Owings Mills and Pikesville Divorce Lawyer
Alimony, complex financial disclosure and custody for northwestern Baltimore County families.
Owings Mills and Pikesville sit in northwestern Baltimore County along the I-795 and Reisterstown Road corridor. Cases from this area often combine substantial marital assets with a genuine dispute about support, which means both the property side and the income side of the case need attention.
Alimony
Alimony in Maryland is not automatic and there is no formula. A court weighs a statutory list of factors including the ability of the party seeking support to become self supporting, the time needed for education or training, the standard of living established during the marriage, the duration of the marriage, the contributions of each spouse, the circumstances that contributed to the estrangement, age and health, and the paying spouse’s ability to meet their own needs.
Most awards are rehabilitative, meaning they run for a defined period. Indefinite alimony is limited to narrow circumstances: where the recipient cannot reasonably be expected to become self supporting due to age, illness, infirmity or disability, or where even after maximum reasonable progress the two standards of living would be unconscionably disparate. See alimony and spousal support.
Financial complexity
Where a spouse owns a business or professional practice, or where compensation includes bonuses, equity or deferred elements, establishing income for support purposes is a separate exercise from reading a tax return. Reported taxable income and actual available income frequently differ.
Establishing the real picture is a discovery exercise, and in complex matters valuation is performed by independent outside professionals retained for the case. See high asset and business owner divorce.
Property
The court identifies and values marital property and then decides whether a monetary award is equitable. Premarital assets, inheritances and gifts can remain non-marital, but only if they can be traced, and years of commingling frequently defeat that. See property and debt division.
Children
Custody turns on the best interests of the child, and Maryland separates decision making authority from the residential schedule. Parenting plans that address holidays, travel, transportation, communication and a dispute resolution method tend to hold up far better than those that only set a weekly rotation. Baltimore County generally requires parents in contested custody cases to complete a six hour online co-parenting class before mediation.
See custody, parenting plans and visitation and child custody.
Access to the Towson office and the courthouse
Owings Mills and Pikesville cases are filed at the Circuit Court for Baltimore County, 401 Bosley Avenue in Towson, accessible via the Beltway. Our office is on Kenilworth Drive in Towson, and many court conferences are now conducted by video.
Related pages
Official resources
- Baltimore County Circuit Court, family law services
- Maryland Courts, divorce
- Maryland Parenting Plan Tool
Talk with a Towson family law attorney
Every divorce and custody matter turns on its own facts. The Law Office of Thomas K. Mallon, LLC offers a free consultation so you can get straight answers about your situation before you decide what to do next.
Call (410) 847-9075 or request a consultation online. The office is at 1107 Kenilworth Drive, Suite 305, Towson, MD 21204.
This page provides general information about Maryland law. It is not legal advice, and reading it does not create an attorney-client relationship. Maryland law changes, and how it applies depends on the facts of your case.