Reason #849: Jamie McCourt strikes gold

If you live in LA, are a Dodgers fan, or even follow Major League Baseball, you’ve probably heard about the McCourt divorce. Frank McCourt, the owner of the Dodgers, and his wife Jamie filed for divorce nearly two years ago after being married since 1979. And then, the bitter divorce battle ensued. Here’s a recap:

He says:

• His wife Jamie had an affair with her Dodgers bodyguard and driver, Jeff Fuller
• Jamie was fired by the Dodgers for "insubordination, non-responsiveness, failure to follow procedures, and inappropriate behavior with regard to a direct subordinate"
• Jamie and boyfriend Fuller spent more than two weeks on a summer vacation in France and billed the team for it
• He's low on cash and can't provide the hundreds of thousands of dollars Jamie wants in monthly compensation
• He's the sole owner of the Dodgers

She says:

• She's the equal co-owner of the Dodgers
• She was "unceremoniously" fired by Frank so he could steal her share of the team
• Frank is understating his net worth by hundreds of millions of dollars to avoid paying her
• She needs as much as $989,000 a month to maintain her lifestyle, assuming she's not reinstated as CEO (That's nearly $12 million a year).
• Her monthly living expenses include the upkeep on the McCourt houses (including a $34 million mansion in the Holmby Hills), salaries for a household staff of eight, tuition and living expenses for the couple's four sons, private jet travel, accommodations at five-star hotels, security escorts when traveling, as well as house calls from her hair stylist and make-up artist, according to the Wall Street Journal.

You might ask why any of this matters. Well, to me it doesn’t. I don’t see why Frank is required to help Jamie “maintain her lifestyle” after the two decide to end their relationship. But California is a community property state, where Jamie's entitled to half of everything that falls under this definition:

California law defines community property as any asset acquired or income earned by a married person while living with his or her spouse.

Read that again if you’re thinking of getting married in California, or any other community property state, without a prenup. Tape it to your mirror so you see it every morning when you brush your teeth!

However, Frank was positioned to avoid the atrocity of being forced to give half of his life's work to his ex-wife. The McCourts had a postnuptual agreement which stated that Frank was the sole owner of the Dodgers. Unfortunately, a judge ruled it invalid back in December, because Jamie claimed ignorance. Apparently, you can get out of a contract after the fact simply by saying you didn’t know what you were doing.

So the community property law was back in play, and now, after years of bitter legal wrangling, they’ve finally reached a tentative settlement. According to the agreement, ownership of the Dodgers will be determined in an August 4 hearing to decide whether team qualifies as community property. If so, Jamie gets:

1. Half of the rights to the team, which will be sold according to the agreement
2. That's it

In case you’re wondering the Dodgers have an estimated value of $800M. So Jamie would stand to make about $400M. If the Dodgers are not deemed community property she’ll get:

1. $650K per MONTH (which she’ll also receive from now until the Aug 4 hearing) up to a total of $55M
2. $325M per month in perpetuity after that
3. A one-time payment of $100M
4. All the couple's houses

Of course, #1 and #2 end if she remarries, but why would she? The monthly payments, assuming 3% inflation and that she doesn’t have more than 50 more years left to live, is probably worth about $50-60 mil to Jamie. So let’s ignore the houses and call the total $160M. A much better deal for Frank than the first scenario, but pretty outrageous.

If you're keeping score at home, that’s roughly $15K per day for the 30 years they were married. Personally, I think Frank could have done better being in business with Heidi Fleiss.