After an Unofficial Wedding, How Do You Split the Co-op When You "Divorce"?

June 26, 2014 — A New York couple, fashion designer Anya Ponorovskaya and lawyer Wylie Stecklow, got "married" in a symbolic ceremony in Mexico in 2010. They had no marriage license, and their officiant was a dentist who got his minister certification over the Internet. Still, the couple referred to themselves as married on the purchase contract of their Manhattan co-op apartment and on a mortgage application.

So when the relationship didn't work out, Ponorovskaya last year filed for a very non-symbolic and for-real divorce. Why? Perhaps because the apartment is titled in Stecklow's name alone — even though, Ponorovskaya says, she invested significant money and "sweat equity" in its renovation. What the couple's co-op board thinks of all this, the lawsuit Ponorovskaya v. Stecklow doesn't say. As for what the judge in this recently decided case thinks of all this, you can read law professor Joanna L. Grossman's wry but learned column about it at Justia.com.