Cohabitation laws in Indiana give unmarried couples almost none of the automatic legal protections that come with marriage. Since January 1, 1958, common law marriage formed in Indiana has been void by statute, and no amount of time sharing a home, a last name, or a bank account changes that.1Indiana General Assembly. Indiana Code 31-11-8-5 – Common Law Marriages Entered Into After January 1, 1958 Without a marriage license, the state treats partners as two legally unrelated individuals: no automatic claim to each other’s property, no right to support after a breakup, no inheritance if a partner dies without a will, and no authority to make medical decisions for each other. Nearly every protection married couples take for granted has to be built from scratch through written agreements and legal documents.
Property Rights If You Split Up
Married couples going through divorce start with a legal presumption that marital property should be divided equally, subject to adjustment based on contributions and circumstances.2Indiana General Assembly. Indiana Code 31-15-7-5 – Presumption for Equal Division of Marital Property Rebuttal Unmarried couples get none of that. When cohabiting partners break up in Indiana, ownership follows the name on the title, deed, or account. Nothing else.
That rule creates real damage when one partner contributed money to an asset held in the other’s name alone. Paying half the mortgage for ten years on a house deeded only to your partner does not give you an ownership share. Your only path would be a civil suit arguing something like unjust enrichment or an implied agreement, and those cases are hard to win without written proof. Courts are not eager to reconstruct a decade of Venmo transfers and verbal understandings.
Couples buying property together should think carefully about how the deed reads:
- Joint tenancy with right of survivorship means both partners own the whole property equally, and the survivor automatically inherits the deceased partner’s share without probate.
- Tenancy in common means each partner owns a defined share (not necessarily 50/50), and that share passes through the deceased partner’s estate rather than automatically to the survivor.
Bank accounts, vehicles, and investment accounts follow the same logic. If only one name is on the account, the other partner has no legal claim to it.
Inheritance When a Partner Dies Without a Will
This is where the gap between married and unmarried couples cuts deepest. Indiana’s intestacy rules, which govern estates where the deceased left no will, recognize only a surviving spouse. A surviving spouse takes at least half the estate if there are children, three-quarters if only parents survive, and the entire estate if neither children nor parents survive.3Indiana General Assembly. Indiana Code 29-1-2-1 – Estate Distribution
An unmarried partner does not appear anywhere in that statute. If your partner dies without a will, you inherit nothing under Indiana law, no matter how long you lived together or what you contributed. The estate flows to the partner’s children, parents, siblings, or more distant relatives. A partner of thirty years has fewer inheritance rights than a cousin the deceased barely knew.
The fix is straightforward but must be done in advance. A valid will can leave assets to a partner. Transfer-on-death designations on bank and investment accounts, and beneficiary designations on retirement plans and life insurance, pass those funds directly to the named person outside probate. Real property held in joint tenancy with right of survivorship bypasses probate as well. For cohabiting couples with shared finances, these steps are not optional.
No Right to Financial Support After a Breakup
Indiana’s spousal maintenance statute applies only to the dissolution of a marriage. A court can award maintenance only to a spouse, and only in limited circumstances such as incapacity preventing self-support or a short period of rehabilitative education not to exceed three years.4Indiana General Assembly. Indiana Code 31-15-7-2 – Findings Concerning Maintenance None of that reaches unmarried partners.
Palimony, meaning court-ordered support to a former unmarried partner, has no statutory basis in Indiana. A partner who left the workforce to run the household during a long relationship has no right to financial help after a breakup. Verbal promises of lifelong support are essentially unenforceable no matter how sincerely they were made.
The one realistic route to post-separation support is a written contract. If a cohabitation agreement contains a support provision, Indiana courts can enforce it as an ordinary civil contract. Without that document, a partner who gave up career advancement for the relationship walks away with nothing.
Healthcare Decisions and Hospital Access
When a married person becomes incapacitated, their spouse is generally the first person authorized to make medical decisions. An unmarried partner has no such standing under Indiana law. If your partner is unconscious in a hospital and no legal documents are in place, their parents or adult children will make the decisions.
Indiana allows any competent adult to sign an advance directive designating a healthcare representative to make medical decisions if they become unable to do so themselves.5Indiana General Assembly. Indiana Code 16-36-7-28 – Advance Directive Signature Witnesses That representative can be an unmarried partner. Without the document, the partner is a legal stranger for medical decision-making.
Two federal rules soften the edges. Under HIPAA, healthcare providers may share information about a patient’s condition and location with loved ones involved in the patient’s care, including unmarried partners.6U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. Guidance on HIPAA, Same-sex Marriage, and Sharing Information with Patients Loved Ones And since 2010, hospitals that receive federal funding must give equal visitation rights to all visitors regardless of legal relationship. Sharing information and being allowed to visit are not the same as having authority to consent to surgery or make end-of-life calls. Only a properly executed healthcare power of attorney gives an unmarried partner that authority.
Children and Paternity for Unmarried Parents
Child support and custody rights are not tied to marriage. Indiana law obligates both biological parents to support their children whether or not the parents ever married or lived together. But for unmarried fathers, those rights and duties do not switch on automatically. Paternity has to be established first.
There are two paths. Parents can sign a paternity affidavit at the hospital within 72 hours of the birth, or later at the local health department before the child reaches adulthood. Alternatively, either parent can file a paternity action in court.7State of Indiana Department of Child Services. Establishing Paternity in Indiana
Custody works differently than in a divorce. The mother automatically has physical custody of a child born to unmarried parents unless a court orders otherwise.7State of Indiana Department of Child Services. Establishing Paternity in Indiana Parents can share joint legal custody by completing the relevant section of the paternity affidavit and providing genetic test results from an accredited laboratory to the health department within 60 days of the child’s birth. Miss that 60-day window, and the mother retains sole legal custody even though the man is still recognized as the legal father.
An unmarried father who wants custody or visitation and did not complete the affidavit process will need to file a paternity action. The statute lists who is eligible to bring one, including the mother, the alleged father, and the child.8Indiana General Assembly. Indiana Code Title 31 Family Law and Juvenile Law 31-14-4-1 Once paternity is established, the court can order child support, set a custody arrangement, and grant parenting time.
Wrongful Death Claims
If an unmarried partner is killed through someone else’s negligence, Indiana’s wrongful death statute does not give the surviving partner standing. Under Indiana Code 34-23-1-2, only the personal representative of the deceased person’s estate may bring a wrongful death action, and damages benefit specific surviving relatives, meaning children and parents of the deceased, not an unmarried partner. Surviving parents or children must also show a “genuine, substantial, and ongoing relationship” with the deceased before recovering.9Indiana General Assembly. Indiana Code 34-23-1-2 – Wrongful Death Actions A cohabiting partner falls outside the framework entirely.
One Area Where the Law Treats Cohabitants Like Spouses
Indiana’s protective order law does extend to unmarried cohabiting partners. Indiana Code 34-26-5 defines eligible petitioners to include individuals who are or were living together in a spouse-like relationship, so a partner experiencing abuse can seek an order of protection through the same process available to married spouses. This is the rare place where cohabitation status alone is enough.
Federal Tax, Benefits, and Immigration Gaps
Federal law does not recognize unmarried cohabitation as a legal status, which produces several concrete costs.
Unmarried couples cannot file a joint federal income tax return. Each partner files as single, or as head of household if they have a qualifying dependent. Depending on the income split, the combined bill can be higher than what a married couple with the same total earnings would owe.
Married spouses can transfer unlimited assets to each other during life or at death without gift or estate tax. Unmarried partners have no equivalent protection. Transfers between them are subject to the standard annual gift tax exclusion, which is $19,000 per recipient for 2026.10Internal Revenue Service. IRS Releases Tax Inflation Adjustments for Tax Year 2026 Amounts above that count against the lifetime exemption. At death, an unmarried decedent’s estate gets no marital deduction on assets left to a partner.11Internal Revenue Service. Estate Tax
Social Security survivor benefits are not available to an unmarried partner based on the deceased’s earnings record, regardless of the length of the relationship or the level of financial dependence. Only a legal spouse (or an ex-spouse married to the deceased for at least ten years) qualifies.
Employer-sponsored health insurance carries a hidden tax cost. If your employer offers domestic partner coverage, the employer’s premium contribution for your partner is treated as taxable income to you for federal purposes. Married employees do not pay tax on spousal coverage. The exception is when the partner qualifies as your tax dependent, meaning you provide more than half their financial support.
Federal immigration law does not treat cohabitation as a basis for a family-based green card. Only a legal spouse is an “immediate relative” for sponsorship of permanent residency.12U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. Green Card for Immediate Relatives of U.S. Citizen
Retirement Accounts and Beneficiary Designations
Federal law under ERISA gives married spouses automatic rights to employer-sponsored retirement accounts. In most pension plans and 401(k)s, the spouse is the default beneficiary, and the employee cannot name someone else without the spouse’s written consent.13U.S. Department of Labor. FAQs about Retirement Plans and ERISA
For unmarried couples it works in reverse: no automatic protection, and no spousal-consent obstacle either. An unmarried partner can name anyone as beneficiary. The catch is that they must actually do it. Without an explicit designation, the account defaults to the plan’s standard rules, which typically direct funds to a spouse, then children, then the estate. An unmarried partner is nowhere in that line. Reviewing and updating beneficiary designations on retirement accounts, life insurance, and bank accounts is one of the most important steps a cohabiting couple can take, and one of the cheapest.
Cohabitation Agreements
A cohabitation agreement is a private contract between unmarried partners that governs how they handle property, finances, and responsibilities during and after the relationship. Indiana courts enforce these agreements under ordinary contract law. It functions much like a prenuptial agreement for couples who are not marrying.
A workable agreement should address at least these points:
- Property classification: which assets each partner owned before the relationship, and how new purchases will be titled and divided.
- Expense sharing: how rent, utilities, groceries, and other household costs are split, whether equally, proportionally by income, or on some other basis.
- Debt responsibility: who is responsible for debts each partner brought in, and how jointly incurred debts will be handled.
- Separation terms: what happens to shared property if the relationship ends, including who stays in a shared home and how joint accounts are divided.
- Financial support: whether either partner will receive support payments after a breakup, and for how long.
Be specific. Use account numbers for financial accounts, VINs for vehicles, and parcel numbers for real estate. Vague references to “the house” or “our savings” invite the exact disputes the document is meant to prevent.
Both partners must sign voluntarily for the agreement to be enforceable. Notarizing the signatures adds protection against later claims of forgery or duress. Each partner should keep an original copy in a secure place. The agreement does not need to be filed with a court; it functions as an ordinary civil contract if a dispute reaches litigation. Legal fees for a customized agreement typically run several hundred dollars, which compares favorably with the cost of fighting over property in court without one.