Small changes coming in April 2020 to ALL child support with potentially HUGE results! For all child support payors and recipients of child support, there are changes coming this April. The Superior Court sent out a notice to all employers last month that effective April 1, 2020 the monthly handling fee for the Clearinghouse will increase from $5.00 to $8.00 per month. This means that the handling fee for collecting and distributing monthly child support…

Spousal maintenance is probably one of the hardest areas to give advice in family law. Unlike child support, which can be mathematically calculated down to the penny, spousal maintenance is based on a number of factors and considerations, some certain and some subjective. The age of the parties, income differences, years of marriage, education, health of parties and lifestyle during marriage are some, but not all, of the factors that a judge would have to…

Close to half of the people in the United States who are 55 or older have failed to properly plan what is become of them or their estate if they are incapacitated or die. A recent study of 3,000 Americans 55 years of age or older by Merrill Lynch and AgeWave has found that nearly half (45%) have no Will and only 18% have a Will and the other two crucial documents that they and…

In December of 2106, the Arizona Supreme Court set up a Task Force to review and revise the family law rules used here in our state. After many months of hard work and several revisions, the new family law rules were approved and, for the most part, are applied in all family law cases after January 1, 2019. A recent article in the Arizona Attorney magazine noted: “The new rules are (completely) re-styled, (modestly) rearranged,…

Under the recently enacted changes to the Federal tax laws, spousal maintenance (formerly “alimony”) ordered by a dissolution (divorce) decree or agreement executed after Dec. 31, 2018, will no longer be deductible by the payer and will be tax free to the recipient. Apparently the supporters of this particular change in our historic handling of support payments believed that this concept was in some way a Federal subsidy supporting divorces. In the entire three plus…

For years, the biggest stumbling block to you family members to avoid a probate action in court after you pass was the family home. Or any real estate for that matter. However, since the relatively recent invention of a beneficiary deed, also ominously known as a transfer on death deed, there is now a legal and clever way to pass on your real estate to loved ones after death. And the best part, it allows…

In a recent article, Maricopa County Bar Association President Norma C. Izzo wrote the following comment: “The legal profession exists largely, if not exclusively, because of conflict. Unlike many other professions in which conflict may arise at intermittent times during one’s career, an attorney’s role is almost exclusively grounded in conflict – managing, mitigating, and overcoming conflicts.” While I do concur with these sentiments, I am quick to always remind clients and prospective clients that…