Texas spousal maintenance rules, caps, and duration

Texas does not do alimony the way most states do. Court-ordered spousal maintenance exists, but you have to clear an eligibility gate before a judge can even consider it, the statute caps the payment, and it caps the number of years.

Plenty of Texas divorces still end with one spouse paying the other every month. Most of the time that comes from a contract the parties negotiated, not an order the court imposed, and knowing the difference tells you where your leverage is.

Who qualifies for spousal maintenance in Texas?

There are two gates and you have to get through both.

The first applies to everyone. Under Family Code section 8.051, the court may order maintenance only if the spouse seeking it will lack sufficient property, including their own separate property, to provide for their minimum reasonable needs when the marriage ends.

The second gate is a list, and you have to fit one of these:

• Family violence. Your spouse was convicted of, or received deferred adjudication for, a criminal offense that is also an act of family violence against you or your child, committed during the marriage, either within two years before the divorce was filed or while it is pending.

• Disability. You cannot earn enough for your minimum reasonable needs because of an incapacitating physical or mental disability.

• A ten year marriage. You were married 10 years or longer and lack the ability to earn enough for your minimum reasonable needs.

• Caring for a disabled child. You are the custodian of a child of the marriage, of any age, who needs substantial care and personal supervision because of a physical or mental disability that keeps you from earning enough.

The family violence route is the only one with no marriage length requirement. It works in a two year marriage.

"Minimum reasonable needs" is not a defined dollar figure and courts decide it case by case. It is a subsistence standard, not a standard-of-living standard, which is the single biggest difference between Texas maintenance and alimony in states like California.

How much spousal maintenance can a Texas court order?

The statute sets a hard ceiling. Family Code section 8.055 says a court may not order maintenance requiring the paying spouse to pay monthly more than the lesser of $5,000, or 20 percent of that spouse's average monthly gross income.

Two consequences follow.

• For most families, 20 percent is the real cap. The $5,000 ceiling only binds when the payer's gross income runs above $25,000 a month.

• Gross income is defined by the statute, not by the tax return. Section 8.055 counts all wage and salary income including commissions, overtime, tips, and bonuses, plus interest, dividends, royalties, self-employment income, net rental income after operating expenses and mortgage payments, and other income actually received such as severance, retirement benefits, pensions, trust income, annuities, and capital gains. It excludes return of principal, accounts receivable, federal public assistance, TANF, foster care payments, VA service-connected disability compensation, SSI and social security benefits, and workers' compensation.

That definition is why a maintenance fight so often becomes an income fight. When the paying spouse owns a business or is paid in bonuses, the average monthly gross income figure is the whole argument, and it comes out of the records covered in the discovery chapter.

How long does spousal maintenance last in Texas?

Family Code section 8.054 sets maximum durations by the length of the marriage:

• Five years if the marriage was under 10 years and eligibility rests on the family violence ground, or if the marriage lasted at least 10 years but not more than 20

• Seven years if the marriage lasted at least 20 years but not more than 30

• Ten years if the marriage lasted 30 years or more

Those are ceilings, not entitlements. The same section tells the court to limit maintenance to the shortest reasonable period that lets the receiving spouse earn enough for their minimum reasonable needs, unless that ability is substantially or totally diminished by a physical or mental disability, duties as custodian of an infant or young child of the marriage, or another compelling impediment.

Maintenance based on a spouse's own disability, or on caring for a disabled child, can run as long as the qualifying condition lasts, subject to periodic review.

What factors does a Texas court consider for maintenance?

Once you are through the eligibility gate, Family Code section 8.052 lists what the judge weighs in setting the nature, amount, duration, and manner of payment:

• Each spouse's ability to meet their own minimum reasonable needs with what they receive in the divorce

• The education and employment skills of both spouses, and how long training would take

• The duration of the marriage

• The age, employment history, earning ability, and physical and emotional condition of the spouse asking

• The effect on each spouse's ability to meet their needs while also paying child support or maintenance

• Excessive or abnormal spending, or destruction, concealment, or fraudulent disposition of community property by either spouse

• One spouse's contribution to the other's education, training, or earning power

• Property each spouse brought into the marriage

• Contribution as a homemaker

• Marital misconduct, including adultery and cruel treatment

• Any history or pattern of family violence

The sixth item is worth reading twice. Money a spouse moved, spent, or hid is not only a property claim under the community property rules, it also pushes the maintenance analysis.

What is contractual alimony in Texas?

An agreement, not an order. Because court-ordered maintenance is capped and time limited, most Texas spousal support is negotiated into the decree as a contract instead.

The differences matter:

• No eligibility gate. You do not have to prove a 10 year marriage or an inability to meet minimum needs. You just have to reach a deal.

• No statutory cap on amount or duration. The parties set both.

• Different enforcement. Court-ordered maintenance can be enforced by contempt within statutory limits. Contractual alimony is generally enforced as a contract, which usually means a suit for breach rather than a jail threat.

• It is harder to modify. A statutory maintenance order can be modified on a material and substantial change. A contract binds you to what you signed.

Texas lets spouses agree on all of this. Family Code section 7.006 allows a written agreement about the division of property, liabilities, and maintenance, and provides that terms the court finds just and right are binding on the court.

This is the main reason support gets settled at mediation rather than tried. The mediation chapter covers what happens once you sign.

Can spousal maintenance be changed or stopped in Texas?

Under Family Code section 8.056, the obligation to pay future maintenance ends on the death of either party or on the receiving spouse's remarriage. The court must also terminate it after a hearing if it finds the receiving spouse is living with someone they have a dating or romantic relationship with, in a permanent place of abode on a continuing basis. Terminating the obligation does not wipe out maintenance that already accrued.

An order can be modified under section 8.057 on a showing of a material and substantial change in circumstances. A modification can lower an amount, and it cannot push the order past the original period or above the statutory cap.

Losing a job does not stop the obligation on its own. Payments keep accruing until a court changes the order, so file the motion when the change happens, not when the arrears become a problem.