Asset Division

Along with the vitriol, quite often involved in parents disagreeing over the custody of their children, the division of community assets and debt can be equally contentious. Texas law provides for an equitable (Note: this does not necessarily exactly mean equal) division of community property and debts. Izzo & Associates is especially well equipped to aid our clients in locating, identifying, and valuing these assets and debts, as well as in developing a strategy necessary to negotiate their division. John Izzo’s experience as the managing director of an investment banking firm, as well as his role in developing an early form of business valuation software, serves our clients well.

While some of our clients come to us with an existing premarital or postnuptial agreement that mitigates the impact such concerns can have on divorce, most people have this burden to contend with in litigation. Assets that are acquired during your marriage, as well as debts incurred during your marriage, are subject to an equitable division in Texas. The court’s determination of what is “equitable” involves several factors that a judge must balance. One of our main jobs at Izzo & Associates is to assist our clients in characterizing these assets and debts. Dovetailing the interests of both parties is often a great aid in their division. Quite often, what is most important to one spouse is not as important to the other, and vice versa.

Note: It is highly important that you locate a Family Law Firm that has a wealth of experience involving both the characterization of assets as well as how such assets are valued and how they can be divided, such as businesses, retirement accounts, stock options or stock, and so on.

Izzo & Associates has established key contacts with real property, financial accounting, and business evaluators that can aid in this process. The key role that our firm can play in determining what assets and debts exist and exactly which of these are actually divisible under Texas law, depending on the size of your marital estate, involves two components:

  1. Your law firm must be adept at sending out proper discovery requests, whether they be personally to the opposing party and/or to gather information from other principals or entities, such as business records requests.
  2. As part of your specific case strategy, it is always best to work at settling all property issues to hopefully keep you out of court while standing ready to litigate key issues to preserve your most valued assets.

Unequal Division

Note: Fault in the breakup of your marriage might play into your result.

Your Family Law Attorney’s case strategy will be critical in this event. Texas law allows for a disproportionate share of assets to be awarded. The court can consider a long list of factors in making such a disproportionate disposition of your community estate, including fault by one spouse in the break-up of the marriage, fraud, and waste of community estates by one spouse, the benefits the innocent party would have received from the continuation of the marriage, the disparity in earning power, the spouses’ respective capacities, the nature of the property involved in the division, etc. If you would like additional information about protecting your assets in a divorce, please give us a call.

Discovery

Discovery is a necessary legal tool that Izzo & Associates can utilize to glean evidence needed to advance or complete our client’s cases involves conducting various forms of discovery. Our attorneys are adept at developing and sending out discovery requests, including:

  • Requests for the production of documents
  • Subpoenas for information from third parties
  • Interrogatories (written questions)
  • Depositions (questioning the opposing party in front of a court reporter under oath)
  • Business or medical record affidavits
  • Developing and sending out Requests for Admissions (requiring the opposing party to admit or deny specific facts for the record)

Conducting discovery can, in the appropriate circumstance, assist our clients in locating assets and debts and collecting proof of fault or fraud, for example. It should be noted that unless the above tools are necessary for your case, Izzo & Associates can conserve time and costs for our clients to accomplish a divorce that can be settled by other means.