Articles Posted in Kaufman County Divorce Lawyer

There are a variety of personal injury claims, and the attorneys at Guest & Gray, P.C. on Forney, Texas have experience handling all types of personal injury claims. Our personal injury attorneys have over 40 combined years of experience in personal injury litigation. Below are a few examples of personal injury claims as well as a few common questions asked in regard to personal injury litigation.  Call (972)564-4644 to set up an initial consultation with one of our personal injury attorneys.

Motorcycle riders get a bad rap for recklessness and too often get blamed for the actions of others when a motorcycle accident occurs.

When products we don’t operate properly and cause harm, the manufacturer may have products liability.

Guest & Gray, P.C. is the largest law firm in Kaufman County and has a wealth of experience with personal injury cases. Our personal injury attorneys have more than a combined 40 years of experience litigating personal injury claims. And our personal injury attorneys have secured multiple settlements in excess of $1,000,000. If you or a loved one has been injured, our experience personal injury attorneys would be happy to meet with you during an initial consultation to discuss your case, the options available to you and how we can help. Below are some links to our discussion of some specific types of personal injury claims.

The difference between assault and battery might surprise you, and assault and battery aren’t just criminal matters. A victim of either may have a personal injury claim.

If you’ve been injured in a  bicycle accident, this post will tell you what kind of damages may be available to you.

The Fair Debt Collection Practices Act

The debt defense team at Guest & Gray in Forney has helped many clients defend lawsuits brought against them by debt collectors. In 2013, we saved our clients over $150,000 via settlements and dismissals. But there are times when it’s the client that should be bringing the lawsuit against the debt collector and not the other way around.

If you’ve ever had a debt collector after you, you know how aggressive they can be. And that aggression often crosses the line. Thankfully, the law provides consumers some protection from over-aggressive debt collectors. Both Texas law and Federal law have a fair debt collection practices act in place to give consumers the ability to sue these debt collectors when they cross the line.

Credit card companies are the absolute worst. Wait, I take that back. The people that buy debt accounts from credit card companies are the absolute worst. You may have received calls and letters from these third parties debt collectors or the law firms that represent them. The three biggest third party debt collectors are Cach, LLC, Midalnd Funding LLC and LVNV Funding LLC. We have experience dealing with these companies, so if you’ve been called, received a letter or been sued by any of these companies or other third party debt collectors, give us a call to speak with a Forney Debt Defense Attorney.

Our experience defending debt lawsuits.

As mentioned, our firm has a lot of experience defending lawsuits filed by these debt collectors. In the last year alone, we saved our clients a combined $188,170.50 through settlements and dismissals. We currently have many other pending cases in which we’re defending lawsuits filed by these debt collectors.

Prenup is a bad word for couples who want to get married. A prenup implies that the marriage might not last forever, and that’s something that most people about to get married simply don’t want to consider. But prenups could potentially help your marriage, and prenups will certainly make your life easier if, heaven forbid, things don’t work out.

How can a prenup help my marriage?

One the biggest personal responsibilities in life is budgeting. Managing your money can be difficult enough on your own, but when you add another person to the equation, it can be even tougher. A prenup is a tool you can use to help you in budgeting. For example, the parties can agree to maintain separate banking accounts but to also maintain a joint banking account for certain expenses.

Health Insurance for Children in Custody Cases

In a case involving child custody, child support isn’t the only monetary obligation. The law also requires that health insurance be secured for the children. The most common way for this obligation to be fulfilled is for the non-custodial parent to provide health insurance for the child(ren) through the insurance available to them through work. The non-custodial parent can also reimburse the custodial parent monthly if insurance for the children is obtained via the custodial parent’s employment. If neither party has access to health insurance through their employment, the court may order a private health insurance policy to be obtained. It’s also possible in some instances to obtain insurance for the child(ren) through a government program.

The obligation to pay for medical support is an obligation in addition to a child support obligation. The amount you pay for medical support cannot be deducted from the amount of child support owed. And this obligation can be enforced through withholding from earnings just as child support can.

If you’ve lost your job and need your child support lowered, I can help you through the process. We get many Kaufman county residents in our office with this very same problem, and we have helped many get their child support lowered. I would like to sit down with you and discuss your specific situation, so please call my office at (972) 564-4644 to set up a confidential consultation with me, Brett Talley, your Kaufman County Family Lawyer.

In order to lower child support, a petition to modify child support must be filed with the court. To oversimplify, you can file such a petition if

  1. It has been three years since the previous order, or

If you live in Crandall and need help with a divorce, I can help you through the process. I understand this can be a difficult experience in many ways, emotionally, mentally and financially.  But as your Crandall Texas divorce lawyer, it’s my job to make the process as hassle-free as possible for you and to make sure you get what you need and are entitled to out of the divorce process. I practice primarily in Kaufman county and am familiar with the system there, the judges, and many of the attorneys who could be hired by your spouse.

A divorce always starts with one spouse filing a petition for divorce. Once the petition has been filed, the other spouse must be served with the papers. Once that has been done, a temporary orders hearing is often the first major step in the divorce process. Temporary orders are sometimes necessary to determine what will happen while the divorce is pending. For example, if you have children, it will need to be decided who the kids will live with primarily during the divorce and when the other spouse will have visitation. And it usually needs to be decided who will be the spouse to have exclusive use of the marital home. Who will pay certain bills? Who will drive what car? These are a few of the common questions addressed through temporary orders.

From there, it’s simply a process of trying to decide how to finalize the divorce. The three main issues that come up in divorce are children, assets and debts. These issues can frequently be resolved by the parties outside the courtroom. There are several advantages to settling outside of court. First of all, you and your spouse get to decide what it best for you and your kids instead of leaving it up to a judge who doesn’t know you from Adam (or Eve). Second, the sooner an agreement can be reached, the sooner you can stop paying attorneys to try and resolve your case. And if an agreement can’t be reached through an informal process, there are tools such as mediation to help you come to an agreement. Mediation is a process in which an uninvolved third party speaks to each party individually and tries to help them work towards a resolution. In my experience, this is a highly effective tool.

Guest & Gray has offices in Rockwall, Forney and Kaufman and serves family law clients in counties all over the Metroplex like Kaufman, Rockwall, Hunt, Ellis, Van Zandt, Smith, Dallas, Collin, Denton, and Henderson. We have experience with a wide variety of family law issues including but not limited to divorce, child custody, child support, paternity, adoptions, grandparent rights, family violence and child custody and support modifications.

The most common family law issue is divorce. This can be a difficult experience and confusing process. If you have questions about how to start the process of getting a divorce, what the process of getting a divorce is like, and the possible outcomes for a divorce, please read this post that discusses each of those questions: Kaufman County Divorce. One part of the divorce process is the division of property. In Texas, there are two kinds of property in a divorce, separate and community property. For an explanation of separate property, please read this post: Kaufman County Separate Property.

One of the big stages of a divorce proceeding is the hearing for temporary orders that usually takes place within two to three weeks after filing for divorce. As the word temporary belies, these orders are not permanent but are designed to set a status quo while the divorce is pending. Check out this post to get a better understanding about this step in the divorce process: Kaufman County Temporary Orders.

Most married couples go through the formalities associated with marriage. They get a marriage license, they have a ceremony, and the person who officiates the ceremony signs the license, which then makes the marriage official. But other people choose not to go through that process, and it’s not necessary to go through that process to be considered married in Texas. Texas also recognizes informal marriages which are more commonly known as common law marriages. As a guy who has been dating a woman for a year and a half, I would certainly like to go the common law route and avoid the the cost associated with all the formalities. But I doubt I’ll be so lucky.

The problem with common law marriages is that it is often difficult to prove their existence. With formal marriages there is paper trail, and there are witnesses from the ceremony. There’s never a doubt about whether a marriage occurred in those instances. But for those who are informally married, it can be difficult to prove there was actually a marriage. Why does it matter that you be able to prove a common law marriage? Unless you can do so, you can’t get a divorce. This can be a problem for people who are in a relationship that they consider to be a marriage because in the event that the relationship ends, the parties are not entitled to half of the marital estate unless they can actually prove that there was a marital estate. This can result in parties losing out on assets that they would be entitled to in a divorce action such as home equity, retirement accounts and more.

Texas law has three requirements for proving a common law marriage.

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