In re the Marriage of Zachary Dean Hollingsworth v. Anne Marie Halling Roe, ...

This opinion is nonprecedential except as provided by
Minn. R. Civ. App. P. 136.01, subd. 1(c).

STATE OF MINNESOTA
IN COURT OF APPEALS
A24-1758

In re the Marriage of Zachary Dean Hollingsworth, petitioner,
Respondent,

vs.

Anne Marie Halling Roe,
Appellant.

Filed November 17, 2025
Affirmed in part, reversed in part, and remanded
Connolly, Judge

Anoka County District Court
File No. 02-FA-23-57

Zachary D. Hollingsworth, Blaine, Minnesota (pro se respondent)

Kay Nord Hunt, Michelle K. Kuhl, Lommen Abdo, P.A., Minneapolis, Minnesota; and

Elizabeth M. Porter, Elizabeth M. Porter, LLC, Apple Valley, Minnesota (for appellant)

Considered and decided by Harris, Presiding Judge; Connolly, Judge; and Schmidt,

Judge.

NONPRECEDENTIAL OPINION

CONNOLLY, Judge

On appeal from the judgment and decree dissolving the parties’ marriage, appellant-

wife argues that the district court abused its discretion in (1) denying her request for spousal

maintenance, (2) miscalculating respondent-husband’s child-support obligation, and

(3) denying her request to change her name. We affirm the denial of appellant’s request
for maintenance and the calculation of respondent’s child-support obligation, but we

reverse and remand in part with instructions to change appellant’s name.

FACTS

Appellant Anne Marie Halling Roe (wife) and respondent Zachary Dean

Hollingsworth (husband) were married in May 2012. The parties had two daughters during

the marriage, one born in October 2013, and another born in July 2017. In 2023, husband

filed a petition for dissolution of the marriage. The parties later reached a stipulated

agreement resolving most of the disputed issues. The remaining issues for trial consisted

of, among other things, spousal maintenance and child support.

The district court met with the parties’ lawyers in chambers before trial. The district

court then stated on the record that “I don’t believe in long, spousal maintenance periods.

I think that those, in the long run, create more issues than they are worth.” The trial then

began, at which evidence was presented that, during the marriage, husband changed careers

to become a plumber. At the time of trial, husband was employed full time as a plumber,

with a net monthly income of approximately $4,887. Husband also has a net monthly

income of approximately $663 through his service with the National Guard.

Wife attended Aveda Institute and became an esthetician before the parties wed.

After the parties’ first child was born, wife reduced her hours “so that [the parties] always

had someone to watch [their child].” Wife later opened her own salon and, at the time of

trial, was working part time. According to wife, she had net profits of $19,389 in 2021,

and $27,056 in 2022.

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 A vocational expert with 15 years of vocational rehabilitation experience provided

a “Labor Market Survey regarding the earning potential of [wife].” In providing this

survey, the vocational expert reviewed “current job postings in the Minneapolis – St. Paul

area,” and spoke with “three subject matter experts,” each of whom had more than 15 years

of experience and were “actively working in the Twin Cities.” According to the vocational

expert, two of the individuals she spoke with worked for salons and the third was self-

employed. The vocational expert opined that, based on her market survey, an individual

such as wife who is a self-employed esthetician and has 15 years of experience, could earn

“approximately $100,000 to $150,000 annually” if she was working full time.

At the end of trial, wife submitted proposed findings that sought to change her legal

name to “Anne Marie Halling Roe.” The district court denied this request, concluding that

the court “has no evidence that a change of name is necessary.” The district court also

found that wife “is voluntarily underemployed and . . . has unjustifiably limited her

income.” The district court then denied wife’s request for spousal maintenance,

determining that maintenance is not appropriate “[g]iven the parties’ respective

employment history, the standard of living they established, [wife’s] ability to immediately

increase her income, [wife’s] ability to provide complete self-support in the near future,

[and] the distribution of marital assets.” Finally, the district court determined that, based

on the parties’ equal parenting-time schedule, husband’s gross monthly income of $9,973,

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and wife’s “potential gross monthly income” of $8,333, husband’s basic child-support

obligation to wife is $97 per month. Wife appeals.1

DECISION

I.

Wife challenges the district court’s denial of her request for spousal maintenance.

District courts generally have broad discretion in decisions regarding spousal maintenance.

Erlandson v. Erlandson, 318 N.W.2d 36, 38 (Minn. 1982). A district court abuses its

discretion when it makes findings that are unsupported by the evidence or when it

improperly applies the law or when it resolves the question in a manner that is contrary to

logic and the facts on record. Dobrin v. Dobrin, 569 N.W.2d 199, 202 & n.3 (Minn. 1997).

This court reviews legal questions de novo, but reviews findings of fact for clear error.

Kampf v. Kampf, 732 N.W.2d 630, 633 (Minn. App. 2007), rev. denied (Minn. Aug. 21,

2007). Findings are clearly erroneous if “they are manifestly contrary to the weight of the

evidence or not reasonably supported by the evidence as a whole.” Id. (quotation omitted).

Wife argues that the district court abused its discretion in denying her request for

transitional maintenance2 because (A) husband has the ability to pay and wife does not

1
Husband did not file a brief in this appeal, and this court ordered that the appeal proceed
under Minn. R. Civ. App. P. 142.03.
2
After recent amendments, Minnesota law now provides:

A maintenance award may be transitional or indefinite.
An award of temporary maintenance issued before August 1,
2024, is deemed transitional maintenance. An award of
permanent maintenance issued before August 1, 2024, is
deemed indefinite maintenance. Maintenance awarded during
the pendency of an initial proceeding for dissolution or legal

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presently have sufficient income to meet her reasonable monthly expenses; (B) the other

spousal-maintenance factors support an award of spousal maintenance; and (C) the district

court stated on the record that it does not believe in spousal maintenance.

A. Wife’s need versus husband’s ability to pay

If a party requests spousal maintenance, the district court must address whether the

spouse seeking spousal maintenance established a need for maintenance under Minn. Stat.

§ 518.552, subd. 1 (2024). Honke v. Honke, 960 N.W.2d 261, 266 (Minn. 2021); see Lyon

v. Lyon, 439 N.W.2d 18, 22 (Minn. 1989) (stating that an award of spousal maintenance

requires a showing of need). “If a party requests spousal maintenance, a district court must

engage in a two-step analysis.” Madden v. Madden, 923 N.W.2d 688, 695 (Minn. App.

2019). The first step is to consider “whether the party seeking maintenance has

demonstrated a showing of need.” Id. (quotation omitted). A party demonstrates a showing

of need if “the party is unable to provide for his or her reasonable expenses through

employment income or investment income or a combination of both.” Id. If a party makes

the threshold showing of need, the second step is for the district court to consider the

appropriate amount and duration of maintenance. Id. In making this determination, the

district court considers “all relevant factors.” Minn. Stat. § 518.552, subd. 2 (2024).

The district court acknowledged that husband has an ability to pay spousal

maintenance, finding that he has “a surplus” of income after considering his income and

separation pursuant to section 518.131 is deemed temporary
maintenance.

Minn. Stat. § 518.552, subd. 3(a) (2024).

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reasonable expenses. But in denying wife’s request for spousal maintenance, the district

court found that wife is “voluntarily underemployed and has unjustifiably limited her

income” by working “the 19 hours per week she has been working.” The district court

found that wife “can and should work 40 hours per week,” and that she is “capable of

increasing her income substantially by increasing her services offered by an additional 20

hours per week,” as well as “raising her prices to match the current prices within the trade

and to meet current economic conditions.” The district court then considered wife’s

“probable earnings level based on employment potential, recent work history, and

occupational qualifications in light of the substantial job opportunities and earning levels

in the community,” and imputed “gross annual income to [wife] in the amount of $100,000

or gross monthly income potential of $8,333.00.”

Wife argues that the district court improperly imputed income to her “because she

was not underemployed in bad faith.” To support her position, she relies on Maurer v.

Maurer, 607 N.W.2d 176 (Minn. App. 2000), rev’d on other grounds, 623 N.W.2d 604

(Minn. 2001), and Carrick v. Carrick, 560 N.W.2d 407 (Minn. App. 1997). In each of

those two cases, this court held that the district court had erred by imputing income to a

longtime homemaker without a finding of bad-faith underemployment. Maurer, 607

N.W.2d at 181; Carrick, 560 N.W.2d at 410. This court reasoned that, when a spouse is

the homemaker and primary caretaker of the children, imputing income to that spouse

without a finding of bad faith would ignore the spouse’s contributions as a homemaker in

the marriage and punish her for maintaining the homemaker lifestyle. Carrick, 560 N.W.2d

at 410; see also Maurer, 607 N.W.2d at 181.

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 Wife’s reliance on Carrick and Maurer is misguided because she reads those cases

to require the district court to find that she is underemployed in bad faith before attributing

income to her for the period of time after judgment is entered. But in Passolt v. Passolt,

this court rejected that reading of Carrick and Maurer, concluding that, “[b]ecause Carrick

addressed only the period between the parties’ separation and the dissolution judgment, the

district court read Carrick too broadly to apply to the post-judgment period at issue in this

case. Similarly, because Maurer simply applies Carrick in a factually similar situation,

our analysis of Carrick also addresses Maurer.” 804 N.W.2d 18, 24 (Minn. App. 2011)

(citation omitted), rev. denied (Minn. Nov. 15, 2011). And more recently, this court held

that a district court need not find bad faith in order to find that an obligee is able to become

fully or partially self-supporting after dissolution. Backman v. Backman, 990 N.W.2d 478,

488 n.5 (Minn. App. 2023). Thus, under the circumstances, the district court did not

improperly impute income to wife without a finding of bad faith. See id.

Wife also contends that, even if the district court “could impute income to [her], it

was error to do so immediately” because the vocational expert “offered no opinion on how

long it would take [w]ife” to begin earning $100,000 to $150,000 annually. 3 And wife

claims that the vocational expert was “unclear about whether the estimated $100,000 to

$150,000 was before or after business expenses.”

We are not persuaded. Despite wife’s claim to the contrary, the vocational expert

testified that her $100,000-to-$150,000 estimate constitutes the “total earnings after you

3
At oral argument, wife’s counsel emphasized that it would take some time for wife to
build a book of business.

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take out the cost of supplies and renting a space and all of that.” Moreover, the vocational

expert’s opinion was based, in part, by reviewing “current job postings in the Minneapolis

– St. Paul area.” The vocational expert testified that, after COVID, there are “a lot of job

opportunities” for qualified workers in wife’s field. (Emphasis added.) The vocational

expert also testified that some of the job opportunities she reviewed were part-time, which

could supplement wife’s current self-employment earnings. The fact that the vocational

expert’s opinion was based heavily upon the “current job postings” indicates that she

believed wife could immediately earn $100,000 to $150,000 annually. The district court

found the vocational expert’s opinion to be credible, and we defer to that determination.

See Sefkow v. Sefkow, 427 N.W.2d 203, 210 (Minn. 1988). And, notably, the district

court’s imputation of income to wife was the lowest amount on the range estimated by the

vocational expert. Therefore, wife is unable to show that the district court clearly erred in

finding that wife could immediately begin earning $100,000 annually.

Next, wife argues that, in denying her request for spousal maintenance, the district

court “impermissibly relied on assets awarded to [her] in the dissolution as available to

meet her immediate needs.” To support her position, wife refers to the following finding

made by the district court in discussing wife’s financial resources: “[Wife] will also receive

her share of equity in the marital home when the home is sold.” Wife contends that, based

on this finding, it “appears the [district] court anticipated [w]ife would use the funds from

the sale of the marital home to meet her monthly expenses at least temporarily until she

can increase her income,” which was “error.” We disagree.

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 Our supreme court has recognized that “a district court cannot require a

maintenance-seeking spouse to invade the principal of the property awarded to a spouse

seeking maintenance to pay living expenses.” Curtis v. Curtis, 887 N.W.2d 249, 254

(Minn. 2016) (quotation omitted). But wife’s argument misconstrues the district court’s

findings. The district court found that wife can “immediately increase her income” which

will allow her to “comfortably meet her needs” in the “near future.” This finding indicates

that her increased income will allow her to meet her needs without invading her property

award. And immediately after finding that wife will “receive her share of the equity in the

marital home when the home is sold,” the district court found that the parties’ agreed-upon

asset distribution is “fair and equitable,” which “will allow each party to provide a down

payment on a new home or meet other financial needs.” This finding indicates that the

district court’s reference to the proceeds from the sale of the parties’ marital home would

be used to meet needs other than wife’s living expenses. We therefore conclude that the

district court did not impermissibly rely on assets awarded to wife in the dissolution as

available to meet her immediate needs.

Wife further challenges several of the district court’s reductions to her monthly

budget. But the district court has discretion to determine the marital standard of living and

to determine reasonable post-dissolution expenses according to that standard of living.

Schmidt v. Schmidt, 964 N.W.2d 221, 230 (Minn. App. 2021). Here, the district court

eliminated from wife’s claimed monthly living expenses $52 for life insurance and $300

for a 401K retirement fund, finding that there was “no evidence” that these expenses were

part of the parties’ standard of living during the marriage. Although wife claims that she

9
presented evidence of such expenses during the marriage, the district court apparently

determined that this evidence was insufficient to show that the parties consistently incurred

these expenses throughout the marriage. In light of the discretion afforded the district

court, wife is unable to show that these findings are clearly erroneous. See id.

Wife contends that the district court erroneously eliminated from wife’s claimed

monthly budget $52 for appliance repair/maintenance and $93 for household

cleaning/laundry supplies. We disagree. The district court found that these expenses were

“duplicative” of wife’s claimed monthly expense of $104 for home repair/maintenance,

which the district court allowed. Appliance repair/maintenance could certainly be

construed as duplicative of home repair/maintenance. And although cleaning and laundry

supplies could be construed as different from home repairs, it was reasonable for the district

court to consider it duplicative of home repair/maintenance since cleaning and laundry are

relatively synonymous with maintaining the family home. See id.

Wife argues that the district court erroneously eliminated vacations from her budget

because both she and husband “testified that they agreed they had taken three to four

vacations per year during their marriage.” But the weight to be given witness testimony is

a function of the fact-finder. See State v. King, 990 N.W.2d 406, 420 (Minn.

2023) (“[Appellate courts] accord great deference to the [district] court’s determination on

credibility because credibility and the weight to be given to a witness’s testimony are

determinations for the factfinder.” (quotations omitted)). The district court found the

parties’ testimony related to the number and frequency of vacations the family took during

the marriage to be less than credible, and this court defers to that credibility determination.

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See id. As such, it was within the district court’s discretion to eliminate vacations from

wife’s monthly budget. See Schmidt, 964 N.W.2d at 230. We therefore conclude that the

district court did not abuse its discretion in determining that wife presently has sufficient

income to meet her reasonable monthly expenses.

B. Spousal-maintenance factors contained in Minn. Stat. § 518.552, subd. 2

Wife argues that the spousal-maintenance factors contained in section 518.552,

subdivision 2, support an award of maintenance. But these factors need be considered only

if wife made a showing of her need for maintenance. See Curtis, 887 N.W.2d at 252

(stating that “[o]nce a spouse has made a sufficient showing of need, only then will a court

consider the amount and duration of a maintenance award by weighing the factors

enumerated in Minn. Stat. § 518.552, subd. 2” (emphasis added)). Because the district

court did not abuse its discretion in determining that wife failed to establish a need for

maintenance, we need not consider wife’s argument related to the factors set forth in

section 518.552, subdivision 2.

C. District court’s statement that it does not believe in long spousal-
maintenance periods

Wife argues that the district court’s “candid admission that it did not ‘believe in’ the

[spousal-maintenance] statute casts serious doubt on whether it evaluated the spousal-

maintenance issue fairly.” But the record reflects that, along with stating that it does not

“believe in long, spousal maintenance periods,” the district court acknowledged that, “until

I hear testimony, I can’t make a commitment.” The district court also noted that, “as it

comes to spousal maintenance, I am going to have to hear from the vocational person” and

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“from [wife’s] witnesses to determine what amount of income, if any, [to] impute to [wife]

and for what length.” And the district court added that spousal maintenance “could be as

short as six months. It could be for up to three years.” The district court’s statements on

the record indicate that it would fairly consider the spousal-maintenance issue after hearing

all the evidence and testimony. As such, appellant cannot show that the district court

abused its discretion in denying wife’s request for spousal maintenance.

II.

Wife argues that, because the district court “erred in finding that [w]ife’s gross

income could immediately be increased to $100,000,” the court’s calculation of husband’s

child-support obligation is erroneous. But, as we determined above, the district court did

not abuse its discretion in determining that wife’s net income could be increased to

$100,000. Therefore, wife’s contention that the district court abused its discretion in

calculating husband’s child-support obligation fails.

III.

Wife challenges the district court’s denial of her request to change her name. We

review a district court’s decision to grant or deny a name change for abuse of discretion.

In re Welfare of C.M.G., 516 N.W.2d 555, 561 (Minn. App. 1994). But the interpretation

of a statute is a question of law that is reviewed de novo. Goldman v. Greenwood, 748

N.W.2d 279, 282 (Minn. 2008).

Minnesota law provides that:

Except as provided in section 259.13, in the final decree
of dissolution or legal separation the court shall, if requested
by a party, change the name of that party to another name as

12
 the party requests. The court shall grant a request unless it
finds that there is an intent to defraud or mislead, unless the
name change is subject to section 259.13, in which case the
requirements of that section apply.

Minn. Stat. § 518.27 (2024). Minnesota Statutes section 259.13 (2024) relates to name

changes concerning persons with felony convictions.

In denying wife’s request to change her name, the district court found that it did not

have the relevant information necessary to grant the request. Wife argues that this decision

is erroneous because, under section 518.27, the district court was obligated to change her

name in the dissolution judgment. We agree.

This court has recognized that “a verified complaint is the functional equivalent of

an affidavit.” Metro. Transp. Network, Inc. v. Collaborative Student Transp. of Minn.,

LLC, 6 N.W.3d 771, 781 (Minn. App. 2024), rev. denied (Minn. July 23, 2024). Here, wife

asserted in her answer and counter-petition that she

has not been convicted of a felony; [she] has not been a party
to a bankruptcy proceeding; [she] has no judgments against
her; [she] is not involved in any lawsuits, as either Plaintiff or
Defendant; [she] is not attempting to avoid or defraud
creditors; and [she] is not attempting to evade any civil or
criminal prosecution.

The answer and counter-petition were accompanied by a signed verification stating that

she

being first duly sworn upon oath, deposes and says that she is
[wife] named in the foregoing, within-entitled proceeding; that
she has read the attached Answer and Counter-Petition and that
the same is true of her own knowledge, except those statements
based on information and belief, which statements she believes
to be true.

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 Because wife’s answer and counter-petition is akin to an affidavit, the district court

was presented with information that wife was never convicted of a felony, was not a party

to a bankruptcy proceeding, had no judgments against her, was not involved in any

lawsuits, was not attempting to avoid or defraud creditors, and was not attempting to evade

any civil or criminal prosecutions. And, as wife points out, none of these allegations were

contested. As such, the district court’s finding that it did not have the relevant information

related to wife’s name-change request is clearly erroneous.

Moreover, section 518.27 states that the district court “shall” grant a request for a

name change unless the requesting party is subject to the requirements of section 259.13,

or the court finds “an intent to defraud or mislead.” Minn. Stat. § 518.27; see Minn. Stat.

§ 645.44, subd. 16 (2024) (stating that “‘[s]hall’ is mandatory”). The district court never

found an intent to defraud, and wife attested that she has never been convicted of a felony.

Nor was there any evidence submitted demonstrating that wife has been convicted of a

felony. Accordingly, the district court was required to grant wife’s request to change her

name under section 518.27. Because the district court was required to grant wife’s request

to change her name under section 518.27, we reverse in part and remand with instructions

to change wife’s name.

Affirmed in part, reversed in part, and remanded.

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