Maryville Divorce Lawyers
Experienced Maryville divorce attorneys for family law issues in Tennessee
Divorces happen for many reasons. Many times, both spouses realize the marriage is over. While most divorces are emotionally upsetting, with time and explanation, most spouses recognize the need to resolve their divorce disputes and move forward. At LaFevor & Slaughter, our experienced Maryville divorce lawyers have helped numerous spouses protect their future by helping them understand their rights, develop financial and personal priorities, and protect themselves and their children through formal court orders. These orders include how marital property is divided, alimony rights, who has legal and physical custody of your children, and the amount of child support that is required to help your children thrive. We negotiate when your spouse is amicable and litigate when your spouse is being difficult.
How can our Maryville divorce lawyers help?
- How do your Maryville divorce lawyers help?
- What are the requirements for filing for divorce in Tennessee?
- What issues are resolved when I file for divorce in Maryville?
- What types of complex divorce cases do you handle in Maryville?
- Will I have to go to trial for my Maryville divorce?
- How long does the divorce process take in Maryville?
- Do you have a Maryville divorce attorney near me?
How do your Maryville divorce lawyers help?
Spouses enter marriage with the hope that their love will last forever. Unfortunately, many marriages end because the dreams of a happy life conflict with the reality of everyday life. The decision to end a marriage is often painful. Marriages end because spouses realize they have different goals. Some spouses grow with time; others don’t. Poor finances, other relationships, and a mountain of personal differences can cause a marriage to end.
At LaFevor & Slaughter, our family lawyers focus on helping spouses who realize that the anxiety of living apart is better than the pain of living together. We explain every aspect of the divorce process, starting with whether you can keep your home, what will happen to your business, retirement accounts, and other property division issues. We help you understand what legal steps are required to protect your children and provide for their future. Our Maryville divorce lawyers help spouses understand whether they might be entitled to spousal support.
We help you understand your legal, financial, and personal rights so you can move forward with confidence into the next stage of your life.
What are the requirements for filing for divorce in Tennessee?
Spouses who divorce in Tennessee either file for a no-fault divorce or a divorce based on some type of fault “ground.”
The grounds for divorce in Tennessee include:
- The inability to have children
- Bigamy
- Adultery
- Desertion for one year or more
- A criminal conviction
- An attempt to end the life of the other spouse
- A pregnancy at the time of the marriage by someone other than the husband that the husband didn’t know about
- Habitual drunkenness or use of narcotics that occurred after marriage
- Cruel and inhumane treatment
- Intolerable indignities
- Abandonment of the spouse
No-fault grounds generally consist of “irreconcilable differences” or living apart for two years or more in separate homes and not cohabiting as man and wife during those two years, provided there are no minor children.
One of our skills as your Maryville divorce attorneys is to help persuade your spouse’s lawyer to convince his/her client that you and your spouse simply can’t get along. Your spouse does need to agree that your differences are irreconcilable.
If your spouse won’t agree to an irreconcilable divorce and you haven’t been separated for two years, we’re skilled at showing that one of the grounds for divorce applies to your marriage.
What issues are resolved when I file for divorce in Maryville?
The following family law issues need to be resolved before your divorce becomes final:
Property division
The marital property needs to be identified and valued. Marital property includes the assets you and your spouse acquired while you were married. Marital property includes your home, bank accounts, cars, furniture, and other tangible assets. Marital property also includes each spouse’s interest in stocks, businesses, pensions, and many other financial assets. The debts of the spouses also need to be reviewed, starting with the mortgage on a home. Marital property may also include your pets.
Marital property is divided equitably. While the starting point is a 50-50 split, many factors can shift the split so one spouse gets more than half. Our Maryville family lawyers help you prioritize the assets you really want and then arrange for you to trade off the assets you don’t desire as much.
Custody
Our Maryville divorce lawyers help spouses resolve custody issues through negotiation, mediation, or the collaborative divorce process where possible so that your children don’t have to testify in court. We’ll prepare you and your children if a court case is required.
In Tennessee, there are two types of custody issues that need to be resolved:
- Legal custody. This type of custody determines which parent(s) decide issues involving the health, education, religion, and welfare of your child.
- Physical custody. This type of custody determines where your child/children will live each day of the year, the responsibilities of the parent who has physical custody, how the children are transferred, and the visitation rights of the other parent.
Both legal and physical custody can belong solely to one parent or can be held jointly by both parents.
Child support
Child support is the amount that the parent who has less physical custody time pays the other parent for your child’s needs, including a home, food, clothing, medical care, schooling, and other expenses. Our Maryville divorce lawyers are skilled at obtaining just child support orders based on the ability of the parents to pay for their child’s needs.
Alimony
There are different types of alimony, which can be rather confusing. At LaFevor & Slaughter, we’ll help you ensure the right type of alimony is awarded for your situation. Generally, the different types are used to:
- Help the spouses transition to single life
- Help even out the distribution of the marital property
- Help level the financial earning capacity of each spouse when one spouse earns a nice living at Denso, Blunt Memorial Hospital, or another business, and the other doesn’t earn a comparable living
- Help ensure that spouses who have been married for a long time, or if one spouse is not able to earn a living due to a disability or other causes, obtain long-term alimony.
We fight for spouses seeking alimony and spouses who may be ordered to pay alimony.
We also seek temporary alimony (called alimony pendente lite) during the divorce so one spouse can’t use their financial advantage to pressure the other spouse.
What types of complex divorce cases do you handle in Maryville?
Our Maryville divorce lawyers handle difficult divorces and non-standard divorces. We represent spouses who can agree to everything and spouses who can’t agree to what day of the week it is. We represent spouses with significant assets and spouses who have very little.
At LaFevor and Slaughter, some of the complex cases we handle include:
High-asset divorces
Our family lawyers represent spouses where one or both spouses have businesses, retirement accounts, assets in other states or overseas, stocks, bonds, trusts, patents and other types of intellectual property, inheritances, and other significant assets.
We’re skilled at identifying these assets. We work with financial professionals who can place a true value on these assets. Our lawyers help you prioritize which assets you want to keep and which assets you are willing to trade to keep the assets you most desire.
High-conflict divorces
Our Maryville divorce lawyers are skilled at understanding when cases can be resolved before trial and when you need to present your divorce issues in front of a Blount County family law judge. We’ll prepare you for the questions your spouse’s lawyer will likely ask.
We’re also skilled at finding ways to resolve differences short of a full-scale trial, such as using the mediation or collaborative divorce process and emphasizing that contentious divorces hurt children the most.
Military divorces
Many residents of Maryville serve in the US military or they’re married to someone in the military. We’ll explain the unique laws and practical requirements involved with obtaining a divorce, determining child custody and visitation matters, and all other divorce issues. In gratitude to our men and women in uniform, LaFevor & Slaughter offers discounts for active duty military.
Will I have to go to trial for my Maryville divorce?
We understand that divorce can be expensive, traumatic, and time-consuming. We work hard to negotiate agreements with your spouse. Often, we use the mediation or collaborative divorce process, which is a pre-trial friendlier way of resolving disputes that is less intense, usually less costly, and lets the parties determine when discussions between the spouses take place.
Most divorces ultimately settle before trial. When your spouse cannot be reasonable, we have the experience and strong advocacy skills necessary to try your case before a family law judge.
How long does the divorce process take in Maryville?
The time to resolve your divorce normally depends on whether you have children, the assets and income of the spouses/parents, and how willing or unwilling your spouse or a co-parent is willing to negotiate. Our Maryville family lawyers seek temporary orders when disputes look like they may take a while to resolve.
The time to formally resolve divorces can take a few weeks or a few months, depending on how much both spouses want to resolve their disputes. Some disputes can take much longer. Child custody and child support orders may be subject to modification until your child/children are adults. Alimony disputes may also be subject to modification during your lifetime or until you remarry.
Do you have a Maryville divorce attorney near me?
At LaFevor & Slaughter, our Maryville divorce lawyers meet clients at our office located at 317 Ellis Ave., Suite 317. If necessary, our attorneys will meet you through a video conference. Our team understands the emotional trauma of divorce. We’ll help you move forward by explaining step-by-step how the divorce process works and asserting all your rights and the rights of your children.
Talk with an experienced Maryville divorce attorney today
Protecting yourself and your children requires understanding your rights, persistence, and knowing when you can negotiate with your spouse and when you need to be prepared to assert your rights in family court. At LaFevor & Slaughter, we’ve helped many spouses minimize the emotional anxiety of divorce and maximize their financial and personal security. We work to ensure your home and assets are as comparable to your life before your divorce as possible. We’re skilled at helping children focus on their school, friends, and the family members who love them – and not the conflict of a divorce. To schedule a consultation, please call our Maryville divorce lawyers or fill out our contact form today.