Spousal support would also be taken into account and the party making the most money would probably have to pay a certain amount to the party who was not making any money or who was making very little money. California likes its people to be self-supporting, so if one spouse was not working, then that spouse would generally be required to look for a job which is what would happen at a RFO hearing date.

The parties would then be able to have a full trial on spousal support, child support and child custody issues at the trial date further down the road, although a RFO generally lets people get into court so the court could make some temporary decisions regarding child support, spousal support, child custody issues and visitation.

How Does Alimony Work?

Generally speaking, in California, there would be the California Family Code 4320 factors and a group of other factors to go through, where the court would look at the age of the parties, whether the parties were near retirement age or if they were already retired, could they work anymore and the health of the parties.

If somebody was disabled, then they would want the other spouse to take care of the disabled spouse, although generally, in a typical case, if one parent or if one spouse was the breadwinner and the another spouse was the stay-at-home spouse, then the stay-at-home spouse could come into court and ask for spousal support from the spouse who was making the money and the person who was working should expect to pay something in spousal support.

The person paying the spousal support would want the other side to start looking for a job, so the court would give an advisement to the spouse receiving support that they would need to become self-supporting, so although they would be getting money, they would need to look for a job and take steps to get a job.

One of the general approaches for spousal support is that the court will look at the income of both spouses and make a determination regarding how much the person who was making more money, should pay the other spouse, which is just a general term and a general way to look at it, but that is what they would look at.

How is Spousal Support Calculated?

We should be able to figure out how the case should go once we know what the property issues, the incomes and the circumstances of the marriage are, and whether spouse A or spouse B, should get the spousal support, if any. We would need to see if it was a long term marriage of 10 years or more, because that would have the potential for lifetime spousal support and it would definitely be spousal support for a very long time.

If the marriage lasted less than 10 years, then generally speaking it would last for half of the length of the marriage, so the spousal support could be 4 years for a marriage that lasted 8 years. Generally speaking, the spouse who would be receiving spousal support would need to look for a job during that time period.

Knowing those facts and knowing how to settle a case is very important, because if somebody was entitled to spousal support, then a good lawyer would know how to give bad news to the client so they could figure out what their next move would be in the case. We might even try to avoid court because the person would have to pay regardless, divide up the property and equalize everything.

Should Someone Going Through A Divorce Plan Ahead And Figure Out Where They Would Live And Their Budget?

Definitely, and it would be even better if they could plan it out because it could sometimes cause problems if they later did not have the time to plan it out. It would generally be an ideal situation if the parties could agree to live with one another, because then they could both live in the same house and save costs. The issues of spousal support and child support generally come into play once they move out of the house so the court would need to address the issue if the parties could not work out their own agreement.

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