Dakota County Law Blog

A family law blog with real world legal advice

Premarital counseling teaches many engaged couples how to avoid the types of negative behaviors and attitudes that often derail intimate relationships. However, if you havent gone through this type of therapy before marriage, its important to learn more about the most common reasons for divorce. Once you gain this knowledge, you and your spouse can…

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While obtaining a divorce, most people are concerned with how much money they’ll have when they reach a final settlement. Although some couples must struggle to keep their most basic bills paid during this time period, others have far different concerns. In fact, a growing number of attorneys for America’s multi-millionaire and billionaire couples must…

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When couples filing for divorce have dependent children, their key concerns normally revolve around child custody issues and receiving a fair and equitable division of all marital assets. Of course, spousal support is also a key issue – although it’s now often handled quite differently than it was long ago – when far fewer women…

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If you’ve taken the time and money to prepare a Minnesota prenuptial agreement, you want to make sure it lasts. After all, why go through the hassle of laying out your plans on paper just to have the prenup tossed out of court. To ensure that your prenuptial agreement will withstand the test of time,…

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This post will discuss jurisdiction issues in Minnesota family law.  In Minnesota, like many other states, there is a law called the Uniform Child Custody Jurisdiction Act (UCCJEA). The UCCJEA and Jurisdiction in Minnesota The UCCJEA is a federal law that has been, almost uniformly, adopted by every state in the United States.  The law governs what…

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How do courts decide child custody in a Minnesota divorce?  The standard for determining child custody in a Minnesota divorce is based on the “best interests” of the child standard. Minnesota child custody law | the “best interest” standard The law in Minnesota provides that the “best interest of the child” standard is many factored and no…

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I have many conversations with clients about how marital retirement assets are valued and divided. The law, for all intents and purposes, divides marital retirement assets at the date of marriage and then again at a valuation date during a Minnesota divorce action. The valuation date will not start until a petition for dissolution of marriage and a summons…

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Although most people are not aware of it Minnesota law grants sole legal and physical custody to the mother of children who were born-out-of-wedlock. This means that fathers who have children with a woman they are not married to have inferior legal rights to their children because they are not married. This is often very difficult information for…

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