Texas Family Law Practice Manual, 2024 ed.

Summary of Contents

A detailed chapter table of contents immediately precedes the text of each chapter.

Introduction
Overview of how to use the manual and features available in the online and downloadable digital versions of the manual

1 Ethics and Malpractice Considerations
Discussion of the regulation of lawyers and law practice, accountability for professional responsibility, liability for professional malpractice, and ineffective assistance of counsel in Texas, with emphasis on family law practice

2 Attorney-Client Relationship and Communications
Practice notes and forms for employment agreements and related correspondence with client about case; basic data-collection forms for family law cases

3 Divorce Pleadings
Practice notes and forms on petitioner’s divorce pleadings, including petition, temporary restraining orders, and motion for nonsuit; respondent’s pleadings, including special appearance, plea in abatement, original answer, and waiver; and additional causes of action

4 Divorce—Temporary Restraining Orders and Temporary Orders
Practice notes and forms for temporary orders, including modification and extension of temporary orders and motions for counseling

5 Discovery
Practice notes and forms for formal discovery, including requests for disclosure, required disclosures, pattern interrogatories, requests for admissions, requests for production of documents, requests for entry upon property, and pattern language for subpoenas

6 Information Gathering and Third-Party Notices
Practice notes, including useful websites, and forms for informal discovery, including various form letters about assets, records authorizations, and forms for lis pendens

7 Inventory and Appraisement
Practice notes and inventory and appraisement forms

8 Ancillary Motions and Proceedings
Practice notes and forms concerning attorneys and judges, service of citation, foreign law, joinder of causes, ancillary relief, witnesses, indigence, and maintaining suit

9 Child Support
Practice notes and forms relating to child support, including medical and dental support, withholding from earnings, and support of a disabled child

[chapters 10 through 12 reserved]

13 Court-Ordered Representatives
Practice notes and forms relating to attorneys ad litem, guardians ad litem, and amicus attorneys, including appointment, pleadings, expenses, and withdrawal

14 Judicial Bypass
Practice notes and forms for abortion without parental notification and consent

15 Collaborative Law
Practice notes and forms for collaborative law proceedings, including retainer letter, participation agreements, required status reports and notices, and settlement agreements

16 Parenting Plans, Parenting Coordinators, and Parenting Facilitators
Practice notes and forms related to parenting plans and parenting coordinators and facilitators, including a basic plan, other possible provisions, and appointment and removal of coordinator and facilitator

17 Protective Orders
Practice notes and forms regarding protection against family violence under title 4

18 Alternative Dispute Resolution and Informal Settlement
Practice notes and forms regarding alternative dispute resolution and informal settlement, with mediation and arbitration forms including motions, checklists, rules, mediated and informal settlement agreements, arbitration decision and award, and reports to the court

19 Trial Proceedings
Practice notes and forms for pretrial conference, preferential setting, continuance, stay, division of property, conference with child, and various aspects of jury trial, including judgment non obstante veredicto and directed verdict

20 Attorney’s Fees
Practice notes on setting, proving up, and collecting attorney’s fees and statutory authority for fees; forms for intervention for fees and prove-up script

21 Common Procedural Language and Notice of Court Proceeding
Procedural forms that are to be incorporated into various forms in the manual, as well as notices of hearings and corresponding orders

[chapter 22 reserved]

23 Divorce—Decrees and Agreements Incident to Divorce
Practice notes, including tax considerations; forms for final decree of divorce, including provisions for conservatorship and support of children, division of property, tax language, and injunctions; additional provisions for sale of real estate; statement of evidence; complex agreement incident to divorce; and prove-up questions, affidavit, and declaration

24 Closing Documents
Practice notes and forms for transfer of automobile, land, utility deposits, insurance benefits, miscellaneous property, and stock certificates; correspondence regarding insurance; and correspondence with client

25 Employment and Retirement Benefits
Practice notes and forms relating to stock options and the division and direct payment of various types of retirement benefits, including qualified domestic relations orders for private and state plans, provisions for military retirement, orders dividing federal civil service and federal employees retirement benefits and railroad retirement benefits, assignment of interest in individual retirement account, and petition for postdivorce domestic relations order

26 Posttrial Proceedings and Appeals
Practice notes and forms relating to proceedings after trial, including new trial, setting aside default judgment, temporary orders pending appeal, findings of fact and conclusions of law, judgment nunc pro tunc, notice of appeal, withdrawing exhibits, and sealing court records

27 Mandamus
Practice notes and forms regarding mandamus, including subjects thereof

[chapters 28 through 30 reserved]

31 Enforcement—Property
Practice notes and forms for proceedings, including clarification and contempt, for the enforcement of orders dividing marital property

32 Enforcement—Spousal Maintenance and Alimony
Practice notes regarding spousal maintenance and alimony and forms regarding the enforcement of an award of spousal maintenance under the Family Code, including income withholding, QDROs, and contempt

33 Enforcement—Child Support
Practice notes and forms for proceedings for the enforcement of orders for the payment of child support, including contempt, withholding from earnings, QDROs, money judgments, security, child support lien, and suspension and denial of renewal of license

34 Enforcement—Possession and Access
Practice notes and forms for proceedings for the enforcement of orders for possession of and access to a child, including clarification, contempt, security, and suspension of license

35 Contempt
Practice notes and forms for contempt proceedings, including habeas corpus actions to release an adult

36 Physical Possession of Child
Practice notes and forms for proceedings to order delivery of children before the court through attachment, habeas corpus actions to return children, and expedited enforcement of child custody determinations under the Uniform Child Custody Jurisdiction and Enforcement Act

[chapters 37 through 39 reserved]

40 Original Suit Affecting Parent-Child Relationship
Practice notes and forms for original suits to establish conservatorship or support of a child if no divorce is sought

41 Modification of Texas Orders
Practice notes and forms for proceedings to modify orders of Texas courts concerning the conservatorship, possession and access, or support of children and concerning spousal maintenance

42 Transfer
Practice notes and forms for proceedings to transfer suits affecting the parent-child relationship

43 Interstate Proceedings
Practice notes and forms concerning the Uniform Child Custody Jurisdiction and Enforcement Act, the Parental Kidnapping Prevention Act, the Uniform Interstate Family Support Act, and the Full Faith and Credit for Child Support Orders Act

44 Grandparents and Other Nonparents
Practice notes and forms concerning proceedings in which a grandparent seeks possession of or access to a child, for proceedings in which a grandparent or other nonparent seeks to intervene in a suit affecting the parent-child relationship, and for proceedings in which a sibling seeks access to a child

45 Military Duty of Conservator
Practice notes and forms concerning temporary orders with regard to rights, duties, possession, access, and support to be effective during the military deployment, military mobilization, or temporary military duty of a conservator

46 Authorizations for Care of Child
Practice notes and forms concerning Family Code provisions for care of children by nonparents, including temporary authorizations for care of a child, agreements authorizing adult caregivers to perform statutorily permitted acts in regard to children, and temporary authorizations for voluntary inpatient mental health services for a child

[chapters 47 through 49 reserved]

50 Termination
General information on termination and adoption; practice notes and forms for actions to terminate the parent-child relationship without providing for the adoption of the child

51 Adoption of Child
General information on termination and adoption and on birth records; forms for actions to adopt a child in which no termination of the parent-child relationship is required

52 Combined Termination and Adoption of Stepchild
Practice notes and forms for actions to terminate the parental rights of one natural parent (including an alleged father) and to adopt the child by the other parent’s spouse

53 Ancillary Forms for Termination and Adoption
Forms, other than petitions and decrees, for termination and adoption actions and for other suits affecting the parent-child relationship

54 Parentage
Practice notes and forms for all judicial proceedings relating to parentage, including parentage based on a validated gestational agreement and suits seeking to set aside acknowledgments of paternity

55 International SAPCR Issues
Practice notes on the Prevention of International Parental Child Abduction Act, adoption of foreign-born children, and the Hague Convention and International Child Abduction Remedies Act and forms for prevention of international parental child abduction and registration of foreign adoption order

56 Miscellaneous SAPCR and Other Child-Related Forms
Variety of forms used in many child-related proceedings, including UCCJEA affidavit; health and dental insurance statements; motions and orders regarding child custody evaluation, parent education course, drug screening, and passports and travel; and split possession order

[chapters 57 through 59 reserved]

60 Adoption of Adult
Practice notes and forms for proceedings to adopt an adult

61 Miscellaneous Litigation
Practice notes and forms for bill of review, for breach of contract, for change of name of adult and of child, for obtaining a hardship driver’s license, for postdivorce property division, for removal of disabilities of minority, for enjoining harassing behavior, for interference with possessory interest in a child, and for declaratory judgment

62 Annulment and Suit to Declare Marriage Void
Practice notes and forms for actions to annul voidable marriages and actions to declare marriages void

63 Property Agreements
Practice notes and forms for nonmarital cohabitation agreements, premarital agreements, partition or exchange agreements, separation agreements, waivers of disclosure of financial information, property agreements between spouses, agreements to convert separate property to community property, and community interest special warranty deeds

64 Retrieval of Personal Property
Practice notes and forms for obtaining writs to enter a residence and retrieve personal property pursuant to Texas Property Code chapter 24A