Divorces Lawyer

A Divorce Lawyer, or Divorce Attorney, is a lawyer who specializes in divorce cases.  Divorce cases often involve child custody, child support, and property division, in addition to the dissolution of the marriage.

Finding the Right Divorce Lawyer

People too often want a cheap or low-cost divorce lawyer to represent them in court.  Instead, what you should look for is the best, or the #1 rated divorce lawyer in your area.  Some law firms specialize in divorce. What most people should look for is a law firm or legal services team that has extensive experience with their type of legal case.  It is often not important to have an attorney that specialized in divorce to represent you. Often times an experienced family law attorney will be able to represent you and help you strategize and provide you the support and guidance you need.

Some divorce lawyers may also advertise as specializing in family law, custody, or child support since these are common functions involved in most divorce cases.

Criminal vs Family Cases

In a criminal case, it is important to have a lawyer represent you, because it is the lawyer who must negotiate with the prosecutor’s office and present evidence in court.  However, In a divorce or family law case, especially in Texas and many other states, the other party in the case is not a governmental prosecutor’s office. Rather it is your spouse or parent of your children. You can talk with them, you don’t need to hire a lawyer to talk to your spouse on your behalf.  Furthermore, there is no evidence required in a divorce case in order to get a divorce.  If you have children, you are expected to continue to co-parent after the divorce. The divorce lawyer will not be the intermediary of you and without your co-parent. You must learn to communicate.

Division of Marital Assets

Division of marital assets can be extremely complicated or very simple.  One of the simplest ways to divide marital assets is to sell the assets and then divide the proceeds. Assets do not have to be divided equally. The parties have the option to determine what they fee is fair and or equitable based their individual situation.

However, if you have complicated assets such as a business or investments you may wasn the help of a Divorce Laywer to help you. If you are not in agreement on how to divide these significant marital assets, consider getting the assistance.

Not all assets may be marital assets.  Some assets may be individual assets owned separately by one of the spouses and are then not considered for division.  This is another reason to talk with a skilled Divorce Lawyer.

In Texas, when divorcing couples have childern, the divorce lawyers representing the spouses must help to put in place a parenting plan. The parenting plan specifies the conservatorship of the children as well as a possession and access schedule.  This parenting plan will determine which parent has primary custody of the children and which parent has possessory conservatorship of the children.  The children will effectively live with the parent who has primary custody and will visit the children with possessory conservatorship.  Parents in a custody agreement are rerred to as the Custodial Parent and the Noncustodial parent.

Children in Divorce

When the Texas Child Support office does a child support order they will put in place an order for custody of the children. However, they will not assist the parents with getting a divorce or with the division of the marital assets.  One might ask why one parent would pay the other child support when the two parents are married. After all, the funds belong to both parents. Moving the money out and back into the family doesn’t change that the money is still marital property.  The best explanation given to this author was although the money is simply being transferred from one marital pocket to another marital pocket, the state makes money as a result of the transfer.

Division of Debt

Another key consideration in divorce is the division of debt.  Too often divorcing couples have more debt than they have assets. therefore, debt and assets are considered property.  The division of debt is often as important as the division of the assets.  Consult a knowledgeable Divorce Lawyer for division of debt consideration.

This article is for informational purposes only. It is not a substitute for legal advice.  Please consult with an attorney for legal advice.

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