## Facts

- Sally K. Olar (wife) and Terry T. Olar (husband) married on September 5, 1970, and separated on June 26, 1982, after about 12 years of marriage.
- At the time of marriage, the wife had completed high school, and the husband was in his first year of undergraduate study.
- During the marriage, except for one year of full-time work, the husband was a full-time student earning undergraduate and graduate degrees and working toward a doctorate in physiology and biophysics.
- Throughout the marriage, the wife worked full time and was the primary wage earner; the parties generally relied on her income while the husband pursued his education.
- Because the parties operated largely on one income stream, they accumulated few marital assets.
- When the parties separated, the wife did not know she was pregnant with their only child.
- A decree of dissolution entered on December 23, 1983; at that time, the child was 11 months old.
- At permanent orders, the wife was unemployed, attending school full time, and living with her parents in Munster, Indiana; her parents provided room and board valued at about $400 per month, which they treated as a loan to be repaid when possible.
- The husband was living in Texas and earning about $35,000 per year as a laboratory manager; he had completed his doctoral dissertation and needed only to defend it to receive the doctorate.
- The wife sought maintenance, asserting that she supported the husband’s education with an understanding that he would later support her education after completing his doctorate and obtaining employment; the husband disputed that agreement.
- The trial court ruled the husband’s educational degree was not marital property and denied maintenance, concluding the wife did not satisfy the statutory threshold requirements for maintenance under Colorado law.
- The court of appeals affirmed, reasoning that maintenance could serve a compensatory role for a supporting spouse, but only if the spouse first proved the statutory threshold of “need.”

## Issues

1. Whether an educational degree constitutes marital property subject to division on dissolution (and whether prior Colorado precedent should be overruled).
2. If the degree is not marital property, whether the wife’s request for maintenance was wrongly denied because the statutory maintenance criteria were applied too narrowly given her support of the husband’s education and the parties’ claimed expectations.

## Decision

- The Colorado Supreme Court reaffirmed prior precedent (Graham v. Graham) and held that an educational degree is not marital property subject to division.
- The court affirmed the trial court’s property classification of the doctorate.
- The court reversed the denial of maintenance and remanded for further proceedings.
- The court held that the lower courts applied the statutory maintenance threshold too narrowly by treating “need” and “appropriate employment” as rigid, immediate self-support tests without sufficient consideration of the marriage’s economic arrangement, the wife’s contributions to the husband’s education, and the parties’ expectations.

## Legal Principles

- An educational degree is not “property” for marital property division because it is a personal attainment that generally cannot be sold, assigned, transferred, or executed upon, and its value rests on uncertain future earning capacity rather than a presently divisible asset.
- The maintenance statute (Colo. Rev. Stat. § 14-10-114) requires threshold findings related to the requesting spouse’s reasonable needs and ability to support themselves through appropriate employment, but those determinations must be made in context.
- “Reasonable needs” and “appropriate employment” are not limited to a bare, short-term subsistence inquiry; they may require consideration of the marital standard of living, the parties’ division of labor, and the economic consequences of choices made during the marriage.
- When one spouse substantially supported the other’s pursuit of advanced education and the marriage ends before the supporting spouse receives the anticipated reciprocal benefit, maintenance may be an equitable means to address the resulting financial imbalance, even though the degree itself is not divisible property.
- In evaluating maintenance eligibility and amount, courts may consider the supporting spouse’s contributions (financial and otherwise), the length of the marriage, child-care responsibilities, the parties’ circumstances at dissolution, and any express or implied understandings about future support for the other spouse’s education.

## Conclusion

In re Marriage of Olar held that the husband’s doctorate was not marital property, but it required a new maintenance determination because the statutory threshold for maintenance must be applied with attention to the marriage’s economic realities, including the wife’s sustained support of the husband’s education and the parties’ expectations about reciprocal educational and financial support.


In re Marriage of Olar, 747 P.2d 676 (1987)