When it looks like a divorce action may be approaching your marriage, being proactive and taking preparatory steps can significantly reduce the overall financial and emotional cost. To get ready before divorce proceedings begin, what follows is a practical guide to organizing your personal business and life in order to make such proceedings go more smoothly.
1) Outline the family financial situation: make a list of what you own, a list of what you owe, what the family income is and from whence it comes, and the family’s monthly bills/living expenses. Specify who is the named owner or owners on each asset and for each debt (home, cars, credit cards, etc.).
2) Make copies of statements for all accounts your family has, such as bank account, stocks or other investments, pension funds, life insurance and so forth, as well as for income tax returns and any other family financial records.
3) Do an inventory and list all the personal property or assets which belong to you and/or which you would wish to keep if a division of family property occurs.
4) Keep. It. Friendly. If you can keep relations with your partner civil and amicable through the split-up, everyone will win at least a little. Vindictiveness is a poison that will hurt everyone, especially children.
5) Before your first meeting with an attorney, write down all the questions and problems about which you want to ask. As when you go to the doctor, a written list will help you remember important topics during what could be an upsetting discussion. It will help focus the meeting so it takes less time, which saves fees, and it will give the attorney a written document of your priorities that can be kept in your file for future reference. Bring your financial records to your initial meeting for the same reasons – it’s much less expensive for the attorney to get information from you than from financial institutions or from your partner’s attorney.
6) The more negotiating and agreement you work through on your own with your partner, before the divorce proceedings are initiated, the less negotiating your attorney will have to do on your behalf, and again, the more money you will save in fees. When agreement can’t be reached, clearly your attorney will need to step in, but you may be able to resolve some day-to-day matters, for example who pays for car insurance or school fees, or how household goods and furnishings will be divided.
7) Don’t make big-ticket purchases or take on new debt. These items will make your finances harder to sort out if the time comes to divide things, and they could add to the debt load you have to assume at a point when your spending money is decreasing.
8) Make the most educated estimation possible of what it will cost you to live after the divorce, so you know what goals you want to meet in the financial negotiations and the divorce settlement.
9) If you don’t have any credit in your own name, you will need it when you are single again. Start getting a good credit rating by taking out a credit card, department store card or gas card. Use it only to the extent you can pay off in full every month.
This general guide to putting your house in order before a possible divorce will not apply to every situation, nor be right for everyone, but it will help make a good start. Your attorney can assess what actions are best for you to take, and the more organized information you give the attorney, the better that assessment will be.
A lot of informational material on divorce is available on the Internet. Two commercial sites which offer free on-site articles on a plethora of divorce topics are www.divorcemagazine.com and www.womansdivorce.com The .com in a website name means the site is operated as a business, and will be offering products for sale, and as mentioned above, always check with an attorney before taking advice on legal matters. www.grandparentsrights.org is a not-for-profit Oakland County, Michigan organization with information for parents, as well as grandparents, on its site, and for one of my favorite family law office blogs, which is astute and educational, go to www.alabamafamilylawblog.com
Posted by Mary Wreford; Approved by Lea Ann Sterling, August 2, 2007
The information presented in this article is for general information only and should not be construed to be legal advice.