WeVote
Log In

Bill

JA

Bill

HB 4609

Property: ownership interests; rights and liabilities of married women act; revise gender-specific language. Amends secs. 1, 4, 5, & 6 of 1981 PA 216 (MCL 557.21 et seq.). TIE BAR WITH: HJR F'25

2025-2026 Regular Session Introduced by Joey Andrews and 27 co-sponsors

Modernizes language to replace “husband” with “spouse” while preserving a married woman’s separate property rights and liabilities for contracts, surety, and guarantees.

bill electronically reproduced 06/10/2025
#civilrights:sexualorientationdiscrimination #property:ownershipinterests
0
WeVote Research Nonpartisan
Bill Summary · HB 4609

Summary — HB 4609 (2025)

Purpose

HB 4609 amends the 1981 “Rights and Liabilities of Married Women” statute (1981 PA 216; MCL 557.21 et seq.) to modernize gender-specific language and clarify certain property and contractual liability provisions. The bill updates references to a married woman’s “husband” to “spouse” in multiple sections, while preserving the statute’s substantive rules about separate property, contract liability, suretyship, and guarantees.

Key provisions

  • Amends sections 1, 4, 5, and 6 of 1981 PA 216 (MCL 557.21, 557.24, 557.25, 557.26).
  • Section 1
    • Confirms that property a woman acquires before marriage or receives during marriage by gift, inheritance, devise, etc., remains her separate property and may be sold, conveyed, mortgaged, devised, or bequeathed as if she were unmarried.
    • States that the woman’s earnings from her personal efforts are considered her separate property.
    • Clarifies that that separate property is not liable for debts or obligations of any other person, including the woman’s spouse, except as provided in the act.
  • Section 4
    • Allows a married woman to enter into and enforce contracts relating to her separate property; she is personally liable on such contracts and judgments may be satisfied from her separate property.
    • Specifies that the woman’s spouse is not liable for breach of a contract entered into by the married woman relating to her separate property, unless the spouse acted as surety, cosigner, or guarantor.
  • Section 5
    • Confirms a married woman may serve as surety for another’s debt (including her spouse’s) by written instrument; a judgment on that suretyship may be satisfied from her separate property.
  • Section 6
    • Allows a married woman to pledge or assign her interest in separate property as security for another’s debt (including her spouse’s); such security can be applied to satisfy a judgment whether or not the separate property benefited.
    • Allows a married woman to give a general guarantee for another’s debt (including a spouse’s); a judgment on that guarantee may be satisfied from any of her separate property.

Who is affected

  • Married women and their spouses: clarifies property rights and liabilities regarding separate property, contract obligations, suretyship, and guarantees.
  • Same-sex married couples: replacing “husband” with “spouse” makes statutory language inclusive of spouses of any gender and reduces ambiguities about applicability to non-heterosexual marriages.
  • Lenders, creditors, and parties to contracts with married women: formalizes enforcement and satisfaction rules against a married woman’s separate property.

Procedural / timeline aspects

  • Introduced: March 12, 2025.
  • Committee consideration and public hearings occurred in April 2025; reported favorably as substituted.
  • Legislative record shows passage/reading activity in May 2025 and electronic reproduction on June 10, 2025. On June 10, 2025 the bill was introduced in the House by Rep. Brenda Carter and referred to the Committee on Government Operations.
  • Companion bill: SB 2436.
  • Effectiveness: The bill contains an enacting clause stating it does not take effect unless a related joint resolution (Senate Joint Resolution ___ or House Joint Resolution F of the 103rd Legislature) to amend the state constitution becomes part of the Michigan Constitution. In other words, the statutory changes are contingent on a concurrent constitutional amendment process (tie-bar to HJR F'25).

Fiscal and policy notes

  • The bill primarily updates terminology and clarifies existing statutory mechanics; it does not create new programs or specified fiscal expenditures.
  • Substantively, the bill appears to retain existing legal outcomes about separate property and liabilities while making statutory language inclusive of spouses of any gender.

Compiled from official sources — confirm details with the bill’s official record.

Sign in to ask a question.