Divorce Appraisal in the Bay Area

Short answer: When a Bay Area divorce includes commercial or investment real estate, each property needs an independent appraisal as of the right date: usually a current value near trial under Family Code Section 2552, and often a retrospective value as of the date of separation. Family law cases are filed in the county where the case belongs, which is not always the same courthouse that handles probate. San Francisco filings go to the Unified Family Court at 400 McAllister Street. Alameda filings go to Hayward. Santa Clara family law is at 201 North First Street in San Jose. The region adds its own value issues: San Francisco, Oakland, San Jose and Berkeley rent rules, older apartment buildings, and portfolios that stretch across several counties. PM Appraisal appraises every commercial property type across the Bay Area, and you talk directly to the appraiser on your assignment. Call or text (805) 990-9700.

Bay Area marital estates often hold more than a house. A rent-regulated apartment building in San Francisco or Oakland, a small industrial or R&D building in San Jose or Fremont, a mixed-use storefront on the Peninsula, an office condo in Oakland or Walnut Creek, or a vineyard or ranch in Napa or Sonoma. In a divorce, the value of each one drives who keeps what and how much one spouse pays the other. Our statewide guide to divorce appraisals of commercial property covers the Family Code basics in depth. This page covers what is different when the property is in San Francisco, Oakland, San Jose or another Bay Area county.

General information, not legal or tax advice. Talk to your attorney or CPA about your case.

Where is a Bay Area divorce filed, and who orders the appraisal?

Bay Area family law is county by county, and the family law courthouse is often not the probate courthouse named in estate work. Your attorney chooses where to file. A few of the venues that come up when the property is in the region:

San Francisco. Dissolution, legal separation and nullity are handled by the Unified Family Court at the Civic Center Courthouse, 400 McAllister Street. The court’s divorce page directs filings to the Family Law Clerk’s Office in Room 402. Unified Family Court sits on the fourth floor of the same building. Probate filings are handled by the Civil Division in a different office in that courthouse, so do not assume an estate and a divorce use the same clerk window.
Alameda County (Oakland, Hayward, Berkeley and the rest of the East Bay). All family law documents must be presented for filing at the Hayward Hall of Justice, 24405 Amador Street, Hayward. That is a different building from the Berkeley Courthouse, where Alameda County probate documents are filed. Domestic violence protective-order papers may also be filed at the Rene C. Davidson Courthouse, 1225 Fallon Street, Oakland.
Santa Clara County (San Jose and Silicon Valley). Family law cases are heard at the Family Justice Center Courthouse, 201 North First Street, San Jose. Civil and probate matters are at the Downtown Superior Court, 191 North First Street, next door.
San Mateo County. Family law is among the case types served at the Hall of Justice and Records, 400 County Center, Redwood City.
Contra Costa County. The court says all family law cases, including domestic violence restraining orders and adoptions, are filed at the Spinetta Family Law Center, 751 Pine Street, Martinez. That is not the Wakefield Taylor Courthouse, which handles probate and civil cases a few blocks away.

If a spouse lives in Marin, Napa, Sonoma or Solano County, the case may be filed in that county’s superior court instead. See commercial appraisal in the Bay Area for regional coverage.

The court does not order the appraisal for you. It is usually ordered in one of three ways:

By one spouse’s attorney, to value the property for negotiation, mediation or trial.
Jointly by both sides, as a neutral appraiser both attorneys agree on, which can save the cost of dueling reports.
By a CPA or forensic accountant working on the case, who needs real estate values to build the balance sheet and the tax picture.

Our opinion of value is the same no matter who orders the report. We never pick a number to help one side, and our value conclusion is never tied to the result anyone wants.

What valuation dates does a Bay Area divorce appraisal need?

Under Family Code Section 2552, the court values community assets as near as practicable to the time of trial. On 30 days’ notice and for good cause, the court may value all or part of the assets at a date after separation and before trial instead. Spouses who settle can agree on their own date.

A date of separation value can matter too. Family Code Section 70 defines that date, and it is the attorneys’ call. Once it is set, a retrospective appraisal values the property as of that past date with the sales, leases and market conditions from that time. That can be needed when one spouse ran a building alone after the split, when value rose or fell after separation, or when separate property money went into a community building and reimbursement under Family Code Section 2640 is in play.

In the Bay Area, two dates can describe two different properties. A building can be re-tenanted, a rent-cap year can roll over, a large lease can start or end, or a seismic retrofit can be completed between separation and trial. Tell us every date in play before the work starts so each value is supported on its own.

What Bay Area issues change a divorce appraisal?

San Francisco rent rules. The city’s partial exemption for newly constructed rental units generally exempts residential units first constructed after June 13, 1979, and units with a Rent Board determination of substantial rehabilitation, from local rent-increase limits, but not from just-cause eviction rules. The exemption applies if the first certificate of occupancy was issued after June 13, 1979 and the unit had no residential use before that certificate. For an older apartment building, the mix of covered and exempt units, and how far in-place rents sat below market on each valuation date, shape the income and the value.
Oakland’s Rent Adjustment Program. The city lists three common RAP exemptions: government-subsidized housing, units built after January 1, 1983, and single-family homes or condominiums exempt under the Costa-Hawkins Rental Housing Act. Just-cause eviction rules may still apply to a unit that is exempt from RAP rent limits. An Oakland apartment building first occupied in 1980 and one first occupied in 1985 can sit under different local rules on the same street.
San Jose’s Apartment Rent Ordinance. The city says the Apartment Rent Ordinance covers apartments with three or more units that were built and occupied before September 7, 1979, about 38,000 apartments. The maximum allowable increase is one 5% increase in a 12-month period, with exceptions after a voluntary vacancy or a lawful eviction.
Berkeley rent stabilization. The Berkeley Rent Board says most multi-unit properties built before June 1980 are fully covered, including a rent ceiling. Units built and issued a certificate of occupancy after June 1980 are treated as new construction: they have just-cause eviction protection, but no local rent ceiling.
Statewide rent caps on other units. Outside those local ordinances, or on units the local rules do not cover, most rent-increase limits come from state law in Civil Code Section 1947.12. General information; ask your attorney how the rules apply to a specific building.
Different submarkets in one estate. Downtown San Francisco and Oakland office, South San Francisco and Mission Bay life science, industrial along Interstate 880, Peninsula mixed-use and Silicon Valley R&D do not trade off the same set of sales. Comparable sales have to come from the right submarket and the right time. See commercial appraisal in the Bay Area.
Residential alongside commercial. Many Bay Area estates mix a family home, a rental house or condominium and commercial buildings. We appraise residential property alongside the commercial property for the same clients, so the whole estate is valued on the same date with the same approach.

How do you value several properties in one Bay Area marital estate?

Consistently. When an estate holds a fourplex in San Francisco, an apartment building in Oakland, an industrial condo in San Jose and a Peninsula office or a North Bay vineyard, each property gets its own report or its own section, but the valuation date, the assumptions and the level of support are the same across all of them. That keeps the division fair and keeps the argument on the facts. See multi-property portfolio appraisals. We appraise property in every California county, so a Bay Area building and a Southern California or Central Valley property can be valued in the same engagement.

A few things to settle up front:

Who holds title. When an LLC or partnership holds a building, we appraise the real estate. If the case needs the value of the spouse’s interest in the entity, that is a business valuation question for a business appraiser or CPA, who can use our real estate value as a starting point. See family LLC property appraisals and fractional interest appraisals.
Disclosure. Under Family Code Section 2104, each party serves a preliminary declaration of disclosure. Rent rolls, leases, rent-board or RAP registrations, operating statements and loan documents for each property make the appraisal faster and better supported.
Property that gets missed. Under Family Code Section 2556, the court keeps jurisdiction to divide community assets that were omitted from the judgment. A full property list at the start is cheaper than a postjudgment motion later.

What happens with property taxes and income taxes when one spouse keeps the building?

Generally, keeping a building does not trigger a new county assessment. Revenue and Taxation Code Section 63 excludes transfers to a spouse or former spouse in connection with a property settlement agreement or a decree of dissolution from the definition of a change in ownership. That is a different rule from Proposition 19, which changed parent-child and grandparent-grandchild exclusions for a later transfer of a family home or family farm. A divorce transfer itself is generally an interspousal exclusion question, not a Prop 19 question. For federal income tax, Internal Revenue Code Section 1041 generally treats a transfer between spouses, or between former spouses incident to the divorce, as a gift, so the receiving spouse takes the transferor’s basis. Two buildings with the same market value can carry very different built-in tax costs, which matters when the CPA builds the division. Talk to your attorney or CPA about how these rules apply to you.

If the spouse who keeps a building later refinances to buy out the other spouse, the lender will order its own appraisal for the loan. A divorce appraisal and a lending appraisal have different intended users, so plan on separate reports. We do both: see private and hard money lending appraisals.

Why do Bay Area family law attorneys and CPAs call PM Appraisal?

You talk to your appraiser. No coordinator, no AMC portal. We pick up the phone and walk you through the value.
Every property type, every county. Apartments, industrial, retail, office, hotels, land, vineyards, mixed-use and new construction, from San Francisco, Oakland and San Jose to the Peninsula, the East Bay, the North Bay and the rest of California. Our team is based in San Diego County and has no Bay Area office. The appraiser inspects the property in person. See commercial appraisal in the Bay Area and our full commercial property appraisal services.
Every kind of commercial appraisal. Divorce is one example. We also prepare date-of-death, trust, lending, partition, litigation, tax appeal and consulting assignments.
Rush commercial appraisals in 5 to 7 business days, when a mediation or trial date is close. See rush commercial appraisals.
Detailed narrative reports that show the comparables and the reasoning, so the value holds up when the other side reads it.

Standard timing depends on the property and scope. Call (805) 990-9700 for a timeline on your assignment. Attorneys and CPAs: call (805) 990-9700 to scope a divorce, date of separation or retrospective appraisal.

Other county guides: divorce appraisal in Los Angeles, Orange County, San Diego and Sacramento.

Frequently Asked Questions

What is a divorce appraisal in the Bay Area?

It is an independent appraisal of real estate owned by one or both spouses, prepared so the spouses, their attorneys, a mediator or the court can divide the marital estate. For Bay Area commercial and investment property, that means a supported market value for each building or parcel as of the valuation date the case needs, and often a second, retrospective value as of the date of separation. PM Appraisal appraises every commercial property type across San Francisco, Oakland, San Jose and the rest of the nine-county Bay Area.

Where are Bay Area divorce cases filed?

It depends on the county. San Francisco family law cases are filed with the Unified Family Court at the Civic Center Courthouse, 400 McAllister Street, Room 402. Alameda County family law filings go to the Hayward Hall of Justice at 24405 Amador Street, not the Berkeley probate courthouse. Santa Clara County family law is at the Family Justice Center Courthouse, 201 North First Street in San Jose. San Mateo County family law is at the Hall of Justice and Records, 400 County Center in Redwood City. Contra Costa County family law cases are filed at the Spinetta Family Law Center, 751 Pine Street in Martinez. Your attorney files the case. The appraisal is ordered by the spouses or their attorneys, not by the court clerk.

What date is commercial property valued as of in a California divorce?

Under Family Code Section 2552, the court values community assets as near as practicable to the time of trial. On 30 days' notice and for good cause, the court may value some or all assets at a date after separation and before trial instead. A settlement can set its own date. Your attorney decides which date applies, and we can appraise the property as of any of them, including a retrospective date of separation value.

How do San Francisco, Oakland and San Jose rent rules affect a divorce appraisal?

They can change the income a buyer would expect from an apartment building. San Francisco generally exempts units first constructed after June 13, 1979 from local rent-increase limits, though just-cause eviction rules can still apply. Oakland's Rent Adjustment Program commonly exempts units built after January 1, 1983. San Jose's Apartment Rent Ordinance covers apartments with three or more units built and occupied before September 7, 1979, and allows one 5% increase in a 12-month period. The appraisal uses the rents and rules in place on each valuation date. General information; ask your attorney how the rules apply to a specific building.

Can you appraise several Bay Area properties in different counties for one divorce?

Yes. Many Bay Area marital estates hold buildings in more than one county, such as a San Francisco mixed-use building, an Oakland apartment property and a San Jose industrial condo. Each property gets its own supported value, on the same valuation date and with the same assumptions, so the division stays consistent. We also appraise property elsewhere in California in the same engagement.

Does one spouse keeping a Bay Area building trigger a property tax reassessment?

Generally not. Revenue and Taxation Code Section 63 excludes transfers to a spouse or former spouse in connection with a property settlement agreement or a decree of dissolution from the definition of a change in ownership. Ask your attorney or CPA how the rule applies to your transfer and whether the county assessor needs a filing.

Do you only do divorce appraisals in the Bay Area?

No. Divorce work is one example. We appraise every commercial property type, including apartments, office, retail, industrial, hotels, gas stations, land, agricultural, mixed-use and new construction, and every kind of commercial appraisal: lending, estate and date of death, trust, retrospective, partition, partnership buyouts, litigation, eminent domain, tax appeals and consulting, in every California county. Call or text (805) 990-9700.

Commercial property in a Bay Area divorce?

Family law attorneys, CPAs and spouses: call or text (805) 990-9700 with the property list and the dates you need. You talk to the appraiser who will inspect the properties and write the reports. Rush commercial appraisals in 5 to 7 business days.

(805) 990-9700

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This article is general information, not legal or tax advice. Talk to your attorney or CPA about your situation.

Divorce Appraisals in the Bay Area: Commercial and Investment Property in a Marital Estate