Spousal, Partner Support,
Alimony
Attorney Charina G. Rhone provides a free introductory telephone consultation. At Rhone Law, A.P.C., in Benicia, you will receive compassionate help to minimize traumatic emotional and financial suffering during this challenging time.
Charina assists in spousal support, partner support and alimony, and has legal expertise and courtroom litigation experience in Solano, Contra Costa, and Alameda counties.
You need the best lawyer for your highly charged family crisis, so that you can focus on building a bright future for you and your family. Talk to Charina about spousal support. She is a top-rated experienced family law attorney you can trust to protect your rights.
Understand Your Rights for
Spousal, Partner Support,
Alimony
When a couple legally separates or divorces, the court may order one spouse or domestic partner to pay the other a certain amount of monetary support each month. This is called “spousal support” for married couples and “partner support” in domestic partnerships. It is sometimes also called “alimony.”
● For temporary spousal or partner support, judges in many local courts generally use a formula to calculate the amount. Temporary spousal support reallocates the parties’ incomes to assist the lower-income-earning spouse’s financial adjustment during the divorce process.
● For marriages ten years or longer, the lower-income-earning spouse can also seek long-term post-judgment spousal support. Long-term post-judgment spousal support exists to assist the lower-income-earning spouse while he or she obtains additional education and/or gains additional training/experience in the workforce. Ultimately, the goal of the lower-income-earning spouse is to become self-supporting.
● For long-term post-judgment spousal support, the parties can negotiate the duration of support, the amount of monthly support, and whether certain triggering events can terminate support. If the parties are not able to come up with an agreement regarding long-term post-judgment spousal support, then the parties can seek court intervention and request a judge determine the monthly spousal support amount and the associated duration of the support. Unlike temporary spousal support, when a judge is considering long-term post-judgment spousal support, the judge will not use a formula to decide the spousal support figure. Rather, when a judge makes a long-term post-judgment spousal support order, the judge must consider the factors outlined in California Family Law Code Section 4320.
Understand The Factors for Long-Term
Post-Judgment Spousal Support
A judge may consider any or all of the following Family Law Code Section 4320 factors when assessing long-term post-judgment spousal support:
● Length of the marriage or domestic partnership;
● What each person needs based on the standard of living maintained during the marriage or domestic partnership;
● What each person pays or can pay, including earnings and earning capacity, to keep the standard of living maintained during the marriage or domestic partnership;
● Determining whether having a job would make it too hard to take care of the children;
● The age and health of both people;
● Debts and property ownership;
● Whether one spouse or domestic partner helped the other get an education, training, career, or professional license;
● The existence of domestic violence in the marriage or domestic partnership;
● Whether one spouse’s, or domestic partner’s, career was affected by unemployment or by taking care of the children or home;
● The taxable impact of spousal support. Starting January 2019, spousal support is no longer a taxable deduction to the person paying spousal support; nor is it taxable income to the recipient of spousal support. These laws have not yet been changed to recognize the taxable impact of spousal support for domestic partnerships.
The spousal or partner support order then becomes part of your final divorce or legal separation judgment.
