Divorce Litigator talks about Alimony

Jeff Cleghorn, a partner at Kitchens, New & Cleghorn, LLC (http://www.gadivorcelitigators.com) talks about Alimony

Transcript:

Georgia law allows for an ex-spouse to receive alimony payments from her or his former spouse under certain circumstances. Alimony is not as popular a remedy of courts as it was thirty or forty years ago given that increasingly, both the moms and the dads are oftentimes in the work force already working to provide financially for the family. However, in events and circumstances where a economically dependent spouse needs the financial support for a period of time from their former spouse in the form of alimony, Georgia courts do have the authority under some circumstances to award alimony. Factors that are most commonly looked at by courts are: What is the financial need of the dependent spouse or ex-spouse? What is the financial capacity of the other ex-spouse to provide some amount of alimony for some amount of time? What has been the standard of living that the parties enjoyed during the marriage, particularly during the latter part of the marriage? There are some additional factors as well, but those are the larger ones. Alimony is one of the most sensitive and controversial topics in family law because it is always the case, in my experiences, that the payor of alimony does not want to pay and certainly does not want to pay for as long or pay as much as the hoped for recipient of alimony would like. So it is a difficult area of family law, but one that is very important.