Legal Expert

Contested Divorce

No divorce is ever easy, but some are much more complicated – and much more contentious – than others. If your divorce is contested, it means that there is at least one issue that you and your divorcing spouse were unable to resolve, and the court was required to intervene on your behalf. If you’re facing a divorce, you need an experienced Austin divorce lawyer on your side. If your divorce looks like it will be a contested divorce – and it’s sometimes clear from the outset – you shouldn’t even consider moving forward without a dedicated Austin divorce attorney in your corner.

The Building Blocks of Divorce

To finalize your divorce, you and your spouse will need to come to mutually agreeable terms regarding all of the following components:

The Division of Community Property

Community property refers to that property that you and your spouse accumulated together during your married years. These assets must be divided upon divorce in a manner that is deemed just and right (or fair).

Conservatorship

Conservatorship is the term Texas uses for child custody, and joint managing conservators share the right and responsibilities of raising their shared children. The primary conservator refers to the parent with whom the children live the majority of the time, and a non-primary conservator refers to the parent with a visitation schedule. The presumption in Texas is that it is in the best interests of the children if both of their parents continue to play active roles in their lives and share conservatorship when possible.

Child Support

While there are state calculation guidelines that determine child support payments, the court has the discretion to factor in extenuating circumstances and to order payments that are outside these guidelines.
Spousal Maintenance – In Texas, alimony is called spousal maintenance, and it refers to payments made by a spouse with greater financial means to a spouse with fewer financial means as a mechanism to help balance this financial discrepancy post-divorce.

If you and your spouse can find middle ground on each and every one of these important issues – however you manage it – your divorce will remain uncontested. If you get stuck on even one of these issues and must turn to the court for answers, your divorce is contested. The goal is obviously not to cede decision-making power to the court, but sometimes it simply can’t be avoided, and you need the right attorney representing your rights and interests in court.