Wyoming Quitclaim Deed (Divorce)

A Wyoming divorce rearranges the title before anyone signs a deed. Wyoming Statutes 2-6-125 severs the interests of former spouses in property held as joint tenants with right of survivorship or as tenants by the entirety, turning it into a tenancy in common. What it leaves undone is visible: the records still show both names, and the share standing in the wrong one moves only by an instrument. This Wyoming quitclaim deed does that job: one spouse or former spouse conveys and quitclaims to the other, and numbered blanks put the court, the civil action number, and the decree date on the face of the deed.

A severance the record still has to show

The section that severs the survivorship also protects a stranger to the marriage: someone acquiring an interest in good faith and for value is protected unless a writing declaring the severance was noted, registered, filed, or recorded before that interest arose. Priority runs the same way in this race-notice state, where an unrecorded deed is void against a later good faith purchaser who records first. The same section also revokes revocable dispositions and fiduciary nominations running to a former spouse.

What the decree settles, and what the deed carries

Wyoming Statutes 20-2-114 puts the allocation in the district court's hands: in granting a divorce, the court makes the disposition of the parties' property that appears just and equitable, weighing the parties' respective merits, the condition each is left in, and the burdens on the property. Wyoming divides by equitable distribution, not by a community property formula, so no part of the outcome is arithmetic. The decree orders the allocation; the land records are where it becomes visible, and self-help material published by the Wyoming Judicial Branch states plainly that title does not move on its own when a decree is entered.

One grantor, one certificate, a homestead release on every copy

The form recites two people in fixed roles. Section 1 takes the conveying spouse or former spouse, Section 2 the receiving one with the mailing address Wyoming Statutes 34-1-119(a) makes a condition of recording, Section 3 the proceeding by court, civil action number, decree date, and settlement agreement date. The operative section conveys in the two statutory words of Wyoming Statutes 34-2-104, whose measure Wyoming Statutes 34-2-105 fixes at the rights held at delivery, and prints the homestead release and waiver of Wyoming Statutes 34-2-121 in substance. That wording rides every copy for a structural reason: signed while the action is pending, the deed runs directly between spouses, the single transaction the homestead section excepts from joinder; signed after the decree, it runs between two people who are no longer spouses of each other, neither of them the spouse of the owner that section addresses. One signature block and one certificate close it, because only the grantor signs, and the grantee takes sole ownership without signing. A spouse deeding the marital home to the other under a settlement agreement, and a former spouse clearing off a title weeks after the decree, present the pattern this deed recites, searched as a divorce quitclaim deed or a quit claim deed after divorce. It is not set up for two record owners conveying together, for an owner whose current spouse joins only to release homestead rights, for an entity or trustee grantor, or for an agent under a power of attorney.

Filing it, and the exemption a divorce carries

Filing happens with the county clerk where the land sits. One statewide schedule prices it, Wyoming Statutes 18-3-402(a)(xvi), at twelve dollars for a first page and three dollars per page beyond, and Wyoming attaches no transfer tax and no documentary stamp. The sworn Statement of Consideration travels alongside, since Wyoming Statutes 34-1-142(b) bars acceptance without one, and the divorce posture matters here: paragraph (c)(viii) lets the State Board of Equalization and the Department of Revenue exempt transfers whose sales information is not useful in determining sales-price ratios, and the joint Board and Department general order issued under it lists transfers pursuant to a court order or decree in divorce proceedings. That statement is prepared apart from this package, on the Board's confidential form.

The download delivers the blank fillable deed drawn to the format standards Wyoming's largest county clerks publish, a completed example worked through a Natrona County conveyance after a Casper divorce, and a guide covering the numbered sections, the severance and homestead statutes, notarization, and recording. The materials are informational and are not legal advice.