Under Ohio law, when parties get divorced the court differentiates between separate and marital property. An inheritance, like gifts or property acquired before the marriage, is considered separate property. Generally, separate property is awarded to the individual owner as long as it can be traced. Tracing is showing the Court the trail of the asset from receipt to current form.
However, the Court has the authority to make a distributive award, an award of separate property to the other spouse, if needed to acheive equity.
Hence, in a nut shell, as long as you can show that you inherited the house, you should have no issue with tracing. Absent a distributive award, Wife should not be awarded any part of the home.
Please be advised that the above answer is for information purposes only and is not intended to create an attorney client relationship.
Answered on Jun 27th, 2013 at 2:00 PM