Alecia Gaynell King McKay v. Michael Patrick McKay

Syllabus

This post-divorce action primarily involves a provision in the parties' marital dissolution agreement (\MDA\) concerning disposition of the marital residence. The parties were divorced in 2011. The wife filed a petition in March 2015, seeking, inter alia, to enforce the divorce decree and MDA by obtaining an order requiring the husband to vacate the marital residence so that she could reside there with the parties' minor child and her three foster children. The MDA provides that the wife is to retain sole and exclusive possession of the marital residence until it is sold while the husband is to deposit one-half of the monthly mortgage payment into the wife's personal checking account each month \in lieu of\ spousal support. The MDA also provides that the marital residence would not be placed on the market for sale until January 1, 2013, but it does not supply a deadline by which the parties would have to place the home on the market. At the time that the wife commenced this action, the wife had vacated the home, and the husband had been residing there for approximately one year. Following a bench trial conducted in May 2016, the trial court granted the wife's petition to enforce the MDA, entering an order directing the husband to vacate the marital residence immediately and to make needed repairs to the home. The court also found that a purported post-divorce oral agreement between the parties for the husband to purchase the wife's share of the marital residence had not constituted a valid contract. Crediting the husband with $12,000.00 he had paid to the wife toward purchase of the marital residence as payment toward a spousal support arrearage, the trial court ordered the husband to pay additional spousal support arrears at a rate of $300.00 per month and to pay the wife's attorney's fees. Specifically at issue on appeal is a provision the trial court included in the order, directing that the wife, the parties' minor child, and the wife's three foster children cou