Q
I'm American, on an F-6, married to a Korean man for seven years. Three years ago I started a small business — a registered sole proprietorship in my name, a café with four employees. It's doing well. My husband contributed nothing to it beyond, in his words, "letting" me do it; the start-up money came from my savings and a loan I'm still repaying. He now wants a divorce, and he has said two things that have kept me up at night: that the café is "half his" because we're married, and that once we're divorced my visa is "gone" and I'll "have to sell."
I'm not going to fight the divorce. I am going to fight for the business I built. I also need to understand whether a divorce really ends a business owner's ability to stay in Korea, because I have employees, a lease, and a loan that depend on me being here.
Please tell me: (1) Is a business I started and run alone during the marriage subject to division, and how would a court value it? (2) What actually happens to my F-6, and is there any status for a divorced foreigner who owns a Korean business? (3) What should I be doing now, before the divorce process starts, to protect the café?
A Answer
The café is subject to property division in principle — it was created during the marriage — but "half his" is not how Korean courts approach a business one spouse founded with her own money and runs alone. Division is by contribution, and his contribution to the café is the question, not the fact of the marriage. On the visa: the F-6 does end with the marriage, and what replaces it is decided by the Immigration Office; but Korean immigration rules do contemplate status for foreign nationals who run businesses here, and "you'll have to sell" is his assumption, not a rule. What you do now — on the records of the café and on the immigration timeline — decides both.
Can you divorce in Korea, and under which law
Jurisdiction under Article 56 of the Act on Private International Law (국제사법, gukje sabeop) is clear; Korean law applies under Article 66. If you both agree, divorce by agreement (협의이혼, hyeobui ihon) or mediation (조정, jojeong) handles the divorce itself quickly, and the property terms are recorded as a court order.
Is the café marital property?
Property division (재산분할, jaesan bunhal) under Article 839-2 of the Civil Act covers property acquired during the marriage through the cooperation of both spouses. A business founded during the marriage is in the pool; that is the part he has right. What he has wrong is the share. Courts set each spouse's contribution ratio on the facts: who provided the capital, who did the work, whether the other spouse's income or homemaking supported the business's growth. A café funded from your pre-marital savings and a loan in your name, operated by you, with him contributing neither money nor labor, is a business in which his contribution ratio is low — and a court can, and does, award the business to the spouse who runs it, with any balancing payment to the other reflecting his actual contribution. Your pre-marital savings are separate property (특유재산, teugyu jaesan) to the extent they can be traced into the start-up; the loan is a liability that reduces the net value and stays with the borrower.
Valuation is by the net value of the business — assets less liabilities, with goodwill considered where a court finds it — at or near the close of the case. The records that decide this are yours to assemble: the capital contribution, the loan, the accounts, the payroll, and the absence of any contribution from him.
What this means for your stay in Korea
An F-6 is spouse status; a divorce ends its basis, and the Immigration Office then decides what follows. Immigration rules provide, separately, for a foreign spouse whose marriage ended through the Korean spouse's fault, for a parent raising a Korean child, and for foreign nationals who operate businesses in Korea under the investment and business categories — each with its own requirements on capital, registration and activity. Which, if any, fits your café is a question for an immigration specialist on your specific numbers, and it is a question to answer before the divorce is filed, not after. Those decisions are the Immigration Office's; we do not predict them. MEGA X handles the divorce; where the result affects your stay, we coordinate with an immigration specialist as part of the case — and for a business owner, that coordination is where the case actually is.
Two practical points. A divorce by agreement with no findings of fault and a divorce judgment recording his fault are different documents in an immigration review. And the timeline of the divorce should be set with the immigration timeline beside it, so that the café is not left without a lawful operator during a gap.
Children, property and support
No children mentioned. Consolation money (위자료, wijaryo) is separate and depends on fault.
What to do now
Assemble the café's history: the original capital and its source, the loan agreement, three years of accounts and tax filings, the lease and payroll in your name, and any communications showing his non-involvement. Do not restructure the business or transfer it to anyone now; a transfer during a pending divorce invites a provisional attachment (가압류, gaapnyu) and a dissipation argument. Do get the immigration assessment before you agree to anything about the divorce's form or timing.
Practical insight
Foreign business owners on F-6 lose twice in these divorces: they concede a share of the business to avoid a fight, and they discover afterward that the immigration route they needed depended on the business being fully theirs and continuously operating. The order of operations is immigration assessment, then records, then divorce terms. A husband who says "half" and "you'll have to sell" is negotiating; the records are the answer to the first, and the immigration plan is the answer to the second.
Send us the café's registration, capital records and loan documents, and we can tell you what his contribution argument looks like and bring in the immigration side — by text consultation or at +82-2-522-3959.
— MEGA X Law Firm Korea, International Family Law Team
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