

What happens to the house in a divorce? For many homeowners, divorce and real estate collide in painful and expensive ways. Your home is often your biggest asset, your largest debt, and the most emotional part of the process, where costly mistakes often happen.

In this episode of State 48 Homeowner, we sit down with family law attorney Marco Brown of Brown Family Law to talk about what really happens to your house during a divorce, and why asking the right questions early can protect your financial future.

We highlight that the real question isn’t who gets the house, but whether either of you can realistically afford it. Marco also walks us through how Arizona community property laws treat the marital home, even if only one name is on the title or mortgage.

Here’s what we break down in this episode:

• What really happens to the house in a divorce
• Common misconceptions about keeping the house after divorce
• How Arizona community property law treats the marital home
• Divorce housing options: selling the home, one spouse keeping it, or deferred sale
• How equity, debt, and property division are handled
• Why co-ownership, nesting, and “we’ll figure it out later” usually fail
• What happens when one spouse refuses to cooperate or move out
• Court-ordered home sales and forced resolutions
• Why walking away emotionally before finances are settled is dangerous

We also talk with Steve Farrington of Unity Home Loans for a mortgage and lending reality check:

• How divorce affects mortgage qualification
• Debt-to-income ratio issues during divorce
• Using spousal support as qualifying income
• Refinancing after divorce, and what happens when rates are higher
• Credit risks when you’re still tied to the mortgage
• How missed payments impact both spouses
• How to protect yourself financially during a divorce

Both experts stress that most financial damage in divorce doesn’t come from bad intentions; it comes from emotional decisions, assumptions, and waiting too long to get professional guidance.

This episode is part of our “When Things Go Wrong” series on State 48 Homeowner, where we help homeowners understand what can happen to their homes during divorce, death, disability, and other major life changes so we can make better choices when it matters most.

If you have questions about how divorce might affect your home or finances, don’t hesitate to reach out to (480) 354-7344, email solutions@klausteam.net, or visit klausteam.com. We’ll take it one step at a time and make sure you know what to expect.