Author Archives: Jay Butchko
Speak Up If You Cannot Pay Your Court-Ordered Child Support
Child support obligations are serious business. If the court orders you to pay child support, you cannot simply ignore the court order and wait for the statute of limitations to run out. Some people keep making payments on their child support obligations until the children are well into their 20s; the idea is that,… Read More »
Can The Court Decide How Much You Should Earn And How Much You Should Spend?
Imputed income is often a contentious issue in divorce cases. To determine alimony or child support obligations, the court considers each party’s income, as proven by financial disclosures the parties submit to the court. Usually, the court bases the alimony amount on the income stated by each spouse. Sometimes, though, you can argue that… Read More »
Understanding Post-Minority Support In Alabama Law
Many divorced parents look forward to the day that their child graduates from high school, because it means no more arguing with their ex-spouse over child support payments. Once your children reach adulthood, your long, painful breakup with your ex is finally over. Of course, everyone knows that young adults do not become financially… Read More »
Covenant Marriage And Alabama Divorce
Like most other states, Alabama law allows for no fault divorce. This means that married couples in Alabama can request that the court dissolve their marriages simply because both spouses wish to dissolve the marriage. The parties must only acknowledge that the parties have irreconcilable differences and that the marriage is irretrievably broken. From… Read More »
Why Is High Net Worth Divorce So Much More Complicated?
You and your spouse took a vow to stay together for richer or for poorer, but if that doesn’t work out, then getting divorced when you are poor is noticeably easier than getting divorced when you are rich. All the comforts that you enjoyed during your marriage become an albatross around your neck when… Read More »
Is 50/50 Timesharing Overrated?
Across the border in Florida, a new law recently went into effect, whereby the family law courts must assume that 50/50 timesharing is in the child’s best interest; in cases where courts decide about parenting plans because the parents are at an impasse, the courts must take the equal division of parenting time as… Read More »
What Happens If You Change Your Mind About Divorce?
If you talk to any couple that has been together for decades, they will tell you that there were periods of conflict in their marriage and issues that were not easily resolved. Shortly after celebrating her 30th wedding anniversary, former First Lady Michelle Obama told an interviewer that 20 of her 30 years of… Read More »
On Back-To-School Co-Parenting Stress
The countdown to the school year is plenty stressful for kids. They are in no hurry to give up their late nights and lazy mornings, nor their aquatic lifestyle and virtually unlimited screen time. Riding the school bus at 8:00 in the morning is a bummer compared to driving a golf cart at 10:00… Read More »
Are Insurance Payouts Marital Property?
With only a few exceptions, all of the money that either spouse receives during the marriage is marital property, which means that it is subject to equitable distribution in divorce. If that were not the case, then divorce would leave stay-at-home mothers destitute and they would reenter the workforce after divorce starting from zero,… Read More »
Residency Requirements For Alabama Divorce
When an employer offers you an employment contract, you keep rereading the line that tells you how much your new job will pay, but you may ignore the most important sentence of the contract, namely the dispute resolution clause. It should say, “The courts of Alabama have jurisdiction to rule on disputes arising from… Read More »