Do You Need a Texas Family Law Attorney?

Family law is an important branch of the law that addresses a wide range of concerns that families often encounter, including divorce, post-divorce modifications, paternity, and beyond. If you’re faced with a family law issue, reaching out for the skilled legal counsel of an experienced Round Rock family law attorney early in the process is in your best interest.

Family Law Matters

Family law addresses a broad range of legal matters, including all the following:

Divorce
Specific terms of divorce, including the division of marital assets, child custody arrangements, child support, and alimony
Post-decree modifications related to child custody arrangements, child support, and alimony
Child custody arrangements outside of marriage and divorce
Paternity

If you’re facing a legal issue in any of these categories, it’s time to consult with a seasoned attorney for family matters.

Divorce and the Terms of Divorce

A primary focus of family law is divorce and the specific terms of divorce. For example, you and your divorcing spouse may be in agreement regarding every divorce term but one, and in such a case, you’ll seek the legal guidance of a trusted family law attorney regarding that specific divorce term.

While your divorce won’t be exactly like anyone else’s, the terms you’ll need to negotiate are the same as those addressed by every other divorcing couple.

The Division of Marital Property

While any divorce term can be hotly contested, the division of marital assets has the potential to top the list. Those assets that you come to own while you’re married – regardless of who made the transaction or whose name is attached – are deemed marital assets, and in the event of divorce, they’ll need to be divided between you fairly.

A fair division in the State of Texas can mean an equal division, but it doesn’t always. Instead, factors like the following are taken into consideration to help ensure the split is equitable:

The length of your marriage
Your overall marital estate – as offset by marital debt
You and your spouse’s separate assets
You and your spouse’s separate debts
Your earning potential relative to your spouse’s
The contributions each of you made to the marriage, including in the form of caring for the home and children
The tax consequences of the division under consideration
Whether wrongdoing, such as adultery, played a role in the breakdown of your marriage – even in a no-fault divorce
Any dissipation of marital assets by either of you, which can include spending down, giving away, or hiding assets

Separate assets refer to any properties or assets that either of you owned prior to marriage and kept separate throughout your marriage. Keeping assets separate involves keeping them financially disentangled from your marital assets, which can be challenging over the span of many years.

When a separate asset increases in value while you are married, that financial bump is generally considered marital and must be addressed as such. For example, if you own a retirement account when you marry, the value at that time is a separate asset. The increase in its value at the time of your divorce, however, will likely be treated as a marital asset.

Child Custody Arrangements

Another top contender for highly contested divorce terms is child custody arrangements, which break down into both legal custody and physical custody in the State of Texas.

Legal Custody

Legal custody determines how you and your children’s other parent will address primary parenting decisions like the following moving forward:

Decisions about your children’s primary residence
Decisions about your children’s health care
Decisions about your children’s schooling and daycare
Decisions about your children’s religious upbringing
Decisions about your children’s participation in extracurricular activities and travel

Your decision-making options include all the following:

You and your ex can continue making these decisions together, but the authority to break a tie may be awarded to one of you.
You and your ex can divide these decisions between you according to the topic at hand. For example, one of you may take on education and religious upbringing while the other handles health care and extracurriculars.
One of you may be awarded sole legal custody, and that parent will be responsible for making each of these decisions on their own.

For garden variety decisions that parents face 24/7, the parent whom the children are with at the time is on call to make them. And in the event of an emergency, the parent who is most readily available is responsible for making all necessary decisions.

Physical Custody

Physical custody is called parenting time in Texas, and it spells out when your children will be with you and when they’ll be with their other parent. Texas courts are guided by the best interests of the involved children, which generally means maximizing the amount of time each parent is awarded with them.

The best interest factors that guide physical custody rulings include all the following:

Each child’s age, developmental stage, and needs, including any special physical, educational, or emotional needs
Each parent’s ability and commitment to effectively addressing these needs
Each child’s age and overall mental and physical health
Each parent’s age and overall mental and physical health
The preference of any child whom the court considers mature enough to participate
The degree to which each parent has actively participated in raising the children to date
The relationship each parent has formed with each of the children
Each parent’s commitment to co-parenting effectively with the other and to supporting the other’s close and ongoing relationship with the children
Whether domestic violence, child abuse, or child neglect is a relevant issue

Parents can negotiate a parenting time schedule that works for them, or the court will order one of its standard schedules based on its child custody ruling. The bottom line is that both parents either split their time with the children more or less evenly, or one parent takes on the primary custodial role while the other has visitation.

Child Support

Parents are required by law to support their children financially, and when parents aren’t together, child support is employed to balance this support. While child support takes a wide range of factors into consideration, the child support obligation is generally shouldered by the parent with higher earnings, and this is true even when parenting time is shared evenly.

Alimony

Alimony—or spousal maintenance—is a divorce term that arises only when one spouse is left without the financial means to provide for their own reasonable needs while the other spouse is able to assist.

Alimony is generally reserved for marriages that last at least 10 years or when the divorcing couple has a binding prenuptial or postnuptial agreement that addresses the matter.

When alimony is ordered – other than in a marital agreement – it is generally set for an amount and duration that is intended to accomplish one of the following in pursuit of greater financial independence:

To allow the recipient the time necessary to obtain further education
To allow the recipient the time necessary to obtain job training
To allow the recipient the time necessary to obtain job skills

Post-Decree Modifications

The terms you receive at the time of your divorce address your circumstances at that time. However, if your circumstances change substantially, your divorce terms may no longer serve your family’s needs, and a modification may be in order.

Every term other than the division of marital property, which typically can’t be modified after the fact unless the original terms were based on fraud, can potentially be modified.

Child Custody Modifications

If the circumstances that supported your original child custody orders have changed to a material and substantial degree, it can support a child custody modification. Because there is no specific legal definition of a material and substantial change, each case must be considered in relation to the unique circumstances involved.

Common examples that can support a modification include moves based on improved earnings, changed needs based on a child’s developmental stage, or changed circumstances that put the children at risk.

Additional factors that sometimes support child custody modifications include the preference of a child who is at least 12 years old or one parent’s relinquishment of custody.

If you need a child custody modification, turn to a focused family services attorney.

Child Support Modification

To obtain a child support modification, you’ll also need to demonstrate a material and substantial change in circumstances. This can mean any of the following:

That the parent receiving child support is earning considerably more or less than they were when the original order was issued
That the parent paying child support is earning considerably more or less than they were when the original order was issued
That the parenting time schedule has changed significantly
That the cost of covering the children for health insurance has changed significantly
That one or more of the children’s healthcare needs – and the associated costs – have increased substantially
That the number of children the parent paying child support is responsible for has increased

The court also pays attention to parents who are intentionally underemployed or unemployed as a means of avoiding their financial responsibilities to their children.

Further, parents are entitled to a three-year review of their child support orders, and a modification can be made if the change involved amounts to at least 20 percent of the original amount or to at least $100.

Alimony Modification

Alimony modifications are also guided by material and substantial changes in either party’s circumstances. This can include changes related to any of the following:

Mental or physical health
Employment
income

Additionally, if the alimony recipient remarries, the alimony obligation automatically ends – with no need to seek a modification. If the alimony recipient begins living with a new romantic partner, a modification may be in order, but it will need to be obtained through the court.

Paternity

Paternity refers to identifying who a child’s father is. When a child is born to a married couple in Texas, the husband is presumed to be the father, and he becomes the child’s legal father. However, when a couple who isn’t married has a child, paternity must be established.

If both the mother and the father are in agreement regarding the child’s paternity, the matter can be taken care of by signing a Notice of Paternity form in the hospital.

The matter can also be resolved at a later date by filing a signed notice with the state, but when paternity is disputed, either parent can seek resolution through the court, which generally requires DNA testing.

The benefits of establishing paternity extend to everyone involved and include all the following:

The child benefits from having a relationship with their father, from financial support, legal benefits like VA or disability, medical history, and inheritance laws.
The mother benefits from the financial support – often in the form of child support and health insurance for the child – and from sharing parenting time and the heavy responsibility of raising a child on her own.
The father has the opportunity to forge an enduring relationship with his child – the benefits of which are difficult to overstate.

Consult with an Experienced Round Rock Family Court Attorney Today

Looking for a free consultation with a family attorney near you? Brett Pritchard at The Law Office of Brett H. Pritchard is a formidable Round Rock family law attorney with decades of experience skillfully guiding challenging cases like yours toward optimal outcomes.

To learn more, we encourage you to contact or call us at 254-781-4222 and schedule your free consultation today.