The Family Court of Australia characterises animals as property, whether they be horses, fish or insta-famous cavoodles.
This means as part of the property settlement process, any animals owned by the parties will form part of the property pool to be distributed between them.
There are generally two basic categories that animals fall into, being pets and livestock:
- If an animal is to be considered a pet, the Court will most likely value the animal by assessing the animal’s resale value.
- If the animal is characterised as livestock, the valuation may take into account the initial cost of the livestock, market selling value or replacement value. Other factors taken into account are the natural increase of breeding the animals (for animals such as cattle, pigs, emus and poultry) and whether the parties take goods from the stock for private use. There are specialist provisions to valuation that can apply for more specific livestock farming like beekeeping, oyster farming and certain horse breeding livestock. The ATO provides strict guidelines for valuation of livestock and there is a requirement that valuation takes place each year.
Of course, sometimes these lines can be blurred. For example, a much-loved family dog may also have significant value such as our instafamous cavoodle or a pedigree on account of his superior breeding stock.
Increasingly, animals such as cows and alpacas are being brought into the family home as pets and, therefore, the court may be inclined to take into account factors such as to whom the pet is registered and who fed and maintained the pet during the relationship (and continues to do so.)
At Tiyce & Lawyers we have ample experience in dealing with division of property that is not run-of-the mill. If you would like to discuss property settlement in relation to animals, call us on 02 9211 9976.
