{"id":3027,"date":"2025-06-30T13:49:19","date_gmt":"2025-06-30T18:49:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.mcclure-lawgroup.com\/blog\/?p=3027"},"modified":"2025-06-30T13:49:19","modified_gmt":"2025-06-30T18:49:19","slug":"texas-supreme-court-says-courts-must-consider-childs-expenses-along-with-child-support-in-spousal-support-analysis","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.mcclure-lawgroup.com\/blog\/texas-supreme-court-says-courts-must-consider-childs-expenses-along-with-child-support-in-spousal-support-analysis\/","title":{"rendered":"Texas Supreme Court Says Courts Must Consider Child&#8217;s Expenses Along with Child Support in Spousal Support Analysis"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The Texas Family Code sets out the circumstances under which Texas spousal maintenance may be ordered. The court may order maintenance to a spouse only if they will lack sufficient property after the divorce to provide for their minimum reasonable needs.\u00a0 The spouse must also meet one of three conditions, either: (A) being unable to earn sufficient income to meet their minimum reasonable needs because of an incapacitating disability; (B) having been married for at least 10 years and lacking the ability to earn sufficient income; or (C) being the custodian of a child of the marriage who has a disability and requires substantial care and supervision that prevents the spouse from earning sufficient income. Tex. Fam. Code \u00a7 8.051. It is generally within the court\u2019s discretion to determine a spouse\u2019s \u201cminimum reasonable needs.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The Texas Supreme Court recently <a href=\"https:\/\/cases.justia.com\/texas\/supreme-court\/2025-23-0507.pdf?ts=1750428090\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">considered<\/a> the nature of evidence required to support a spousal maintenance award.<\/p>\n<p>The wife stopped working outside the home to become their primary caregiver to the parties\u2019 triplets.\u00a0 One of them was a \u201cmedically fragile child\u201d who needed extensive medical treatment.<\/p>\n<p> <a href=\"https:\/\/www.mcclure-lawgroup.com\/blog\/texas-supreme-court-says-courts-must-consider-childs-expenses-along-with-child-support-in-spousal-support-analysis\/#more-3027\" class=\"more-link\">Continue Reading \u203a<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Texas Family Code sets out the circumstances under which Texas spousal maintenance may be ordered. The court may order maintenance to a spouse only if they will lack sufficient property after the divorce to provide for their minimum reasonable needs.\u00a0 The spouse must also meet one of three conditions, either: (A) being unable to [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":13,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[123,23,4,126],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3027","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-alimony","category-child-custody","category-divorce","category-spousal-support"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.4 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Texas Supreme Court Says Courts Must Consider Child&#039;s Expenses Along with Child Support in Spousal Support Analysis &#8212; Texas Divorce Attorney Blog &#8212; June 30, 2025<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"The Texas Family Code sets out the circumstances under which Texas spousal maintenance may be ordered. The court may order maintenance to a spouse only if &#8212; June 30, 2025\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.mcclure-lawgroup.com\/blog\/texas-supreme-court-says-courts-must-consider-childs-expenses-along-with-child-support-in-spousal-support-analysis\/\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:title\" content=\"Texas Supreme Court Says Courts Must Consider Child&#039;s Expenses Along with Child Support in Spousal Support Analysis &#8212; Texas Divorce Attorney Blog &#8212; June 30, 2025\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:description\" content=\"The Texas Family Code sets out the circumstances under which Texas spousal maintenance may be ordered. The court may order maintenance to a spouse only if &#8212; June 30, 2025\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Francesca Blackard\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"6 minutes\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Texas Supreme Court Says Courts Must Consider Child's Expenses Along with Child Support in Spousal Support Analysis &#8212; Texas Divorce Attorney Blog &#8212; June 30, 2025","description":"The Texas Family Code sets out the circumstances under which Texas spousal maintenance may be ordered. The court may order maintenance to a spouse only if &#8212; June 30, 2025","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.mcclure-lawgroup.com\/blog\/texas-supreme-court-says-courts-must-consider-childs-expenses-along-with-child-support-in-spousal-support-analysis\/","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_title":"Texas Supreme Court Says Courts Must Consider Child's Expenses Along with Child Support in Spousal Support Analysis &#8212; Texas Divorce Attorney Blog &#8212; June 30, 2025","twitter_description":"The Texas Family Code sets out the circumstances under which Texas spousal maintenance may be ordered. The court may order maintenance to a spouse only if &#8212; June 30, 2025","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"Francesca Blackard","Est. reading time":"6 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Article","@id":"https:\/\/www.mcclure-lawgroup.com\/blog\/texas-supreme-court-says-courts-must-consider-childs-expenses-along-with-child-support-in-spousal-support-analysis\/#article","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.mcclure-lawgroup.com\/blog\/texas-supreme-court-says-courts-must-consider-childs-expenses-along-with-child-support-in-spousal-support-analysis\/"},"author":{"name":"Francesca Blackard","@id":"https:\/\/www.mcclure-lawgroup.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/99f9f1e83401bfe81629c93e6c6c0cc2"},"headline":"Texas Supreme Court Says Courts Must Consider Child&#8217;s Expenses Along with Child Support in Spousal Support Analysis","datePublished":"2025-06-30T18:49:19+00:00","mainEntityOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.mcclure-lawgroup.com\/blog\/texas-supreme-court-says-courts-must-consider-childs-expenses-along-with-child-support-in-spousal-support-analysis\/"},"wordCount":1310,"articleSection":["Alimony","Child Custody","Divorce","Spousal Support"],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.mcclure-lawgroup.com\/blog\/texas-supreme-court-says-courts-must-consider-childs-expenses-along-with-child-support-in-spousal-support-analysis\/","url":"https:\/\/www.mcclure-lawgroup.com\/blog\/texas-supreme-court-says-courts-must-consider-childs-expenses-along-with-child-support-in-spousal-support-analysis\/","name":"Texas Supreme Court Says Courts Must Consider Child's Expenses Along with Child Support in Spousal Support Analysis &#8212; Texas Divorce Attorney Blog &#8212; June 30, 2025","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.mcclure-lawgroup.com\/blog\/#website"},"datePublished":"2025-06-30T18:49:19+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.mcclure-lawgroup.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/99f9f1e83401bfe81629c93e6c6c0cc2"},"description":"The Texas Family Code sets out the circumstances under which Texas spousal maintenance may be ordered. The court may order maintenance to a spouse only if &#8212; June 30, 2025","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.mcclure-lawgroup.com\/blog\/texas-supreme-court-says-courts-must-consider-childs-expenses-along-with-child-support-in-spousal-support-analysis\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.mcclure-lawgroup.com\/blog\/texas-supreme-court-says-courts-must-consider-childs-expenses-along-with-child-support-in-spousal-support-analysis\/"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.mcclure-lawgroup.com\/blog\/texas-supreme-court-says-courts-must-consider-childs-expenses-along-with-child-support-in-spousal-support-analysis\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.mcclure-lawgroup.com\/blog\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Texas Supreme Court Says Courts Must Consider Child&#8217;s Expenses Along with Child Support in Spousal Support Analysis"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.mcclure-lawgroup.com\/blog\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.mcclure-lawgroup.com\/blog\/","name":"Texas Divorce Attorney Blog","description":"Published by Texas Collaborative &amp; Family Attorney \u2014 McClure Law Group","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.mcclure-lawgroup.com\/blog\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.mcclure-lawgroup.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/99f9f1e83401bfe81629c93e6c6c0cc2","name":"Francesca Blackard","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/e7d6bd0746d1242f148b58f0c2370bd74ae47909972ca07543b91263b77fc637?s=96&d=mm&r=g","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/e7d6bd0746d1242f148b58f0c2370bd74ae47909972ca07543b91263b77fc637?s=96&d=mm&r=g","contentUrl":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/e7d6bd0746d1242f148b58f0c2370bd74ae47909972ca07543b91263b77fc637?s=96&d=mm&r=g","caption":"Francesca Blackard"},"sameAs":["https:\/\/www.mcclure-lawgroup.com\/francesca-blackard.html"],"url":"https:\/\/www.mcclure-lawgroup.com\/blog\/author\/mcclurelaw4\/"}]}},"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mcclure-lawgroup.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3027","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mcclure-lawgroup.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mcclure-lawgroup.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mcclure-lawgroup.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/13"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mcclure-lawgroup.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3027"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.mcclure-lawgroup.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3027\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3028,"href":"https:\/\/www.mcclure-lawgroup.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3027\/revisions\/3028"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mcclure-lawgroup.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3027"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mcclure-lawgroup.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3027"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mcclure-lawgroup.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3027"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}