Relevant questions to ask a family law attorney in Texas

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Houston Divorce Lawyer: In doing some recent consultations with potential clients of the Law Office of Bryan Fagan, PLLC I have encountered some topics that I don’t think I have ever written about on this blog. With that said, I would like to get after a few of these topics today so that they can be addressed and hopefully help some of you out as far as increasing the amount of information that you have access to.

If you would like some specific advice in regard to something that we discussed here today please do not hesitate to contact the Law Office of Bryan Fagan, PLLC. We offer free of charge consultations six days a week with one of our licensed family law attorneys. It is there that you can get individualized, specifically tailored advice for your situation.

Could your marriage actually be invalid without you knowing it?

Divorce Lawyer in Houston: I had a woman come in to our office recently and she told me a story very similar to what I am about to lay out for all of you. She began by telling me that she was living with her husband for years before she found out (not from her spouse but from another source) that her husband had been married before to another woman. This in and of itself is unfortunately more common than you would think. Sometimes people do not feel comfortable disclosing this sort of information about their past. In some instances people don’t think it is actually relevant at all.

What I learned from this person is that after she confronted her husband about the prior marriage he fessed up and told her that he did not think it was relevant because the woman was now deceased. Therefore, he never pressed forward with divorce plans that he had due to their being unnecessary. There was nothing to worry about, he told her. Famous last words, if I’ve ever heard them.

The story took a fateful turn when this woman did some research and found out that the supposedly deceased ex-wife of her husband was very much alive. She was living in Houston but had never contacted her husband nor moved toward getting a divorce from him. The husband was understandably surprised by all this (from what she told me). All three were facing a bit of an issue now that the husband in this story had two wives.

Bigamy is illegal but a second marriage may bestow benefits upon the putative spouse

Divorce Attorney Houston: If you are already married you cannot marry a second (or third person). That is called bigamy and is against the law in Texas and every other state in the country. I had to tell this potential client who had come to talk to me that her marriage was invalid. However, she may still be in a positive to collect benefits of the marriage based on her having believed that she was validly married to her husband.

She and her “husband” had been married in a civil ceremony that was just like any of the weddings that you and I have been to in our lives. Since the potential client of ours had reasonably believed that she was married in a valid ceremony she may still be able to receive proceeds of a life insurance policy should her “husband” pass away or be listed as a covered person under his health insurance as his “wife”.

Her next question had to do with whether or not a divorce was necessary if she did not want to be married to her spouse. After all- they had lived together for years with him keeping a major secret from her. She felt like she could no longer trust him and wanted out of the marriage.

Her thought (a reasonable one, at that) was that she would not need to get a divorce because if her marriage was not valid in the first place a divorce wouldn’t be necessary. I had to tell her that it is possible that because the length of their marriage was pretty substantial that it would not surprise me if a judge would require them to get a divorce based on a refusal to declare the marriage invalid.

At the end of the meeting I told her that if she wanted to get a divorce from this man she would likely need to file for divorce, have her “spouse” served with the paperwork and then have a hearing on the matter to determine how the judge would allow them to proceed. The attorneys on both sides could present arguments to the judge and from there a judge would give them his or her pronouncement. It may seem like this is a lot of trouble for a marriage that was invalid from the start, but the key point here is that you cannot make any assumptions when it comes to marriage and the laws that institutionalize it.

Premarital agreements- what are they exactly and is one right for you?

Houston Divorce Lawyers: With some regularity I have received questions regarding premarital or prenuptial agreements. It is probably because the word is used so much in popular culture that the concept of a premarital agreement has begun to spread throughout our society.

A premarital agreement is basically a contract that two spouses can enter into before they get married. That premarital agreement defines the rights of each party as they pertain to property and spousal maintenance.

People enter into premarital agreements in order to define expectations for the marriage in regard to some pretty important topics related to finances and property. In that way there is no question as to how much money one spouse will pay to the other in the event of a divorce as far as spousal maintenance is concerned, for example.

Premarital agreements also allow parties to declare property either community or separate property in ways that a judge and the laws of the State of Texas may not do. Also, suppose that you have a small business that takes on a lot of debt annually and pays it off in the coming years. If you and your spouse are concerned about the risks that this presents to your spouse, you all can enter into a premarital agreement that specifically names this debt as a separate debt of yours should a divorce be necessary for you all.

Interested in knowing what the “wealthier” spouse has to gain from signing a premarital agreement? Stay tuned to our blog and you can learn this tomorrow

Family Law Attorney Houston: We will pick up tomorrow where we left off in today’s blog post by discussing premarital agreements. If you are marrying a person with a high amount of wealth, or you yourself are a wealthy person you may be interested in learning the benefits that a “wealthy” spouse-to-be has from signing to a premarital agreement ... Continue Reading