Louise Nixon is a nationally recognized QDRO expert. She is co-founder and Principal of QDROCounsel, a legal technology document drafting platform for retirement division matters founded by QDRO attorneys and Valuation experts.
Louise has spent 30-plus years focused on retirement division in divorce, first as an attorney representing major pension plans, then founding her own law firm preparing QDROs for litigants as a result of divorce. In 2017, Louise co-founded QDROCounsel to make QDROs accessible on a national level.
Since 2004, Louise has prepared QDROs pro bono for the family law non-profit Harriett Buhai Center for Family Law, which became known as one of the only non-profits in the country providing QDRO services. She has served on its Board and Advisory Council.
In 2022 as a result of her decades of non-profit work, Louise co-founded and is President of the Board of Directors for the nonprofit Center for Access to QDROs with seed money from the California State Bar Foundation.
The Center’s mission is to close the justice gap by providing access to QDRO to nonprofit legal services organizations and self-help centers. QDROCounsel donates an exclusive license to the Center for Access to QDROs for use of its technology.
Education
Louise received her BA from the University of California, Davis and her JD from Whittier Law School.
Expert Areas
Qualified Domestic Relations Orders (“QDROs”) for private retirement plans under federal law [Employee Retirement Income Security Act (“ERISA”)]
Domestic Relations Orders (“DROs”) for state public retirement plans under state plan law
DROs for military and federal employee public retirement plans under federal plan law
IRC Section 408 DROs for individual retirement accounts (“IRAs”) under federal law [Internal Revenue Code (“IRC”) Section 408].
Professional Outreach and Associations
Louise is a recurrent family law court-appointed expert on QDROs. She is a frequent speaker for family law groups and Bar Associations, employee benefit groups, and local to national continuing legal education (CLE) organizations, including a recurrent speaker for the Advanced Family Law Program (AFLC) and California Family Law Reports (CFLR) both divisions of Thomson Reuters.
Louise has been repeatedly recognized as one of California’s Top Attorneys for Employee Benefits. She was awarded the Pro Bono Attorney of the Year and Hall of Fame Award by Harriett Buhai Center for Family Law. Louise has been quoted in the New York Times, Bloomberg, MSNBC, and the Wall Street Journal.
Louise is a member of the QDRONES, a national study group comprised of QDRO attorneys and pension valuation experts, and is an inactive member of the California Bar and the Texas Bar.
