Question

I’ve lived with my boyfriend for over ten years, are we in a common law marriage?

Answer

No – not if you and your boyfriend live in Washington.   Eleven states recognize “common law marriage”, but Washington is not one of them.  “Common law marriage” is a a legal status given to some couples who have not had a formal wedding ceremony or signed a marriage contract but act a lot like a married couple.  In states that recognize common law marriage, couples who meet certain specific requirements are considered legally married even though they haven’t actually tied the knot.

However, Washington does recognize “intimate committed relationships” (or “marriage-like” relationships)* and will give those couples some of the same rights as married people.  We’ll talk a little more about those rights in a moment.

First, let’s take a look at how Washington courts define a committed intimate relationship. There’s no strict checklist, but a 2002 case provided a list of factors that a Washington court should look at when determining whether a relationship qualifies as a committed intimate relationship.  Those factors are:

• Continuous cohabitation, or living together as a couple for a continuing period of time without any significant break ups;

• Duration of the relationship, or how long a couple has been together;

• Purpose of the relationship – this factor is a little odd, but generally it means the court wants to know if the couple was together in order to partake of the generalized benefits of a marriage such as “companionship, friendship, love, sex, and mutual support and caring”;

• Pooling of resources and services for joint projects such as sharing a bank account and the money in it or buying a house together;

• The intent of the parties or, whether the couple intended their relationship to be like a marriage.

See In re Pennington, 142 Wn.2d 592 (2002).

So, assuming that a couple fits all of these requirements, what does being part of a “committed intimate relationship” mean? What rights do people in committed intimate relationships get?  Generally speaking, the rights of people in such a relationship are pretty limited.   This is what makes Washington’s committed intimate relationships different from common law marriages in other states.

In Washington, if a couple qualifies as being in an intimate committed relationship, they are entitled to inherit property from their partner’s estate.   They can also ask the court to divide their property according to Washington’s community property laws when or if they split up.  In essence, the title of “committed intimate relationship” only matters in Washington after a relationship ends – either by death or a break up – and relates primarily to property.  It does not give couples many marriage rights during their relationship.

*Interestingly, Washington courts called  these types of relationships “meretricious relationships” for a long time before adopting the more PC term “committed intimate relationship.”   Meretricious means “relating to prostitution.”  Guess that shows you what Washington courts thought about cohabitation!