Grandparents Rights Attorney in Rochester Hills

Over 40 Years of Family Law Experience, Rooted in Oakland County

When a divorce, a death, or a family rupture cuts off your relationship with your grandchildren, Michigan law gives you specific but limited tools to act. At Little & Boylan, PLLC, attorneys John Little and Karie Boylan bring over 40 years of combined Michigan family law experience to these cases. We handle both negotiation and contested litigation, so whether a workable schedule can be reached without a courtroom or a judge needs to decide, we’re prepared either way.

Grandparents in Rochester Hills are in Oakland County, which means any petition filed in circuit court goes through the Oakland County Circuit Court, Family Division. Attorney Boylan has lived in this community for over 50 years. That history isn’t incidental. It shapes how she understands the families she represents.

Contact our firm to schedule a free initial consultation about your grandparenting time or custody options. Call (248) 809-1402 to speak with our team.

Michigan’s Legal Framework for Grandparents’ Rights

The governing statute is MCL 722.27b. Its current form reflects amendments made in 2009 after the Michigan Supreme Court in DeRose v. DeRose (2003) struck down the prior version for failing to give adequate deference to fit parents. The constitutional backdrop comes from the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in Troxel v. Granville (2000), which established that a fit parent holds a fundamental constitutional right to direct how their child is raised, including decisions about grandparent contact.

Under current Michigan law, a fit parent’s decision to deny grandparenting time is presumed to be in the child’s best interest. Grandparents carry the burden of rebutting that presumption, and how a case is prepared and presented matters significantly. There is also a distinct procedural bar worth understanding: if both fit parents sign an affidavit opposing grandparenting time, the court must dismiss the motion under MCL 722.27b(5). This isn’t a rebuttable presumption. It is a hard dismissal rule, which is why the decision of when and how to file requires careful legal strategy.

Who Can File for Grandparenting Time in Michigan

Before a grandparent can ask a court to order grandparenting time, they must have legal standing. MCL 722.27b sets out specific qualifying circumstances:

• A divorce, annulment, or separate maintenance action is pending or completed between the child’s parents
• The grandparent’s child (the child’s parent) is deceased
• The child’s parents were never married, don’t live together, and paternity has been legally established
• Legal custody has been given to someone other than the parents, or the child lives outside the parental home
• The grandparent provided an established custodial environment for the child in the year before filing

These rights apply only to grandparents. Aunts, uncles, cousins, and godparents have no comparable petition right under Michigan law. A grandparent may generally file only once every two years, unless good cause exists to file sooner. Adoption ordinarily ends grandparenting time rights, but a key exception applies when a stepparent adopts: grandparents of a deceased or rights-terminated parent may still be able to seek grandparenting time.

What Grandparents Must Prove to Receive a Court Order

Having standing isn’t enough. To obtain a grandparenting time order, a grandparent must rebut the parental presumption by showing that denying grandparenting time would create a substantial risk of harm to the child’s mental, physical, or emotional health. If that threshold is met, the court applies a best-interest analysis.

Factors courts weigh include the emotional bond between grandparent and grandchild, the child’s age and expressed preference, the grandparent’s moral fitness and physical health, and whether the grandparent supports the child’s relationship with the parent. Courts also consider any history of domestic violence, the grandparent’s intentions, and the stability of the environment they can provide. In contested cases, testimony from a child psychologist or comparable expert is frequently relevant to demonstrating how the absence of the relationship affects the child.

Grandparenting time isn’t the same as parental parenting time. Any order the court enters sets a reasonable schedule tailored to the child’s best interest, not a presumed weekly arrangement.

Third-Party Custody & Guardianship for Grandparents

Some grandparents need more than a visitation schedule. Two additional pathways exist under Michigan law.

Third-Party Custody
Under the Michigan Child Custody Act of 1970, grandparents may pursue custody directly. The standard is demanding: clear and convincing evidence that awarding custody to the parent or parents may not be in the child’s best interests. Circumstances courts have recognized include parental substance abuse, incarceration, abandonment, neglect, homelessness, and untreated mental illness.

Probate Court Guardianship
A guardianship petition filed in Michigan Probate Court is a different path. A guardian holds most custodial responsibilities but acts under court supervision, typically files annual reports, and may be required to facilitate parenting time with parents. When a parent consents to the arrangement, many grandparents raising grandchildren pursue probate guardianship rather than a contested custody action. Importantly, a grandparenting time order does not create parental rights and does not prevent a court from later acting on custody, parental rights, or adoption.

Why Rochester Hills Grandparents Choose Little & Boylan, PLLC

Attorney Boylan’s connection to this community runs deeper than office location. Before earning her Juris Doctor from the University of Notre Dame Law School, she served as a police officer with the Birmingham Police Department and was honored as Birmingham-Bloomfield Officer of the Year. That background informs a direct, clear-eyed approach to family cases where children’s welfare is at stake. She also holds Master’s-level coursework in Public Administration from Oakland University.

Our firm is Martindale-Hubbell Peer Reviewed, holds a Martindale-Hubbell Client Champion Silver 2026 rating, was named to 10 Best Law Firms 2022 in Family Law, and earned Lawyers of Distinction 2022 recognition. We combine smart advance planning with strong courtroom advocacy, building case-specific strategies rather than applying a one-size template. For grandparents in Oakland County, that means representation that accounts for both the procedural demands of the Oakland County Circuit Court and the human reality of what these cases involve.