My husband and I are informally separated but married 32 years. I live in one of our houses. He makes about 200,000/year. I make about 20,000. He deposits money to pay household finances, and some support to me. We filed married/jointly. Surprisingly the refund deposited into our joint account was 20,000 . I took half thinking that's how it works in community property and opened an account to invest for our new grandbaby. I just never thought we had to discuss how to divide the refund.He stopped depositing then sent me a note that he'll just apply the 20,000 to the monthly amount he would have deposited and would resume in four months. Said he'll have to fix it so there isn't such a big refund. This means that the money I thought was mine is now attributed to the monthly support.
He makes the majority of income, but we filed jointly.
I assume I have no basis for half of the refund because we have no formal agreement. Absent that, are there legal guidelines we could use? Or am I screwed...he does have me over a barrel since he can just not deposit anything.
Is there any family code that would help sort this out?
Should I let it go? Call it a wash? Is he right? I'd like to see what others would think of this. I have no perspective and probably no power to change anything.