In this episode Doreen and Jeff discuss different ways to speed up the divorce process. They will give up ways to speed up the process and will not only save you time, but it may also save you money, emotion, and stress. The less confrontational the divorce, generally, the less time it will take.
Ep. 166 – How Long Does It Take To Get Divorced?
Transcript
Jeff 00:00
Hello, everybody out there. Today, we’re going to be talking about, how long does it take to get divorce. The old, very very popular question. So if you’re ready, let’s get started with Episode 166.
Doreen 00:23
Are you ready to create a life that’s better than ever before? We are Doreen Yaffa and Jeff Wilson, and we are here to give you the strategies you need to create the life after divorce that you deserve and desire. As partners both in marriage and coaching, we use our expertise as well as our own personal experiences to help you make the next chapter of your life, the best chapter.
Jeff 00:57
Hey Doreen, how are you?
Doreen 00:58
I’m great. How are you?
Jeff 01:00
Good to seeing you.
Doreen 01:01
Good to seeing you.
Jeff 01:02
Good to seeing you. Good to see you.
Doreen 01:05
Nice to see you as well.
Jeff 01:06
All right, hey, a much better weather. Hurricane has passed, the sun is out.
Doreen 01:11
Yeah a lot of devastation from what was the name, Helene?
Jeff 01:16
Helene.
Doreen 01:17
Yeah, Helene. So we’re sending our prayers out to, of course, the people who lost family members and loved ones, and also for all the people that are dealing with the aftermath of these hurricanes that we deal with down here in South Florida, all over the coast. And you know, this thing has made its way all the way up, right?
Jeff 01:38
I know it’s still going, but now at least it’s downgraded to a tropical storm.
Doreen 01:42
Yes, yes. All right, so let’s talk about how long is this divorce going to take?
Jeff 01:48
I’m sure, as an attorney for 30 years now, how many times do people ask you that?
Doreen 01:55
I think that’s a common question. I would say more likely than not, they asked me two questions, you know what they are?
Jeff 02:02
“How long is this going to take?” and “How much is this going to cost me?”
Doreen 02:05
Exactly.
Jeff 02:06
Okay. Remember, I’ve been divorced.
Doreen 02:09
Yes, I do remember. Well, I wasn’t there at that time, but-
Jeff 02:13
No, you weren’t. But most people that have been through divorce, I think think of those two things.
Doreen 02:18
Yeah, absolutely. So I think there’s, you know, a couple reasons that there’s a delay in the divorce process.
Jeff 02:28
Well, I think the main thing is lack of cooperation between the two parties. They don’t see eye to eye. You know, somebody’s done something wrong, and there are maybe unresolved issues and, you know, there you have the emotions, you know, playing a part of that as well.
Doreen 02:47
Well, I think the lack of cooperation is probably up there as a you know, scale 1 to 10. Ten being the most you know, relevant to why the divorce delay is delayed. That’s probably it.
Jeff 03:02
Yeah and I’m sure that they’re in most cases, not maybe in most, but in some cases, one party, this one spouse may not even want the divorce and do and does everything they possibly can to go against the grains.
Doreen 03:16
Well, we’re going to talk about that, right? We’re going to talk about that. So, yeah, and the next one, I think is unresolved issues, meaning they’re not cooperating, but they’re also they haven’t taken the time to sit down and to talk about the issues of the divorce. Whether they both want the divorce or don’t want the divorce. It takes getting to some resolution or basic understandings, even just the tiny understanding, which is not tiny, it’s huge. We’re gonna do everything that we can, to try to get through this divorce and cooperate that in and of itself, would be probably, you know, well served for sure.
Jeff 04:09
I guess, when you go back to talking about, how much is this going to cost me, I think financial matters, complex. Financial matters comes into play as well, whether, you know, there’s a business involved or maybe one spouse is making money while the other one is, you know, staying home, whatever the case might be, but there might be some financial disagreements.
Doreen 04:31
I don’t think it’s so much. I think what you’re trying to focus on is the financial matters, the complexity of the case.
Jeff 04:38
Yeah, complex financials.
Doreen 04:40
So the more complex the financial issues, the longer the case is going to take. Because it takes time to- one of the things you know, in Florida, at least and in throughout, you know, the United States, at least and throughout the world, because we’ve dealt with some cases overseas where you had co-council there is you have to determine the assets and liabilities to in Florida come to what’s known as an equitable distribution of the assets, which is a presumption of the 50/50, right? Like a balance sheet. But what if you don’t know what the values are? So sometimes, right? So sometimes you can identify the assets, but you can’t, you don’t agree on the value, or the value is complicated. So a business for sure. How do you value a business? And in Florida, I can get into some of the legalities of that. It’s different, though, valuing a business for the purposes of a divorce than it would be an arm’s length transaction outside of the divorce, because there’s certain factors when you’re valuing a business in divorce that you cannot consider, or you have to consider, so it really is much different. So yeah, then you can have financial issues that are complicated, just identifying you know where money went, right, what we call a tracing. You know, money’s been moved, or maybe money’s been hidden, or what they call dissipated, meaning, used on a for a purpose unconnected to the marriage. Like all of that just requires more time and effort. You know another thing, we were just at dinner with some friends last night. We were talking about this issue too, income. You know, if you have 2W2 wage earners, pretty simple, you know, that’s easy to find out. But suppose you have a stay at home person, one of the spouses stays home, and then one of the spouses has a business, but shows on her return that there’s like no income. So now you got to determine incomes for support purposes, child support and alimony. You’ve got someone who’s underemployed, meaning that they’ve chosen not to work. So now the courts are likely going to require as well as they’re as long as they’re well bodied and able, and you can always do something in the court’s mind to impute income to that spouse. So that takes longer. And also, if you have somebody showing no money, which happens often ideal at Yafa Family Law Group, with a lot of those cases where income is under reported. And I’m not saying that the person is doing anything inappropriately with their tax returns. They’re probably taking valid, let’s assume valid expenses, etc, but I got to hire a forensic accountant to come in and look at all of the perks that are being paid through the business, the expenses, and now add those back to derive income. So it gets a little complicated, for sure, and that’ll delay case.
Jeff 07:43
It’s very interesting, especially coming from a or coming to a life coach from an attorney. So I’m sitting there taking mental notes, because I think this is all great stuff that I’m learning for the maybe the first time, second time, or something. I’ve heard this.
Doreen 07:57
I’m sure you heard it. Throughout our many years together.
Jeff 08:00
I mean, I’ve heard of it, but I know the our listeners, you know, are they’re like, “Oh, that’s a great education”, something that they really are learning.
Doreen 08:07
So a lot of times I’ll have clients, you know? Why is this taking so long? And so it’s really important that we’re big strategizers, you know, we like to come in and really look at kind of what there is, what the issues are, and then do a blueprint and a strategy, and we look at the best case, worst case scenario here. So it’s you know, it takes time to put all that together. It takes time to gather the financial records, give them to us, consume them. Do what’s known as a financial affidavit where you’re listing everything, your income, your expenses, your assets, your liabilities, your contingent assets, your contingent liabilities, all the things. And it takes time to put all that together. So that’s just the normal course. Now, listen, that’s not to say there that there aren’t simple divorces, because there are, and that’s why I opened, you know, split up law firm is because there are cases in which people can agree there is not complicated issues that need to be resolved, meaning, like we said, income, business, valuations, all of that, and they can just really quickly come to a resolution.
Jeff 09:19
And I believe that’s an uncontested divorce versus a contested divorce.
Doreen 09:26
Well, that was the next issue that I have on my list. I know is, if your case is contested, it’s going to take longer. Because although, at least in Florida, about 5% of the cases, so let’s think about that the reverse way, 95% of the cases settle. Okay, that’s based on the last stats that I looked at it’s approximate. That doesn’t mean that they’re not in litigation. It means that they settled their issues before the actual trial. So there might have been hearings motions for temporary relief depositions, all of that. But if 95% or so of the cases settle, it’s sad that people aren’t able typically to settle sooner, right? Right? To settle sooner.
Jeff 10:15
Well, I know that one thing that we’ve talked about in the past is the fee fatigue, or the emotional fatigue, or the stress fatigue, eventually people just give in to settling. And they don’t have to go through that. They can go into it, you know, a little bit more as trying to get along Kumbaya let’s settle this thing quicker, to save on the fees, to save on the emotions, to save on the stress.
Doreen 10:40
A 100%. You know, in saying that, I just want to bring up one point that came up recently, in a situation where you have to let your lawyer do their job, okay? It costs if you have a complicated contested case or just a complicated case that you’re trying to figure out, like we talked about, let your client do their job but be understanding
Jeff 11:06
The attorney. Do their job.
Doreen 11:08
What did I say? Client? Oh, I’m sorry.
Jeff 11:10
Well, the client has to do their part.
Doreen 11:12
The client has to do the job, but the lawyer should be strategizing, guiding. But it takes time, it takes effort, it takes strategy, it takes understanding as an expert the legal field, or if you’re not an expert, I’m considered an expert because I’m board certified, but a lawyer doing this, heed to your lawyer’s advice and understand these things cost time and money. So when the bill comes to you and the invoice is there, look at it, spend time, understand. Why are they spending these kind of dollars? I mean, one of the biggest complaints we get is the cost involved. And while it’s important to run a business and to maintain your gross revenue, you know, you’re selling, my widget is we’re selling legal services. Okay, that’s that. I have employees. We have, you know, people that rely on their paychecks, and you and you have rent and you have insurances, and you have all the things that run a business. Law is the same thing. And I think clients forget that this is a service. And yes, it’s not a tangible product that you can walk away and hold it and touch it or wear it or drive it. It is a service to get you through the divorce, and it costs dollars. It just does. And good lawyers are going to cross their t’s and dot their i’s, and good entrepreneurs who are lawyers are going to run an efficient firm, and that means they’re going to look for clients that pay, right? Because you have to pay your bills.
Jeff 12:49
And a side note of that we had spoken before about, when you’re with your attorney, wear your legal hat. In other words, as a client, yeah, wear your legal hat when you’re with your life coach or your therapist or whoever helped you emotionally, leave the legal stuff out of that and bring your emotions and your personal stuff to the the coaching session.
Doreen 13:15
There’s this balance that you have to deal with as a divorce attorney, which is understanding and meeting your client where they are emotionally and really recognizing where they are. Trying to get them the support and the help they need. Now, I happen to be a life coach so I can recognize signals, signs, thoughts that create results. Because remember, thoughts create feelings. Feelings create action or inaction end up in a result. So I can see thoughts they have that are delaying the process. But also, you know, when you’re with your attorney, it’s important to manage those emotions, but your lawyer is also trying to figure out who you are in the beginning of the case, where you are, so they might spend more time with you, opening up conversations, dealing with the emotions, with you. But then, really, it should be the business of divorce.
Jeff 14:18
You don’t want to be- you don’t want to spend $400 to $500 an hour being coached? You want to make sure that you’re spending your time wisely with your attorney, focusing on the case and the issues.
Doreen 14:31
Well, it makes sense, because first of all, we’re not qualified. We’re not therapists. When we have our our legal hat on, we are, we are lawyers or a legal team. And so that’s a first thing. And the second thing is, we charge more than most therapists. I’m billing out at 5-15/hour. Now I have a team, and we write and we, you know, manage the expenses for the clients by I’m kind of the captain of the boat, and then I have the crew and I assign things to the most competent team member that can handle the job with oversight as a captain does. But yeah, so what was your point?
Jeff 15:12
Well, my point is, you know, again, where your coaching at and where your case and legal issues at when you’re with your attorney.
Doreen 15:24
Get the help you need. So many people don’t think that they can afford to get support outside of their paying fees. They’re in the middle of a divorce. They’re concerned about money. I get all that. Those are very very real. Many times, circumstances. Which in coaching, a circumstance is a fact.
Jeff 15:47
A fact. And you cannot be denied, or you know.
Doreen 15:51
So those are very real facts that need to be addressed. And a lot of them involve money, and spending dollars and having that which, PS, I’ll be doing a social media little thing after this on having your own money. I don’t- it probably won’t even air until like November.
Jeff 16:11
But when evolutions- Oh go ahead.
Doreen 16:13
Hey, I was plugging my social media.
Jeff 16:15
Go for it.
Doreen 16:15
You know, TikTok, Instagram, all the things. But anyhow, okay. But oh my gosh, so much of the delay that is dealt with in divorces really has to do with the emotion that is inevitable for anyone going through a divorce, sadness, anger, fear, just to name a few, any others? Loneliness.
Jeff 16:19
I was just gonna say that a lot of people are mistaken that their emotions or their personal feelings are circumstances, and they’re more and they’re really thoughts. Really thoughts. Loneliness. There’s-
Doreen 16:49
Confusion.
Doreen & Jeff 16:51
Guilt.
Doreen 16:52
I mean, this is what the thrive- this is what the Thrive after Divorce Program focuses on is really understanding where you are in the feeling process and then working through those. I love that program for that, but, yeah, it’s like-
Jeff 17:05
I was just thinking that it’s kind of like when you go to your hairdresser, how they shoot the shit and they spill their guts out because I guess the hairdresser is-
Doreen 17:09
They should be therapists.
Jeff 17:14
They’re used to that they should be therapists, right? But they’re still being able to cut your hair. But it’s a, you know, of course, a lot less than $500 an hour. But when you go to your lawyer try to-
Doreen 17:24
Most therapists don’t charge 500 an hour.
Jeff 17:27
No, I’m talking about attorney.
Doreen 17:28
Yeah, well, and most attorneys, I mean, good attorneys, have a lot of experience, are going to be 450 up, at least in Florida. And, you know, you look at places like New York, it’s like $1,000. So don’t, you know, prolong your divorce by having long winded conversations with your lawyer that feel good. You’re telling them about your emotions. You feel that they need to understand it, and they do. We do need to have the emotions understood what’s going on. But then there’s a point where let the more professional people handle this at a lot less of dollars, so you can save money there.
Jeff 18:05
Well, I was just saying, you know, reminding everybody of the topic of this episode, because we’re trying to discuss not taking so long with the divorce. Why does it take so long? How to not prolong your divorce and get through it quicker.
Doreen 18:19
I think, I think getting a therapist and a life coach on board to deal with the emotional part of it. I wish everybody could afford it, but in the long run, it’s going to cost you less money than not having it, because you’re going to pay more in fees and time, and time is money too, so.
Jeff 18:35
So let’s dive in. Total refusal.
Doreen 18:38
Wait, wait, I had one more. I had the delay tactic.
Jeff 18:42
Oh, my goodness, go ahead with the delay tactic.
Doreen 18:43
Well, yes, we were talking about reasons that it takes so long to get divorced. Another thing is delay tactics. There are spouses that want to use to, you know, delay tactics, basically to try to, you know, rescheduling meetings not being not being available, you know, not filing the necessary paperwork on time, maybe making false accusations, filing frivolous motion. Purposely undermining the case and doing everything to just delay it. That delay is dollars, and there’s things that lawyers can do to prevent that, or you know, maybe that’s not the right word, but we can certainly try our best to prevent it, meaning we can’t prevent another person from taking certain actions, but we can certainly cut them at the knees when they do take an action. Sorry. That was blue.
Jeff 19:39
No, that wasn’t blue. That was-
Doreen 19:41
Oh, why do I keep doing that? Blue was blue was my previous, my previous dog. I keep doing that. Recently, I have blue on the mind. But that was, that was Zen. Anyhow, okay, so that was it. So let’s talk about some of the-
Jeff 19:59
Well, let’s say somebody is undermining your case, not negotiating with you. They’re refusing to work with you and cooperate with you. You know, what can you do? Because I’ve heard, I’ve heard some of my clients come to me and say, you know, they’re doing this on purpose, just to get to me.
Doreen 20:19
Well, I mean, let’s talk about before the divorce is filed, maybe you’re trying to negotiate with your spouse, which a lot of people do. They start talking about it, and they’re not cooperating. They don’t want to talk to you. They don’t want to deal with it. The next solution would be filed for the divorce. Get the person served. Tell them listen, I’ve been trying. You can do what I would consider a healthy boundary, and you could say, if we don’t discuss this and sit down and start to cooperate to try to get through this divorce as amicably as possible, I will have no choice but to hire a lawyer and file divorce papers by blank week. Now we have episodes about setting boundaries. So listen, I’m gonna do life coaching for a minute. Okay, so hold on. I’m gonna go over there. You can say to someone, why aren’t you filing the- why aren’t you- sorry. Why aren’t you sitting down with me and talking to me about the divorce? I’ve been trying to do this. You’re just avoiding blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, all the things, right? That is not going to get you anywhere. It’s probably going to cause a fight. It’s certainly not going to be cooperative in nature, depending on how you say it and it’s likely a great use of your energy and time. So when you say to someone, listen, I’ve been trying to get you to talk about this so we don’t have to hire lawyers, right? Right away, or we can try to resolve this as inexpensively as possible and cooperate. You’re not, you know, wanting to do that, here’s what I’m going to do. If you don’t sit down with me and we don’t have a game plan with timelines in place by X date, I’m going to go ahead and just file for the divorce. Don’t say- please don’t say you’re going to force me to go file for the divorce and all that. What you want to do in divorce is as hard as it is, is to keep those emotions in check. And think about the words you use, and think about the way in which you say things, because both make a difference, your expressions, your tone and the words, because it’s very easy to trigger an argument or withdraw. You know, some people withdraw if you’re not pursuing it with love and kindness. Now, I get how challenging that is.
Jeff 22:45
That can be.
Doreen 22:46
I knew you were thinking that. You’re thinking, but yeah, I can hear the listeners, “But you don’t know my soon to be ex!”
Jeff 22:52
Well, no, I’m sure everybody’s out there saying that, but you know, after you think about how, how sore your tongue is going to be from biting your tongue so much. But you have to think that what is in your best interest. Well, coming across as I’m thinking about what’s in their best interest as well. For an example, when you say, when we if we sit down and we can work this through and everything, the benefits are for you as well, explaining that they’re going to save money, they’re going to be less stressed out, they can go on with their life quicker to the better life, not just it’s for me and I can do this, and I can, you know. So if you’re coming across, I think you said with love and kindness. You know and it might be pretend love and pretend kindness.
Doreen 23:43
Hopefully not hopefully you go- hopefully do the work with us on-
Jeff 23:46
Eventually it becomes more real.
Doreen 23:49
Figure it out. Let me tell you something.
Jeff 23:50
Right, but eventually it becomes more real. But I think you have to kind of fake it till you make it when you first start. But it’s thinking of the ultimate goal, the ultimate end. I think when you do that, it’s a little bit easier to communicate with your spouse, or soon to be ex in that loving and caring tone. Tell me something.
Doreen 24:14
First of all, side note, you look very handsome today.
Jeff 24:19
Don’t do a side note, let’s do a podcast on that.
Doreen 24:23
I was just looking at you as as and we’re on YouTube so the world can see. But you have very- you look very nice.
Jeff 24:29
Well, you look amazing as always, but, and I think we can go back to every podcast I say that.
Doreen 24:36
You’re sweet. But anyhow, the question was, what?
Jeff 24:42
The question was, okay, you know, if they’re not cooperating, but you want to set yourself up for success. And I think even pre, pre, pre filing, if you see this coming, yeah, I think you can set yourself up for success.
Doreen 24:58
Absolutely.
Jeff 24:59
It’s like. It’s like, almost-
Doreen 25:00
I think that everybody-
Jeff 25:01
Can I say it? It’s almost like foreplay. It’s almost like-
Doreen 25:02
Yeah. Oh, I was just forplaying with you.
Jeff 25:07
Yeah, right. So when you, when you know it’s leading towards divorce, you can start setting kindness up. You can start setting up the the negotiation. It is hard.
Doreen 25:21
It’s hard. But you know what?
Jeff 25:22
It’s worthwhile though.
Doreen 25:26
Think about, think about how smart it is to really just try your best. Now I get also that there are certain personalities mental health- mental health issues that people have. You know, certain diagnosed mental health diagnosis that may not warrant, may not enable, even someone that has the best intentions to sit down, because it takes two to have that conversation from a good place. But let’s hope that, you know, most can and so, yeah, it’s very hard for two people to fight when one person isn’t in that fighting mode, you know? So anyhow, we kind of went off on that one.
Jeff 26:16
No, it’s good stuff. Good stuff.
Doreen 26:17
You know another thing that delays is a lot of times you’ll serve, you’ll file the petition, and the person dodges service, not a lot of times. But it happens.
Jeff 26:30
That’s a requirement in Florida, right?
Doreen 26:32
Yeah, you have to serve the the papers on the other person by a process server, or there can be an acceptance of service. So I could say, not me, but someone could say their spouse instead of me, you know, filing the having you served. Would you just accept service? Now, we do that a lot in our cases, as a lawyer on your behalf. So we’ll just try to say, hey, you know, either, if the person is not doesn’t have a lawyer yet, would you accept service? Because nobody wants, nobody wants somebody knocking on their door, lurking around trying to, you know, it’s not an it’s not a comfortable feeling. And they do, you know, because the harder it gets to serve people, the more you have to, first of all, spend because now it’s basically staking it out, finding them at the places that they’re that, you know, now we sending a picture again, showing them where they’re going so they can get them, you know.
Jeff 27:27
I thought that only happened in the movie.
Doreen 27:28
No, it doesn’t. Or like going to their office and doing it in public. No, I always try to have service done by acceptance first and then at the home, so that it’s less private and and when the children are now around as well, you know, I try to, I try to provoke that.
Jeff 27:44
Think of the word acceptance. I mean you’re, you know, you’re going through a divorce. Sooner or later, it’s going to happen. You might as well accept the fact and again, work it out between the two of you just to accept the fact and take, take the process.
Doreen 27:58
But there’s solutions too, because if someone is dodging services, they say we can do certain things legally to get around that right, right and keep things moving along. So that’s another thing. The other thing I had mentioned was filing fearless motions and legal requests, taking unwarranted positions. You know, that’s just nonsense. Look, the law is not that complicated. You know, 30 years ago, there was a lot more discretions with the courts in Florida when I started practicing. It has come to the point where, you know, there’s equal distribution of assets and liabilities. Alimony is by a guideline, statutory guidelines. Now, you punch in the numbers, the number of years, the incomes. Remember, we can always have issues about incomes and values, but assuming we don’t, and child custody issues as people generally know it, there’s a presumption now, a 50/50, time sharing, you know. So there’s not a lot to fight about. Let the lawyers do their job, let the accountants do their valuations, if you have to, and get to a table and settle.
Jeff 29:05
One thing I thought of this filing frivolous motions. And all this probably is one side being childish and maybe trying to hurt the other person, posturing for the children, but maybe for child custody.
Doreen 29:19
Yes, posturing. I don’t do that if somebody wants to file something and it’s considered frivolous, meaning they just don’t have a chance of prevailing. I don’t. I will not file that. I will not ask for that particular issue. Okay, so- Well, if you’re running into that, what are some of the solutions? Go to court. You can ask for fees and costs against a person for filing for frivolous motions, delaying, not being cooperative, all these things. I mean, there’s things you can do. You can call a status conference with the judge and say, “Hey, things are out of control here.” I mean, literally, you know, this is what I need your help with. The courts are there for you, the public. They’re there as your servants. They are people that are appointed and elected by you, the citizens, and they’re there to serve you. Part of that is managing your case.
Jeff 30:09
Yeah, but unfortunately, I know that it’s very difficult to get into the courts, right?
Doreen 30:13
Those are- no, that’s a, that’s a quick no, that’s a quick hearing.
Jeff 30:16
Oh, is it?
Doreen 30:17
That’s a quick hearing. I’m not talking an evidentiary hearing, where you have to, you know, specially set something for a day or an hour or whatever it is. These are little five minute hearings that any lawyer can, you know, competent lawyer will know to file the appropriate motion to stop people’s nonsense, get things moving.
Jeff 30:34
It’s good that we’re learning that.
Doreen 30:35
No, it’s important. So what else? Take amicable action. Well, we talked about that.
Jeff 30:44
We talked about that. I just think it’s something that you’re setting yourself up for success again, where I’m talking about pre divorce filing, you know, maybe talk to them as at one time we had a great relationship, we were in love, and you know, now the time has come where we’re not the marriage doesn’t serve us anymore. Let’s move on, like two adults, you know-
Doreen 31:09
You can try.
Jeff 31:10
You can try, but it doesn’t always work.
Doreen 31:13
I want to believe that most people come from a place of goodness, that you know, most people want to do the right thing. You know, when we’re talking about all this kindness and the way, we don’t have to love each other, we don’t have to agree with each other’s positions. We just, you know, need to have be civil and respectful. I think that the world could use personally, I think the world could use a lot of that, and our politicians could use a lot of that. You know, why? Why can’t we just agree to get disagree and move on and be civil? It’s so challenging. And I think that, you know, I don’t want to get off on it, but I think that the platforms and all of that and the news, it just, it just, it excites people to to not come together and anyhow.
Jeff 32:05
Well, it definitely is a different feeling when I’ve spoken to some of our- well, my clients that come to us with an uncontested divorce, and even though they’re they’re not happy about the divorce, but they both agree on everything. It’s so much nicer though. It’s so much more acceptable and they’re going through these certain emotions because of it, but there isn’t that much anger. There’s not that much content- contention.
Doreen 32:36
We had a case recently where represented someone and you were coaching this person and it was over within 30 days. Okay, now that’s remarkable. And these are people that had things. It wasn’t just, you know, it was. It could have, it could have gone ugly. It didn’t, and it was over quickly. And that is possible for people. It is a reality, and that’s what I really like, is my life’s mission to get you saved, to get you over the hump, to get you secure, and then to finish the divorce. You know, that’s that’s the motive.
Jeff 33:18
I think we need to say that again, just so people out there didn’t hear it.
Doreen 33:22
What?
Jeff 33:22
Under 30 days can you imagine now, divorce finishing, start to finish, under 30 days, that was amazing.
Doreen 33:29
What we do at split up is the same thing. Those are quick cases in and out and they are under $5,000 the most expensive one, I think, is what? $4900?
Jeff 33:39
You have children to deal with.
Doreen 33:41
And, yeah, you get a bunch of things, meaning that parenting plan and the marital settlement agreement and representation and advice and you know, strategic- strategy and all the things. It’s just much more condensed. When people work together, you can really get divorced with representation, you know, which is important, because a lot of people I think, well, a lot of people I know, make that mistakes when they try to represent themselves. Because they come to me and they’re like, “Yeah, I have this agreement.” But I know we do. Well, we know lots of people, but we know somebody personally that was a big issue and they’re paying for it, like, it’s just because it wasn’t written correctly, and it’s really, don’t save money on that. What’s that penny? Penny wise and pound foolish? How does it go?
Jeff 34:29
That’s a good one. Never heard that one. I heard, penny saved is a penny earned.
Doreen 34:34
Now, it’s just like, there’s certain things you want to you want to get the best.
Jeff 34:39
So when do you seek legal representation. I know that they have these do it yourself. Divorces, that I heard, you know, can be costly when it comes to mistakes. You know, so if somebody’s trying to get through a divorce quicker, does it help to hire a lawyer or help to hire legal?
Doreen 34:58
It depends. You have to hire the right lawyer. You know, we do both. We do uncontested cases through a platform, and it’s virtual and it’s very streamlined, and I have a whole department that does that, a whole, you know, and then we have the contested cases, and they fit into the box. Typically, you start off in one or the other, right? But look, the goal is to cooperate and to settle the case. So the next thing I wanted to talk about was getting through the divorce sooner is go to mediation, put some offers out there, you know, get this- get the understandings of what you’re entitled to, and tell your lawyer to make offers and see if you can get the case resolved, start the settlement negotiations.
Jeff 35:51
Required in Florida law?
Doreen 35:53
What’s that?
Jeff 35:54
That they go to mediation before anything?
Doreen 35:56
Yeah so one is just settlement discussions you can offer and have settlement discussions at any time that’s and I would have more often. I would have them more often. Try to settle. Make sure your lawyers trying to settle. Ask them, what’s your plan to settle? Just ask the questions. But sometimes people have good intentions to settle, but they need a mediator. You know someone who is typically a lawyer, many times a retired judge who handled family cases. At least here in Florida, we have amazing mediators, I could name a few right off the top that are just, you know, they have a really good track record of settling cases and have them help you to push you closer together. That’s what mediation is about. You know, you leave a mediation feeling that you gave up too much and took too little. I know that like that, but you settle your case. Nobody’s a winner in divorce, it’s a business deal. You’re gonna feel like you got some things and you didn’t get some things. You know, you won some things. You didn’t win everything. So that goes into my next thought about settling a case sooner. You know why it takes so long. Give up the small issues. You know? I mean, we were just talking about this the other day as we were preparing Jeff and I on this and I said, you know, let’s say that they have a car, and they both, they both want this car. You know. Now, normally people have two cars if they need them. In our family, we have an older car that I drive, typically, but then we have a newer car. And I like the newer car, you know, it’s a- what is it called, again?
Jeff 36:32
A defender.
Doreen 37:39
It’s fun. And and my, you know, my other card is it’s a 2015 you know, and, but it’s fine for my purposes, right? And so I keep it, but, um, I would want the- I would want the defender.
Jeff 37:52
You know, you probably want both cars.
Doreen 37:56
And I would get both cars.
Jeff 37:57
I get the bicycle.
Doreen 37:58
I don’t know if you heard that, I said, and “I would get both cars.” No, just kidding, but give up those small issues. It’s a car. If they want it, give it to them, you’re still going to get half the value of it.
Jeff 38:11
Or the famous one that you always talk about.
Doreen 38:13
The chair, the antique chairs, and they were fighting over. This is multi million dollar case, back in the day when multi millions meant something, and they were arguing over this antique chair. It was like I was a new lawyer, and I was sitting there watching this case develop in court, and the judge is like, so the only issue is a chair. And it was like, yes, but anyhow, they did. They resolved it. They resolved it. So give up the small things. Come on. Don’t hold on to the stuff. It’s just stuff. It’s just stuff. Focus on the finances for your financial future. Focus on the kids and the best schedule. Be reasonable with that, and then the rest of it, you know, you just want to make sure you’re okay and you get the best result. Sorry about that.
Jeff 39:02
That’s okay. Coda, come here, boy, girl. And by the way, you know, we had talked about the small stuff, and eventually you’re gonna move on with your life.
Doreen 39:15
Hold on one second.
Jeff 39:16
Hold on one second. Coda, come, come. Come.
Doreen 39:20
Okay sorry about that. We film at home, and y’all can see us on a video here. Can’t see coda. You got to show coda. Come on. Show Coda in the video. No, they can’t.
Jeff 39:31
Anyway, the point I was trying to make you talking about the small stuff, typically, most of our clients, and I’m sure most of the divorces you’ve done in your 30 years, they always lead into that much, much better life that they’re so much happier in the future. So you’re gonna get a better car.
Doreen 39:50
Marriages don’t just break up because there aren’t situations going on. Now, there are those where there was cheating and you know, things seem to be good, and I’ll just take that as an example, and the marriage breaks up. Okay, because therapy isn’t working or forgiveness is not available, which, PS, forgiveness is always available, but in any event, but most of the times, there’s been a lot of issues going on in the marriage, so the divorce is happening, and yes, you are going to be happier. Well, my chances are pretty good that people are going to be much happier.
Jeff 40:13
But my point is you’re going to find better love. You’re going to find you’re going to maybe have more kids. You’re going to be find a better job. Your life is going to be so thriving that you’re going to look back and say, “Thank you for the divorce because my life is so much better”. I can also say, take the damn car. I’m going to get in much better car, right? That’s my point. You know, you think that something is so important to you now that in the future is be like, take it, it’s worth pennies to me.
Doreen 41:00
Exactly, and people will hold on to these things, and it delays divorce, and it costs a lot of money to hold on to certain things and positions, you know, always do that cost benefit. I recommend, you know, if you’re, for example, you think your lawyer thinks at the highest you’ll get, you know, because there’s it like, for example. Well, let’s talk about value. Let’s say that one of you say the value of the house is 2 million, and the other one says it’s 2,000,100. Okay, so that would mean $50,000 extra to each party, $100,000 difference, okay, and $50,000 is a lot of money. Okay? And let’s assume that they’ve decided that the wife is going to keep the house. She’s going to stay there primarily with the children, you know. They want, they want the consistent, consistency of the home, you know, so wife can afford it, etc, $100,000, 50,000 each. And you try to compromise that, because it’s, it’s not a huge money amount. It sounds big, but when you look at how much it costs to go to trial, you know, if you can compromise 25 difference, and now you’re down to, it’s going to be a lot less expensive than going to trial. Trial is expensive. 50 grand is not unusual when you go to a trial for a day or two days, because there’s depots and there’s preparation and there’s all the things don’t spend your money on lawyers. Okay, good lawyers should be busy enough. And yeah.
Jeff 42:36
Again, I think the thing that we talked about earlier to finish up proper planning and preparation promotes peak performance. You know, those are the six P’s, right? So when you know divorce is inedible and inevitable, plan, get your financial documents in order get your things that you want to talk about in order get your- so the better prepared you are, the less-
Doreen 43:01
Yeah there’s a lot of delay going on because people, there’s a lot of documents that have to get provided. It’s called financial disclosure. In Florida, there’s a financial affidavit, mandatory disclosure. You usually get served with these things called request to produce interrogatories. If these are larger cases, small cases, you don’t even have a lot of that, another reason to go for an uncontested, easy divorce. You know, you can waive 90% or sometimes all of the financial disclosure. Now, as lawyers, we’re a little concerned, because we want to, we’re we have to advise you as to what you’re entitled to. So we have to have some understanding of the finances. And, you know, cross our T’s, dot our i’s, but yeah, it’s so many times people just can’t get their organization of the records together. One of the things that I think we do in our office well, is we have somebody on team who’s an accountant, and she works very closely with the clients to know what is the client’s aptitude for collecting records, understanding finances, filling out a financial affidavit, trying to get them to do more of it, will streamline the case. But some people need more help, and that’s okay too. You know, we just had a lady come in recently and she, you know, needed help getting online and getting her records. And that’s you know, that just takes more time, but you do what you need to do.
Jeff 44:24
Well, you’re helping them.
Doreen 44:25
It’s a long episode, sorry.
Jeff 44:27
Well, I have one final question.
Doreen 44:29
Will you marry me? Been there done that.
Jeff 44:33
No. My question is, if you’ve been a divorce attorney for now 30 years, how in the heck did you practice law when you were 10 years old?
Doreen 44:40
Hahaha very funny.
Jeff 44:42
All right, everybody. Well, have an amazing week, and we’ll see you soon.
Doreen 44:45
We’ll see you soon. Oh, listen and come visit us on social media channels. You know absolutely, life after divorce coaching has its own channels.
Jeff 44:55
That’s on YouTube, life after divorce. If you want to watch us on, YouTube. And then we’re also on Instagram, Facebook, or you can go to our website as well, which is LAD-coaching.com
Doreen 45:08
And then I have my own social media stuff going on. So go, go check me out there, because I’ll give you some tidbits and thoughts about divorce if you’re interested, and just life in general. All right everybody, have an amazing week. Be kind to yourself and others, and we will talk to you and see you next week.
Jeff 45:25
Bye. You have the vision of what you want your life to look like after divorce, but maybe you just don’t know how to get there. So if you’re ready to take control of your life and want to find out more about our coaching, visit us at LAD-coaching.com that’s LAD as in LAD-coaching.com
Doreen 45:54
Until next time, have an amazing rest of your day, and remember, yes, you can-
Doreen & Jeff 46:03
Have an amazing life after divorce.
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