Oklahoma City Family Law Attorneys
Family Law Guidance for What Comes Next
Facing a divorce, child custody dispute, support matter, or another family law issue can bring difficult decisions. Davis & Associates provides experienced legal guidance to help Oklahoma City families understand their options, protect what matters most, and move forward with confidence.
Oklahoma City sprawls across four counties, so a family case here can land in more than one courthouse. Most of them end up at the Oklahoma County Courthouse on Robert S. Kerr Avenue, the same street as our office. Whether you’re filing for divorce, fighting for time with your kids, or trying to get out of a dangerous home, Oklahoma law sets the rules, and a local judge applies them.
Davis & Associates represents individuals and families throughout Oklahoma City and nearby communities, including Edmond, Moore, Norman, and Midwest City. Our attorneys handle divorce, custody, child support, paternity, guardianship, and protective orders.
We also know what a family case looks like from your side of the table: the midnight math on whether you can keep the house, a pickup schedule nobody has written down yet, and the phone call you keep putting off. We can take a lot of that weight off you.
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Without the Fear of High Bills
No High Hourly Billing
Most firms charge by the hour, which means every call, email, and update can increase your bill. Our approach is built to give you more clarity and control.
Custom Monthly Pricing
Your monthly rate is tailored to your case, so you know what to expect, plan ahead with confidence, and avoid surprise costs.
Less Stress, More Access
You should not have to hesitate before reaching out to your lawyer. Our pricing model keeps representation clear, approachable, and realistically affordable.
What It Takes to Get Divorced in Oklahoma
Before a judge can grant a divorce, Oklahoma requires a few boxes to be checked. Either you or your spouse must have lived in the state for the six months before filing. You file in the county where you’ve lived for the past 30 days or in the county where your spouse lives, which matters in a city that sprawls into Canadian, Cleveland, and Pottawatomie counties.
Oklahoma’s no-fault ground is incompatibility, so nobody has to prove wrongdoing. Fault grounds still exist, including adultery, extreme cruelty, abandonment for one year, habitual drunkenness, and a spouse’s imprisonment for a felony.
Then there’s the waiting. A divorce with no minor children can’t be heard until the petition has been on file for 10 days. With minor children, the court generally can’t enter a final decree until 90 days after filing, though a judge can waive that wait for good cause if neither spouse objects. Parents divorcing on incompatibility grounds must also complete an educational program on how divorce affects children before custody is finalized. Your spouse must be formally served or sign a waiver accepting service.
After the decree, neither spouse can marry someone new in Oklahoma for six months, and a quick wedding across the Red River doesn’t get around it. Living together back home after an out-of-state marriage during that window breaks the same law. This rule catches some people off guard.
Every divorce also has to settle property, debts, support, and, if you have children, custody. You and your spouse can agree on those terms, or a judge will decide them for you. Agreements usually cost less and leave you more say in the outcome, so our Oklahoma City divorce attorneys negotiate first, represent you through mediation, and stay ready for the courtroom if your spouse won’t budge.
Who Gets What: Property, Debt and Alimony
Oklahoma judges divide what a couple acquired together in a way that is “just and reasonable.” That means “fair,” which isn’t always the same as half.
What each spouse owned before the marriage stays with that spouse. So does property one spouse received on their own during the marriage, such as an inheritance or a gift made to them alone. Everything the two of you acquired together gets divided no matter whose name is on the title: the house, the cars, the bass boat, the retirement accounts and the debts that came with all of it.
Separate property doesn’t always stay separate, though. If you deposited an inheritance into a joint account and spent from it for a few years, you may struggle to prove how much of the balance is still yours.
When spouses can’t agree, the judge can split an asset, award it to one spouse and order a payment to the other to even things out, or order it sold. In a metro where home prices swing from Nichols Hills to south Oklahoma City, the house is often the item fought over the most.
Alimony works differently. Oklahoma has no formula for it, so the judge decides what’s reasonable based on the facts of your marriage. Support alimony generally ends when the person receiving it dies or remarries, and a judge can reduce it if that person moves in with a new partner. Payments labeled as part of the property division can’t be modified later, so it’s important to pay close attention to the wording in your decree.
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Child Custody and Child Support in Oklahoma City
Oklahoma’s stated policy is that children should have frequent and continuing contact with parents who have shown they can act in their children’s best interests. If a parent asks, the judge may give both parents substantially equal time at a temporary or final hearing, unless shared parenting would be detrimental to the child. Equal time is on the table. That does not mean it’s automatic.
Every custody decision turns on the best interests of the child’s physical, mental, and moral welfare. Parents who want joint custody must file a plan covering living arrangements, school, medical care, support, and visitation for the judge to approve. If the judge finds that child abuse, domestic violence, stalking, or harassment has occurred, Oklahoma law presumes that custody or shared parenting with the parent responsible is not in the child’s best interest. Our Oklahoma City child custody attorneys build the plan and the evidence behind it before you walk into court.
Children get a voice, too. If the judge decides it serves the child to be heard, a child 12 or older is presumed old enough to form an intelligent preference, and the judge must consider it. The judge isn’t bound by it.
Child support follows the state’s income-shares guidelines. The calculation starts with both parents’ incomes and the number of children, then accounts for health insurance, work-related child care, and parenting time. A parent with at least 121 overnights a year is presumed to qualify for a shared-parenting adjustment. You can run the numbers yourself with the state’s official calculator and computation form.
The formula does the arithmetic. The arguments are over what goes into it. What counts as income for a parent who owns a business or gets paid in cash? How many overnights does each parent actually have? Who covers the insurance and the day care? Getting those inputs right is where our child support lawyers make the biggest difference.
Practice Areas
- Divorce
- Child Custody
- Child Support
- Guardianship
- Restraining Orders
- Restraining Orders
Find the Help You Need Near You
Domestic Violence and Protective Orders
If you’re in danger right now, call 911. The Oklahoma Safeline at 1-800-522-SAFE (7233) connects you with an advocate.
Oklahoma’s Protection from Domestic Abuse Act lets you ask the court for a protective order, and filing one costs you nothing. It comes in two forms:
- Emergency ex parte order. If you’re in immediate danger, a judge can hear your request the same day you file and issue an order before your spouse gets notice. The sheriff then serves your spouse with the order and the hearing date. The emergency order stays in effect until a full hearing, which the court schedules within 14 days of filing.
- Final protective order. The judge issues it after both sides can present evidence at the full hearing. It can include whatever terms are needed to stop the abuse, such as no contact and staying away from your home, workplace, or school. It can last up to five years, and the judge can make it continuous when the facts call for it, such as a history of violating court orders or a prior violent felony conviction.
A protective order doesn’t decide custody, support, or who keeps the house, although a judge can temporarily suspend visitation to protect a child. Those questions belong to the divorce case, and Oklahoma moves them up the line when you have an order. With a protective order in place, the court must hold a hearing on temporary custody, support, and property within 10 days of your request. Our Oklahoma City domestic violence attorneys can work both cases at once.
Protecting Parental Rights Under Oklahoma Statutes
An unmarried father has to establish paternity before he can ask a court for custody or parenting time. A signed acknowledgment of paternity carries the same legal weight as a court ruling on who the father is. It doesn’t set a parenting schedule, which still takes a court order. Our attorneys help fathers establish paternity and help mothers secure support, including through DNA testing when paternity is disputed.
We also handle guardianship for children and for adults who can no longer make their own decisions, including emergency temporary custody when a child’s parents can’t provide care. We help grandparents with adoptions, too.
These cases rarely give anyone time to plan. Whether you live in Bethany, Warr Acres or elsewhere in the metro, we move quickly.
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When Life Changes: Modifying Divorce Orders
Custody and support orders can change when your life does. The rules reward whoever moves first.
Child support can be modified after a material change in circumstances, such as a job loss, a raise, new child care costs or a child aging out of support. The new amount takes effect the first day of the month after you file your motion, and Oklahoma never modifies support retroactively. Every month you wait to file after a layoff is another month you owe at the old rate.
Moving with a child has its own rules. A parent who plans to move a child’s primary residence more than 75 miles for 60 days or longer generally has to mail the other parent notice at least 60 days ahead. The other parent then has 30 days to file an objection, or the move is allowed.
When the other parent stops paying, Oklahoma Child Support Services can enforce an existing order through tools such as wage withholding and tax refund intercepts. When a parent ignores support or parenting-time orders, we can take the case back to court with a contempt motion.
Frequently Asked Questions
Most family law matters in the metro area are handled at the Oklahoma County District Court, located at 320 Robert S. Kerr Ave in downtown Oklahoma City. Depending on your specific municipality, such as Edmond or Norman, you may alternatively file in Logan or Cleveland County courts.
In Oklahoma, once you file and serve a divorce petition, an automatic temporary injunction goes into effect. This legal order prevents both spouses from hiding assets, changing insurance policies, or removing children from the state without court permission or mutual agreement.
Judges in Oklahoma County evaluate several factors, including the child’s physical and emotional needs, the stability of each parent’s home environment, and any history of domestic violence or substance abuse. The court’s primary goal is to maintain frequent, ongoing contact with both parents when safe.
Yes. Davis and Associates, Attorneys at Law, have experienced family law attorneys near you for help with establishing paternity, representing you in custody hearings, and more.
Why Choose Davis & Associates as Your Oklahoma City Family Law Attorney
Most family law firms bill by the hour, so every phone call and email adds to the tab. Davis & Associates uses a monthly subscription model instead. Your rate is tailored to your case, with no surprise invoices, so you can plan around it.
Clients also choose our firm for:
- Attorneys who serve clients in Oklahoma, Cleveland, Canadian and McClain counties
- An office on Robert S. Kerr Avenue, down the street from the Oklahoma County Courthouse
- Representation through negotiation and mediation, with a plan for court if settlement fails
- Quick action on emergency filings when safety or a child’s whereabouts can’t wait
Whether you need a divorce lawyer, a custody advocate or help with a protective order, contact us to schedule a consultation with an Oklahoma City family law attorney at our firm. Change starts with a conversation.
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