I am a divorcee and my lady-friend a widow. Sometimes she spends the night in my apartment and sometimes I spend the night in hers. We are together most of the week. We each manage our own individual households. Does this mean she has the status of a “common-law wife” or cohabitee ?
By: דיאנה שאלתיאל•Published on: 27 June, 2022No. To qualify as cohabitees or common-law spouses a couple must fulfil certain criteria e.g. they must usually live together under one household as man and wife and run it together . It is not enough to sleep at each others apartment in rotation. However, in the Shukran Supreme Case it was stressed that the test should not be a rigid, objective one and the couple concerned were given the status of cohabitees even though they lived separately but sometimes lived in each other’s apartment. Particular laws may demand that the parties actually live together on a proper basis to qualify as cohabitees.