Are you looking for a spousal maintenance & alimony lawyer in Chicago, IL?
At Hurst, Kay, Allen & Stambler, LLC, we are Chicago spousal maintenance lawyers whose practice spans over 100 years of combined experience and includes recognition from Super Lawyers.
If your divorce in Chicago involves a gap between two incomes, maintenance is usually the issue that takes the longest to resolve. Maintenance keeps both households connected for years afterward, which is why people fight harder over it. Our attorneys have handled Illinois domestic relations matters for decades. A Chicago, IL spousal maintenance & alimony lawyer from Hurst, Kay, Allen & Stambler, LLC can run the guideline calculation, identify what your spouse’s income actually is, and argue for or against a deviation where the numbers do not fit the marriage. Contact us to set up a consultation.
Spousal Maintenance & Alimony Lawyer Chicago, IL
Illinois applies a guideline formula to maintenance whenever the parties’ combined gross annual income falls below $500,000 and the paying spouse owes no support from a prior relationship, under 750 ILCS 5/504. Above that figure, the guidelines stop applying and a judge decides using statutory factors instead. Cases from Chicago are heard in the Domestic Relations Division of the Circuit Court of Cook County at 50 West Washington Street.
Illinois answers the amount question with arithmetic and the entitlement question with judgment. A court first decides whether maintenance is appropriate at all, which is discretionary and turns on the standard of living during the marriage, each spouse’s earning capacity, and what one gave up for the other’s career. A maintenance attorney works both halves, because winning the entitlement argument and losing the income argument produces the same disappointment as the reverse.
Types of Spousal Maintenance & Alimony Cases We Handle in Chicago
Maintenance disputes take several forms, and the guideline formula governs fewer of them than people assume. What the parties earn, how long they were married, and whether an agreement already addresses support all change the analysis. Our attorneys handle the following matters for Chicago clients.
- Guideline maintenance. When combined gross income sits under the statutory threshold, the calculation is mechanical and the fight moves to what counts as income. Bonuses, distributions from a closely held business, and deferred compensation are where these disputes actually live.
- High net worth divorce. Above $500,000 in combined gross income the guidelines do not apply, and the court weighs statutory factors instead. These cases turn on business valuation, asset tracing, and lifestyle evidence rather than on a formula.
- Temporary maintenance. Support during the case itself is set separately from the final award, and temporary orders often shape expectations for everything that follows. An early order set too low is difficult to undo.
- Post-divorce. A substantial change in circumstances can raise, lower, or end maintenance. Retirement, job loss, a raise, or a former spouse’s remarriage each trigger different rules.
- Legal separation. Couples who separate without dissolving the marriage can still obtain a maintenance order. The financial analysis is similar even though the marital status does not change.
- Prenuptial agreements. A valid agreement can waive or cap maintenance entirely, which makes enforceability the whole case. Disclosure at the time of signing is usually the pressure point.
- Child support. Maintenance and child support are calculated in sequence, not independently, and a maintenance award changes the income figures that drive the support number.
- Mediation. Negotiated maintenance terms can be structured in ways a court order cannot, including non-modifiable amounts and fixed end dates that both parties accept in exchange for certainty.
Why Choose Hurst, Kay, Allen & Stambler, LLC as my Spousal Maintenance & Alimony Lawyer in Chicago, IL?
A Corporate Finance Background Applied to Divorce
Olga Stambler has 30 years of legal experience and practices exclusively in family law. She began her career in corporate law at Dewey Ballantine in New York and Bell, Boyd & Lloyd in Chicago, where she was lead attorney structuring and negotiating complex commercial transactions. That background matters in maintenance cases, because identifying what a spouse actually earns from a closely held company is a financial exercise before it is a legal one. She is a Cook County Domestic Relations Division court-approved mediator, a fellow of Collaborative Divorce Illinois, and an adjunct professor at DePaul University College of Law teaching family law mediation. Income disputes reward that order of operations, balance sheet before statute, and it is the order a family law lawyer in Chicago, IL brings to a contested maintenance file.
Appellate Results in Illinois Family Law
Olga A. Allen has practiced family law exclusively since 2007 and has handled hundreds of matters through both litigation and settlement. She has prevailed in the Illinois Appellate Courts and before the Illinois Supreme Court through her appellate practice. Super Lawyers named her a Rising Star every year from 2016 through 2022 and has since selected her as a Super Lawyer, a distinction given to roughly five percent of Illinois attorneys. She is fluent in Polish.
Understanding Spousal Maintenance & Alimony Cases
How Illinois Calculates Spousal Maintenance
When the guidelines apply, the statute sets both the amount and the duration, and the arithmetic runs in a fixed order.
- Take one third of the paying spouse’s net annual income
- Subtract one quarter of the receiving spouse’s net annual income
- Check the result against the ceiling, since the award cannot leave the recipient with more than 40 percent of the parties’ combined net income
- Multiply the length of the marriage by a statutory factor to set duration, starting at 0.20 for shorter marriages and rising to 0.80 as the marriage approaches 20 years
- For marriages of 20 years or longer, the court may order support for the length of the marriage or for an indefinite term
Two conditions switch the formula off entirely: combined gross income of $500,000 or more, and a paying spouse who already owes support from a previous relationship. How maintenance is calculated matters less in those cases than what the statutory factors show about the marriage itself.
What Should You Bring to Your Spousal Maintenance & Alimony Consultation?
Three years of tax returns will tell us more in ten minutes than an hour of conversation will.
- Federal and state tax returns for the last three years, including all schedules
- Recent pay stubs for both spouses, plus records of bonuses or commissions
- Business tax returns, K-1s, and financial statements if either spouse owns an interest in a company
- Any prenuptial or postnuptial agreement, and any existing support order
- A rough monthly budget reflecting the standard of living during the marriage
We will run the guideline figure during the meeting and tell you where the realistic range sits above or below it.
What Is The Spousal Maintenance & Alimony Case Timeline?
Maintenance is decided inside the divorce rather than as a separate case, so its timeline follows the dissolution.
- A petition for temporary support, often filed within the first weeks
- Financial disclosure, which in Cook County means a sworn affidavit and document production
- Discovery into income, including depositions and subpoenas where a business is involved
- Independent valuation where a closely held company or professional practice is in play
- Settlement negotiation or mediation, and trial where the parties cannot agree
Contested financial cases commonly run a year or more. Divorcing later in life tends to extend that further, because retirement accounts and pensions require their own analysis.
What Are Important Aspects of a Spousal Maintenance & Alimony Case?
A salaried employee’s income is a number on a pay stub, but a business owner’s income is a conclusion drawn from tax returns, distributions, and personal expenses run through the company.
- What counts as net income, which is a statutory definition rather than a common-sense one
- Whether a spouse is voluntarily underemployed, which permits a court to impute income
- The standard of living established during the marriage, which anchors the entitlement analysis
- Whether either spouse delayed education or a career for the household
- Federal tax treatment, since tax rules changed for orders entered after 2018 and payments are no longer deductible to the payor
Plenty of Illinois divorces end with no maintenance at all. Where incomes are comparable, or the marriage was brief, the honest answer is that the formula produces little and the fight is not worth its cost.
Chicago Family Court and Local Resources
Every Chicago dissolution is filed with the Circuit Court of Cook County, and the Domestic Relations Division publishes the material litigants need.
- Domestic relations cases and the statutes the Division applies
- Divorce and dissolution information, covering what the court can and cannot decide
- Court forms used in Domestic Relations matters, including financial affidavits
- Our own overview of the Cook County court process from filing through judgment
Reach Out to Hurst, Kay, Allen & Stambler, LLC to Schedule a Consultation
Contact us with your income figures and the length of the marriage, and we can tell you what the guideline produces before you decide anything else. We will explain whether the formula governs your situation, what a deviation argument would require, and how the maintenance question interacts with property division and child support. Appointments are generally available within a few business days.
