Common-law marriage: the seven-year rule doesn't exist

There is no state where sharing a home for seven years turns two people into spouses. The seven-year rule is folklore. In the few states that still recognize common-law marriage, the test isn’t a length of time. It asks whether the couple agreed that they were married, lived together, and presented themselves to the world as a married couple. A couple who meet that test are married, with every right and duty that comes with it. A couple who doesn’t isn’t, however many years they have been together.

Ten weeks, and a full trial

The actor William Hurt found out how seriously courts take the question. A former partner sued him in New York. She argued that the two of them had become husband and wife during a stretch of roughly ten weeks in South Carolina, from late October 1982 into January 1983. He was filming there at the time, and South Carolina still recognized common-law marriage then.

Ten weeks is nowhere near seven years. The claim went to a full trial in 1989 anyway, because the calendar was never the test. What mattered was what the two of them had agreed and how they had held themselves out while they were in that state. She lost, and a New York appeals court affirmed the result in 1990.

Fewer states, and the old marriages still count

Several states have stopped allowing new common-law marriages. Pennsylvania recognizes none contracted after January 1, 2005. Alabama recognizes none formed on or after January 1, 2017. South Carolina ended them in 2019 with a court decision, Stone v. Thompson, for any formed after July 24 of that year.

Each of those changes applied going forward. A common-law marriage that was formed before the cutoff remains a marriage. Pennsylvania courts have taken that seriously. In a 2017 case, a Pennsylvania court accepted that a same-sex couple was able to enter a common-law marriage in the years Pennsylvania still permitted them, even though the state would not have acknowledged such a marriage at the time. For couples who were together long before they could legally wed, that can change how long the law says the marriage lasted.

Getting out requires a court

The way in is informal. The way out is not. No state offers a common-law divorce. A couple who became married without a license and later separated are still married until a court ends the marriage. If either of them marries someone else first, the second marriage has a bigamy problem.

That is why these cases tend to surface at a breakup or a funeral. One person says the couple was married, because a spouse can claim a share of the property, support, or an inheritance. The other side, which may be the dead partner’s family, says the two of them only lived together. The court then looks at how the couple described themselves over the years: tax returns filed as married, a partner listed as “spouse” on an insurance or emergency-contact form, the way they introduced each other, whether they wore rings. Forms signed years earlier, when nothing seemed to depend on them, can carry a lot of weight.

What to do

If you live, or have lived, in a state that recognizes common-law marriage, settle the question now while you both agree on the answer.

• If you mean to be married, get a document. Texas lets a couple sign a declaration of informal marriage and file it with the county clerk, and the clerk issues a certificate. A certificate is much easier to show a pension administrator or an agency than years of joint tax returns.
• If you don’t mean to be married, say so in writing. Both of you should sign it. Then stop describing yourselves as married on forms.
• If you lived in Pennsylvania, Alabama, or South Carolina, check when the relationship began against those cutoff dates.
• If there’s any chance you’re already married and you plan to marry someone else, see a family lawyer in your state before the wedding, not after.

The rules differ from state to state. Your state’s page, at the state pages, gets more detail as each one is checked.

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