Santa Clara County Divorce Attorney Blog

Valentine's Day may have become a kind of Hallmark holiday, but there is something about it. The mood that Saint Valentine and his cupid bring about on Feb. 14 is romantic. In fact, it is one day of the year in which most engagement proposals are made. In fact, according to an American Express survey, an estimated four million people said "Yes" this past Tuesday.

The whirlwind of the evening still lingers for those couples, but now the wedding planning begins. When San Jose couples make their wedding checklists, they should seriously consider including a prenuptial agreement as one of those items.

Deciding to get a divorce is only the first step of the divorce process. Divorces divide assets, determine future support and determine custody issues between the divorcing parties. Divorce settlements are determined by state specific laws and California has its own set of divorce laws. A common misimpression is that divorce laws provide parties with perfectly equal property division, and while California is a community property state -- which gives each party a 50/50 interest in assets -- there are some instances where property could be considered separate and not subject to equal division.

The next step in the divorce process is the settlement negotiation between the parties. In California, you need to be knowledgeable and prepared for the settlement negotiation process. There are several ways you can prepare yourself for this negotiation process.

The housing crisis has complicated more than just home sales and mortgages in California. The effects of the housing crisis have made their way into divorce and attorneys across the nation are finding new complexity when it comes to property division.

Only years ago it was fairly easy to sell your home and walk away without a loss or even with a profit. That is not as true today with more and more homes falling underwater - an owner owing more on their mortgage then the home is worth.

Frank McCourt has endured a lot during recent years. Once the proud owner of a thriving MLB franchise in California, he weathered a messy and extremely expensive divorce that was a factor in losing ownership of the team. The proceedings in that case showed that things could have gone much more smoothly for him.

When McCourt and his then wife bought the Los Angeles Dodgers in 2004, they sought out legal counsel to protect their marital assets. The acquisition was heavily financed with debt, and the McCourts wanted to structure the deal in a way that would insulate them from financial liabilities and the risks of owning a baseball team.