Washington doesn’t have common law marriage. What it has instead is a court-made rule called the committed intimate relationship, or CIR, which lets a judge divide the property an unmarried couple built together. This post is part of a series on how that rule works. It answers one question: how a court applies the Connell factors to decide whether you were in one.
Five things, and none of them is a requirement by itself: how continuously you lived together, how long the relationship lasted, what the relationship was for, whether you pooled your money and effort, and whether both of you intended a committed relationship. Those are the Connell factors, named for the 1995 Washington Supreme Court case that listed them. A judge then weighs all of them against the facts of your relationship. There’s no checklist, no minimum number of years, and no single factor that decides it.
Where the Connell factors come from
In Connell v. Francisco, 127 Wn.2d 339, 346 (1995), the Supreme Court defined the relationship as “a stable, marital-like relationship where both parties cohabit with knowledge that a lawful marriage between them does not exist,” and then listed the things a court should consider: “continuous cohabitation, duration of the relationship, purpose of the relationship, pooling of resources and services for joint projects, and the intent of the parties.” The court said the list “include[s], but [is] not limited to” those five.
Five years later, in In re Marriage of Pennington, 142 Wn.2d 592, 602, 605 (2000), the court added the two rules that matter most in practice. The factors are “neither exclusive nor hypertechnical,” and they’re meant to reach all relevant evidence. And no one factor outranks the others: “One Connell factor is not more important than another.”
What follows is how each factor plays out in real cases.
Factor one: continuous cohabitation
Did you live together, and was it continuous? This is the factor that comes closest to being required. In In re Marriage of Byerley, 183 Wn. App. 677, 689 (2014), Division II of the Court of Appeals held that a CIR “cannot in any event commence prior to the date the parties begin living together.” Division I, which hears Snohomish and Island County appeals, followed that rule in an unpublished 2025 decision, Jorgensen v. Sears. Division III disagreed in an unpublished 2024 decision, In re Marriage of Thew and Jacques, reasoning that no single factor should control. Unpublished decisions don’t bind any court, so plan around Byerley. The move-in date is usually the earliest date the relationship can count from.
“Continuous” matters too. An on-again, off-again relationship with real breaks is a weaker case. In an unpublished 2025 Division I decision, Sammeth v. Ervin, the court affirmed a finding of no CIR for a seven-year period of non-continuous cohabitation, even though the couple had bought property together.
Factor two: duration
How long were you together? Longer is better, and a short relationship makes the claim harder. But there’s no minimum. You may have read that Washington requires two or three years of living together. It doesn’t. In In re Marriage of Lindsey, 101 Wn.2d 299 (1984), the couple lived together for just under two years before marrying, and the Supreme Court held that period counted. In Muridan v. Redl, 3 Wn. App. 2d 44 (2018), six years of cohabitation “favors” a CIR. And nothing in the cases says a shorter relationship fails. Duration is one factor among five.
Factor three: purpose
Why were you together? Roommates who split rent aren’t in a CIR, however long they share a lease. A couple who moved in to build a life together probably is. So courts look at what you did: planning a future, buying property, raising children, holding yourselves out as a family. In Muridan, the couple signed a domestic partnership affidavit so one of them could get health insurance. The partner later argued it didn’t mean anything because the motive was insurance. The court disagreed. They’d sworn under penalty of perjury that they were partners, and the motive didn’t change that.
Factor four: pooling of resources and services
Did your money and effort go into shared projects? A joint bank account is the obvious example, but it isn’t required. In re Long and Fregeau, 158 Wn. App. 919 (2010). One partner paying the mortgage while the other paid the groceries, utilities, and kids’ expenses is pooling. Likewise, buying real estate together is pooling. Working unpaid in your partner’s business is pooling. What defeats this factor is a couple who kept everything separate on purpose and never combined money or effort on anything.
Factor five: intent
Did both of you intend a committed, marriage-like relationship? Both. For example, in Pennington, one partner stayed married to someone else for the first five years and refused to marry after his divorce. The court found the mutual intent wasn’t there. 142 Wn.2d at 604. In the companion case decided with it, one partner was still married when the relationship started and the facts on intent were “too equivocal” to support a CIR. 142 Wn.2d at 606.
Being married to someone else isn’t automatically fatal. In Long, the Court of Appeals called it “a fact to consider, but it is not determinative.” But it’s a serious problem for the intent factor, and it often overlaps with the cohabitation factor if the partner was still living with a spouse part of the time.
What doesn’t decide it
Sex. The word “intimate” in the name wasn’t meant to make sexual intimacy “the litmus test.” Muridan, 3 Wn. App. 2d at 61. In an unpublished 2024 Division I decision, In re Harris and Brimlow, the court upheld a CIR after 16 years with separate bedrooms and almost no sexual relationship.
Cheating. Infidelity weighs against the intent factor, but it doesn’t end a CIR by itself. What mattered in Muridan was that after the affair came out, the couple stayed together and kept living as a family.
How the judge puts the Connell factors together
Whether a CIR existed is a mixed question of law and fact. Pennington, 142 Wn.2d at 602-03. The judge decides what happened, then decides whether those facts add up to a CIR under the five factors. There’s no jury. And because the factors aren’t a checklist, two relationships that look similar on paper can come out differently based on the details. An unpublished 2026 Division I decision, In re Robertson and Kenlon, found no CIR after years of living together where the cohabitation was driven by outside circumstances, one partner repeatedly said the relationship was over, and there was no shared project on any property.
Two things you can do now
Write out a timeline. When you met, when you moved in, when you bought anything together, when you separated, and every break in between. Be honest about the breaks, because the other side will find them.
List every document where one of you named the other. Insurance enrollments, employer benefit forms, emergency contacts, loan applications, wills, beneficiary designations. Those are the sworn or semi-sworn statements that carry the purpose and intent factors. Our post on how to prove a committed intimate relationship existed goes through the full list.
Common questions
Is there a minimum time you have to live together for a committed intimate relationship in Washington? No. Duration is one of five factors, and the Supreme Court has counted a relationship of just under two years. A short relationship is harder to prove, but there’s no cutoff.
Do you have to live together to have a committed intimate relationship? Under the published rule, yes. Division II has held a CIR can’t begin before the couple starts living together, and Division I has followed it. One unpublished Division III decision disagrees, but unpublished decisions don’t bind any court.
Does cheating end a committed intimate relationship? Not by itself. Infidelity counts against the intent factor, but courts look at what the couple did afterward. A couple that stayed together and kept living as a family can still be in a CIR.
This post is part of our series on committed intimate relationships in Washington. Start with the main guide, What is a committed intimate relationship in Washington, and what happens when it ends?, or read about how to prove a CIR existed and whether you can be in a CIR when your partner is still married.
Last updated September 2026.
Law Offices of Daniel Ehrlich, Everett. Family law in Snohomish, Island, King, and Skagit Counties. (425) 954-5578.
This article is general information, not legal advice. Every case is different. If you’re separating from a partner you never married and there’s property between you, talk to an attorney.
