“If you can’t explain it simply, you don’t understand it well enough.” – Albert Einstein.
Big changes in life can often be a trigger for a divorce. There are fewer bigger changes than sustaining a significant personal injury and then receiving a subsequent settlement or award for that personal injury. Often, this change in physical and financial circumstances can make a marriage unsustainable and, thus, subject to divorce. What is
Legal separation is a good scenario for conflict: not quite married, not quite divorced. Not surprisingly, people are always getting legally separated on television because it adds conflict to a storyline. This leads the American public to believe that legal separation is common. Legal separation is not common in Illinois, however. In the Illinois statute,
Most people don’t know much about divorce before entering the divorce process. They hear from friends and relatives’ bits and pieces, almost always scandalous and dispiriting. Then the rest they pick up from television and movies such as the ability to disqualify a divorce lawyer from talking to your spouse by merely consulting with the
Children are expensive. Children need to be fed, clothed and cared for when they’re babies. Then when children get into school, they inevitably get into activities that require some kind of financial contribution from the parents. When the parents of the children are divorced, there must be some kind of arrangement made to pay for
The whole point of going to court in a divorce is to get a ruling from the court. If you and your spouse cannot agree on an issue in your divorce, either of you may ask the court to make the decision based on the facts of your divorce case as applied to Illinois law.
This past week, I spent 8 days in Houston, Texas, at the annual National Family Law Trial Institute‘s Regular Program. This was not a conference where you attend a few lectures and then spend the rest of the day at happy hour. This conference was 9 to 10 hours a day of lectures and exercises
Whenever money is being transferred there is a possibility of taxes. Perhaps there is no bigger transfer than the transfer of assets and income during divorce. Therefore, taxes and divorce must be considered together when negotiating and finalizing a dissolution of marriage. Tax Implications of Transferring Property In Divorce Any transfer of property pursuant to
I am often called on by my fellow lawyers who practice immigration law to enter an order in the family law or domestic relations courts of Cook County. A family law lawyer can often be the only one to establish the “findings of fact” necessary to grant immigrants certain statuses which allow them remain in
Divorces are difficult wherever they are. An Illinois divorce with a child or with children is even more difficult. I often tell clients who have no children or have grown children, “your divorce is automatically 75% easier than the average divorce with a child.” Is It My Child? In Illinois, all children born to a
A married couple may be from a foreign country, have a foreign vacation property or have diversified their investment portfolio by buying foreign property. Property is still property no matter where it is located. The question is “What happens to foreign property in divorce?” A property’s location outside of the United States may impact how
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