In re the Marriage of:

This opinion will be unpublished and
may not be cited except as provided by
Minn. Stat. § 480A.08, subd. 3 (2016).

STATE OF MINNESOTA
IN COURT OF APPEALS
A16-2068

In re the Marriage of:

Julie M. Steen, petitioner,
Respondent,

vs.

Keven L. Steen,
Appellant.

Filed August 21, 2017
Affirmed in part, reversed in part, and remanded
Smith, Tracy M., Judge

Hennepin County District Court
File No. 27-FA-15-2305

Mark A. Carter, Carter Legal Services, P.A., Minnetonka, Minnesota (for respondent)

John T. Burns, Jr., Burns Law Office, Burnsville, Minnesota (for appellant)

Considered and decided by Smith, Tracy M., Presiding Judge; Connolly, Judge; and
Smith, John, Judge.


 Retired judge of the Minnesota Court of A ppeals, serving by appoi ntment pursuant to
Minn. Const. art. VI, § 10.

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U N P U B L I S H E D O P I N I O N
SMITH, TRACY M., Judge
In this marriage-dissolution appeal, appe llant-husband Keven Steen argues that the
district court abused its discretion by (1) granting respondent-wife Julie Steen her portion
of appellant’s military pensio n retroactively to the date of the initial ca se-management
conference; (2) making appellant responsible for half of respondent’s student-loan debt;
and (3) overstating his income and respondent’ s need for purposes of calculating spousal
maintenance. Because the district court did not abuse its discretion in awarding respondent
her share of the pension retroactively or in dividing the student-loan debt between the
parties, we affirm in part. But because the district court did not make adequate factual
findings on appellant’s available income, we reverse the award of spousal maintenance and
remand to the district court for further findings.
FACTS
Appellant and respondent married in 1 988. They commenced this marriage-
dissolution action in February 2015.
For most of the marriage, respondent did not work outside of the home; instead, the
parties agreed that respondent would primarily care for the children and the household.
Around 2008, after the children reached age 18, respondent took out a student loan and
enrolled in an associate-degree program. She finished school and became certified as a
medical assistant in 2010. She has been employed full time since then in that career.
Appellant retired from the U.S. Army in 1998 and has since received a military
pension in the amount of $2 ,225 per month. Of that amount, the parties agree that

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respondent is entitled to $480.86, which represents half of the porti on of the pension that
was earned during the marriage.
At the case-management c onference in July 2015, appellant agreed to pay
respondent $1,000 per month in temporary maintenance until the case was resolved.
An evidentiary hearing was held in May 2016 on disputed issues. While the parties
agreed that appellant would pay permanent spousal maintenance, they disagreed as to the
amount. And while the parties stipulated to th e division of most of their property, they
disagreed as to whether respondent was entitled to be paid her share of the pension for the
months between the May 2015 valuation date and the hearing. They also disagreed on the
allocation of respondent’s student-loan debt.
The district court dissolved the partie s’ marriage, ordered appellant to pay
respondent her share of the pe nsion dating back to the valu ation date, made each party
responsible for half of the remaining bala nce of the student-loan debt, and awarded
respondent $2,000 per month in permanent maintenance.
D E C I S I O N
I. The district court did not abuse its discretion in awarding respondent her share
of the pension beginning on the valuation date.
Appellant argues that the district court erred in awarding respondent her $480.86
monthly share of the pension from the May 2 015 valuation date th rough the May 2016
evidentiary hearing. Appellant asserts that the parties agreed that the $1,000 monthly
payments he made to respon dent between July 2015 and the evidentiary hearing would
come from the pension, so those payments satisfied respondent’s interest in the pension for

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those months. Respondent argues that the district court correctly treated the $1,000
payments as temporary spousal maintenance havi ng no effect on her property interest in
the pension.
The district court has broad discretion with respect to the division of property in
cases involving the dissolution of marriages. Rutten v. Rutten, 347 N.W.2d 47, 50 (Minn.
1984). We will uphold the district court’s determinations unless they are clearly erroneous.
Id.
Appellant’s argument that the parties understood the temporary payments to include
respondent’s share of the pension is unsupported by the record. At the case-management
conference on July 9, 2015, when discussing respondent’s request for spousal maintenance,
appellant, who was not yet represented by co unsel, stated, “I don’t have any problem
splitting my military pension, which is roughly a thousand dollars a month.” The district
court explained that, because the pension accrued during the marriage, respondent “would
get it anyways. That’s not spousal support.” Appellant insisted that, if respondent received
$1,000 per month from the pension, it would count as a maintenance payment by appellant
because respondent was not eligible to receive pension payments directly from the military
under federal law. The district court again explained that the“[p]ension that was accrued
during the marriage is [a] marital asset [and] will be divided between the parties,” meaning
that appellant could not use respondent’s sh are of the pension to make maintenance
payments to respondent. To ward the end of that confer ence, respondent’s attorney
proposed that appellant pay $1,000 per month “as temporary maintenance” until the case
could be resolved. Appellant agreed to pay $1,000 per month as temporary maintenance.

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The idea that the $1,000 would eliminate respondent’s intere st in the pension for those
months was not mentioned during this conversation about temporary maintenance.
Although appellant initially believed that he could use respondent’s share of the
pension to pay temporary maintenance, the district court immediately corrected that
misunderstanding. See 10 U.S.C. § 1408(c)(1). The district court stated unequivocally that
the marital share of the pension would be di vided among the partie s as marital property
and that appellant’s giving respondent her ow n share of the pension would not count as a
maintenance payment. When appellant agreed to pay respondent $1,000 per month, both
the district court and respondent’s attorn ey expressly referred to it as “temporary
maintenance” and made no reference to the pension.
We therefore conclude that the district court did not abuse its discretion in ordering
appellant to pay respondent her half of the ma rital share of the pension dating back to the
valuation date.
II. The district court did not abuse its dis cretion in dividing the student-loan debt.
Appellant challenges the district court’s decision to make appellant responsible for
half of respondent’s student-l oan debt. He argues that this division is unfair because he
voluntarily assumed responsibility for a shared tax debt, making hi s total marital-debt
obligation greater than responde nt’s, and because the student lo an is within respondent’s
control, which means responde nt has the ability to increase appellant’s obligation by
delaying repayment and letting interest accrue.
We review the district court’s determination for an abuse of discretion. Rutten, 347
N.W.2d at 50.

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The district court made each party responsible for half of the remaining balance of
the debt on the student loan that respondent to ok out during the marriage. This
determination is reasonable in light of the district court’s findings that “the parties agreed
that [respondent] would be a stay-at-home mother,” that this arrangement caused
respondent to lose “earnings, seniority, retirement benefits, and other employment
opportunities” for 18 years, and that responde nt now “earns much less than” appellant.
These findings are supported by the record. Respondent testified that she believed
appellant should pay the entire remaining balance of the stude nt loan because the parties
had a “deal” that she would stay at home, raise their children, and support appellant’s
career, and then go back to school to pursue her own career after the youngest child reached
adulthood. Appellant does no t dispute respondent’s accoun t of this arrangement. We
conclude that the district court did not abuse its discretion in dividing the student-loan debt.
III. The district court abused its disc retion in awarding spousal maintenance
without making sufficient findings on the parties’ available income.
Appellant challenges the maintenance award, arguing that the district court abused
its discretion by overestimating both appellant’s ability to pay and respondent’s need.
We review awards of spousal mainte nance for an abuse of discretion. Maiers v.
Maiers, 775 N.W.2d 666, 668 (Minn. App. 2009). District courts have broad discretion in
decisions regarding spousal maintenance. Melius v. Melius, 765 N.W.2d 411, 414 (Minn.
App. 2009). A district court abuses its discretion in determining spousal maintenance if it
makes findings unsupported by the reco rd or improperly applies the law. Id. We review
legal questions de novo and review factual findings for clear error. Id.

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A district court may award spousal mainte nance “as the court deems just . . . after
considering all relevant factors,” including the eight factors listed in Minn. Stat. § 518.552,
subd. 2 (2016). Here, the district court ma de written findings on each statutory factor.
Appellant specifically challenges the district court’s findings on factor (g), which refers to
appellant’s ability to meet his own needs wh ile also meeting the needs of the spouse
seeking maintenance, and its findings on the amount of main tenance respondent needs,
which is informed by factors (a) through (f).
Even discretionary decisions that fall with in statutory limits must be supported by
factual findings. See Lee v. Lee , 775 N.W.2d 631, 643 (Minn. 2009) (remanding for the
district court to make factual findings su pporting its choice of effective date for
modification of maintenance, which is committed to the district court’s discretion). Here,
the district court made a finding of appellant’s gross annual income from employment and
a finding of his total reasonable monthly budg et. But the district court did not make
findings on appellant’s available income and ability to pay after meeting his needs, which
are the appropriate inquiries. See Minn. Stat. § 518.552, subd . 2(g) (considering “the
ability of the spouse from whom maintenance is sought to meet needs while meeting those
of the spouse seeking maintenance”); see Lee, 775 N.W.2d at 637-42 (discussing which
sources of income may be characterized as income available for maintenance payments).
Importantly, the district court made no find ing of appellant’s net income, which is
necessary to determine his ab ility to pay maintenance. See Kostelnik v. Kostelnik , 367
N.W.2d 665, 670 (Minn. App. 1985) (“In order to determ ine ability to pay, the [district]

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court must make a determination of the payor spouse’s net or take-home pay.”), review
denied (Minn. July 26, 1985).
Minnesota cases make it clear that suppor t orders should in clude findings on the
parties’ circumstances at the time support is set. See Maschoff v. Leiding, 696 N.W.2d 834,
840-41 (Minn. App. 2005) (directing courts to make findings of fact addressing the parties’
existing circumstances in child-support orders). Such findings serve the purpose not only
of informing the district court’s exercise of its discretion in the initial support order, but
also of establishing baseline facts for use in any future motions for modification. Id. at
840. It is necessary to establish baseline facts in the initial support order because any
modification of a support order requires cons ideration of whether there has been a
substantial change in circumstances rendering an existing support obligation unreasonable
and unfair, which requires comparing the par ties’ circumstances at the time support was
set with their circumstances at time of the motion to modify. Id.; see Hecker v. Hecker ,
568 N.W.2d 705, 709 (Minn. 1997) (making a similar observation in the context of spousal
maintenance). If the support order lacks findings on the parties’ circumstances at the time,
“the litigation of a later motion to modify th at order becomes unnecessarily complicated
because it requires the parties to litigate not only their circumstances at the time of the
motion, but also their circumstances at the tim e of the order sought to be modified.”
Maschoff, 696 N.W.2d at 840.
Based on the factual findings before us, we cannot adequately review whether the
record supports the district court’s determ inations regarding appellant’s ability to pay
$2,000 per month in maintenance. Accordi ngly, we reverse the maintenance award and

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remand for the district court to make findings on appellant’s available income under Minn.
Stat. § 518.552, subd. 2(g). The district court shall have discretion to reopen the record on
remand.
Affirmed in part, reversed in part, and remanded.