FRANZ v. FRANZ (2021)

Rita Franz, the Former Wife, challenges the Final Judgment on Modification of Alimony. We affirm without comment the trial court's reduction in alimony but reverse and remand for the trial court to order the modification to be retroactive to the date of the Former Wife's first receipt of social security.

In its Final Judgment on Modification of Alimony, the trial court ordered the reduction in alimony to be retroactive to the date of filing of the petition, which the Former Wife argues, and the Former Husband concedes, was error. A trial court has the discretion to modify alimony effective from the date the petition for modification was filed or any date subsequent to the filing of the petition. See Gurdian v. Gurdian, 198 So. 3d 65, 68 (Fla. 2d DCA 2015). Here, the evidence presented indicated that the Former Wife did not receive her social security income until some point after August 2018 when she turned sixty-five. Because one of the bases of the alimony modification was the Former Wife's increased income, the modification should have been retroactive to the date of her first receipt of social security. Accordingly, we reverse and remand for the trial court to order the modification of the alimony to be retroactive to the date of the Former Wife's first receipt of social security.

Affirmed in part, reversed in part, and remanded.

SLEET, Judge.

ATKINSON and STARGEL, JJ., Concur.