Tips for Your Uncontested Divorce

Speaker 1 (00:07):

Welcome everyone to Divorce Team Radio sponsored by the divorce and family law firm of Merriweather and Tharp. I'm your host, Todd Orton, and here you're going to learn about divorce, family law and from time to time even tips on how to save your marriage if it's in the middle of a crisis. If you want to read more about us, you can always check us out online@atlantadivorceteam.com. Alright, let's get started. So today, let me start by saying, of course divorce is unfortunate, but we all know that for too many people it's a reality and if you've gone onto our website, if you've looked at Merriweather and Thorpe, a message we repeat over and over again is that divorce hurts, but it doesn't have to be nasty.

(01:00):

Well, today's show is about it not being nasty. It's about a concept that people call about all the time. People will call all the time and they'll say, this is going to be an uncontested divorce. We're going to file as an uncontested divorce when we file, we're going to check that box, send that to the court and it's going to be uncontested. Well, what does that really mean? The problem, and I've talked about this before, it is an oftentimes misused and misunderstood term. I mean, if you're listening, if you're considering going through a divorce, if you're thinking that you want your divorce to be uncontested, you're not alone.

(02:01):

Many people, and I mean many will call and they'll talk about uncontested divorces. My spouse and I are talking, we agree on everything. We want to file this as an uncontested divorce. The problem is a few questions in and it is very clear that the case is not uncontested, at least not yet, and that does not mean, don't get me wrong, that does not mean, and I'm not saying that the exact opposite is true, that it's now going to be a big fight, that there's going to be prolonged litigation, higher costs, it's going to take longer to resolve everything. That's not what I'm saying.

(03:05):

I don't like the term because what the term means to most people versus what the term means to judges and court staff and attorneys is very different uncontested. What that means when you check that box, what you're really saying to the court is that my spouse and I have already discussed everything. We have negotiated all of the terms. We have drafted documents that reflect that agreement. Everything is ready to go. We have either already filed the agreement and all the other supporting documents or we're about to, and we are ready to take a final, we are ready to present those final documents to the court for approval, which will then make their way into a final order. That's what you're saying to the court, but that's not what most people think.

(04:11):

What most people think, and I figure this out usually 30 seconds into the conversation, is that uncontested means we want this to be amicable, that we are communicating that we do see eye to eye on a lot of these issues. We have not yet fleshed out all of the issues. We have not yet finalized documents, but it is our expectation that we don't want to fight and we're going to reach an agreement and that's great. Coming from someone where we are Merriweather and Tharp, we are a resolution focused firm. I am an attorney. I am very resolution focused.

(05:01):

So going into the process with an open mind and a desire to resolve rather than just fight great, but it's not uncontested, not yet every single case, if you look at it through that lens, every single case is going to be contested until it's uncontested. I don't care if you're going to reach an agreement within 20 minutes of a conversation until the agreement is reached, the documents are prepared and signed off and you're ready to take that final, it's still contested, IE, you don't have that agreement, you're not ready to take the final. So if that's the case, don't be by the fact that you now have to define your case as a contested case. You're going to if you are communicating and we're going to get into some tips, but if you're communicating, if you're doing all the right things to try and keep things amicable, you're going to get there whether you need help or not to get there, that's a different story, but you're going to get there.

(06:23):

The vast majority of cases do. So saying it's contested, it just means you're not ready to walk into court, you're not ready to present all of those things necessary to obtain that final judgment to CRA divorce. And that's what uncontested means, that you have reached an agreement on all terms, it resolves all the issues related to the divorce. You've prepared and executed and signed all the required documents, filed them with the court or you're about to, and you're ready to stand in front of a judge and say, we've given you everything. Please grant the divorce.

(07:07):

So as long as you go into a case you're agreeable, you are going to work in good faith and do what is necessary, then you're like I said, you're going to get there. So how do you have an uncontested case? Well, it's going to take work and I'm going to go into some of the things, some of the work that needs to be done, but it's going to take work and it's going to take communication. It's going to take basically patience and the problem with divorce and anyone listening who has gone through it is about to go through it. You know that sometimes even the simplest of things can be complicated because of emotions. When you're going through a divorce, oftentimes there's emotion and I can't sit here and tell you to ignore it. I can't tell you to pretend like you're not emotional about the fact that you have to go through a divorce. But I am going to say for purposes of trying to get through this process, you need to work through those emotions, kind of shelve them for a period. At the very least, you need to make sure you are not allowing those emotions to cloud judgment. And we've talked about that as well.

(08:47):

You can't have it both ways, right? You can't be super angry, super frustrated and call an attorney and say, I think this is be uncontested. Well, you can as long as you are not allowing those feelings to affect your negotiations. So this show is going to be about uncontested divorce. If you're about to call me and say, Todd uncontested divorce, then I want you to know, and we've talked about it now, what that means, and I want to set your expectations and I want to give you some tools so that if you're going down that path, you're going to be successful.

(09:40):

So when we come back, that's what I'm going to do. We're going to start with some tips. I'm going to give you some tips about or that relate to how to approach if you're trying to accomplish an uncontested divorce. I'm going to give you five tips on how you should be approaching this sort of a logical, organized way to approach the divorce so that you are setting yourself up for a success, setting yourself up to accomplish that uncontested divorce that you are calling about. Because too many people, if they don't, I can tell you right now, they say it's uncontested. They don't do the paperwork right? They go to court, the court sends them away because things weren't done properly, or they wake up and they're like, huh, I just entered into an agreement and I regret those terms and I don't want that to happen. When we come back, we're going to hit you with those tips and then we're going to keep talking about how to achieve an uncontested divorce.

Speaker 2 (10:52):

I just wanted to let you know that if you ever wanted to listen to the show live, you can listen at 1:00 AM on Monday mornings on WSB, so you can always check us out there as well.

Speaker 1 (11:03):

Better than counting sheep, I guess, right? That's right. You can turn on the show and we'll help you fall asleep.

Speaker 2 (11:10):

There you go. I'll talk

Speaker 1 (11:11):

Very soft.

(11:15):

Welcome back everyone to Divorce Team Radio, a show sponsored by the Divorce and family Law firm of Merriwether and Tharp. I'm your host, Todd Orton, and if you want to read more about us, you can check us out online@atlantadivorceteam.com or if you want to read a transcript of this or other shows or go back and listen to shows again, you can find them@divorceteamradio.com. So today we're talking about uncontested divorce and the fact I started with the fact that it is a oftentimes misused misunderstood term. They equate it to we don't want to fight, we're going to work together to reach an agreement when really what uncontested means is we have that agreement, we've identified the issues, agreed on terms, and even if you're doing it on your own and you're telling the court it's uncontested that the agreement's done.

(12:19):

So that's what a lot of people think. Unfortunately, that's not what uncontested means, meaning that, hey, we just don't want to fight. It means everything's done. So now I want to give you five tips on how to achieve an uncontested divorce, meaning how to be successful if that's the path you are going down. So let's start with number one, communication. If you and your spouse are going to try and do things in an uncontested manner to have an uncontested divorce, there has to be communication, healthy communication. This goes back to the need to put aside that anger. Number two, both parties need to be approaching this and with a desire for there to be a level playing field. No power dynamic issues, meaning there's no duress, there's no pressure, there's no nothing. You need to go into this wanting to engage in good faith. Too many times it doesn't happen and what was uncontested is suddenly no longer uncontested.

(13:54):

Number three, education. You need to educate yourself. There may be very few issues in your case, rarely are there no issues, but you need to educate yourself about the law, about the issues in your case. I mean, you need to understand what is going to be reasonable if custody is an issue, you need to educate yourself about custody. If child support needs to be paid, you need to educate yourself about how child support is handled here in Georgia. If this is where you are, if you're in another state, of course you need to look to the laws of that state.

(14:42):

You need to educate yourself. You are making decisions that will affect you for potentially years to come. Custody issues, child support issues, alimony, obligations, and of course division of property and debt. So you must educate. Then four, you can engage and need to engage in issue spotting or issue identification. Now you know the four core areas. If you don't have kids, alright, you don't have to deal with custody, you don't have to deal with child support. Identify the issues. Is alimony going to be an issue in your case if no, great move on to division of property and debt.

(15:37):

Deal with the specifics In your case, what are the issues going to be? Oh, I was in the military, we've been married for 10 plus years. That's going to be an issue. We have to identify and deal with that. I have retirement. He or she has a pension. Hey, there's separate property and there's marital property components to some of the property that needs to be divided. Then number five is going to be drafting. So it's exactly what it sounds like. It's great. You have good communication, you are approaching it in a good faith manner. You've educated yourself, you've identified the specific issues, you've reached an agreement, great, but now it needs to be drafted and drafted properly, drafted correctly.

(16:34):

If you don't do it correctly, you need to understand the court could very well reject what you file, especially when you're dealing with custody and parenting time. But even if it's not related to those things, and even if the court doesn't reject what you filed because the court isn't going to look using the same magnifying glass when you're dealing with division of property and alimony, you could be saddled with terms that are not fair to you simply because you didn't do those other things and it needs to be drafted correctly. You don't want to file it, draft it, file it, and then wake up a week later and go, what did I do?

(17:22):

What I thought I wrote in there? That's not what that says. Oh my goodness, and I've seen that before. Hey, we agreed to something and then the other party is filing a contempt going, yeah, you're supposed to do something else. Well, that's not what the agreement was and we look at it and we go, yeah, but that's what you wrote. So you have be correct. You have to be accurate. You have to really be aware when you are drafting and memorializing the agreement to make sure you're not making mistakes. Okay, now let's jump back to communication.

(18:07):

If you're not speaking, how can you have an uncontested divorce? You have to be able to communicate communication. It needs to be healthy, it needs to be respectful. Remember what an uncontested divorce is. You are trying to sort of circumvent all of the stress and strife and conflict and you're basically saying, Hey, whatever we feel about one another, now let's try and put that to the side and do this amicably. Let's get through this and hopefully we save time, money, effort, emotional impact, all of that. So to do it, you need to start with good respectful communication.

(18:56):

That's the only way you're going to be able to avoid the emotional and financial cost of litigation. Remember, agreement is defined as a negotiated arrangement between parties as to a course of action or another definition, a meeting of the minds. That's not a dictate, that's not one party saying, this is what we're going to do, sign here. You have to be able to communicate things may be emotional, you need to put that aside, that's natural, but you need to put it aside. So that's the first thing you need to accomplish. If you're sitting at the kitchen table or you're about to, you need to look at them and you need to say, look, we need to put all the other stuff aside for a moment and let's commit to one another. We're going to communicate if we can do that, we can move on to other steps and we can talk about terms and hopefully reach an agreement, draft everything up and get this done. If you're on the same page when it comes to that, you're going to put yourself in a position where untested divorce is possible and that's going to set you up well for that next issue, which is the good faith negotiations.

(20:30):

If you're communicating, that means both of you feel comfortable saying, Hey, what about X? What about Y? And you're not pressuring me, I'm not pressuring you. So that next step is the good faith approach, negotiating on a level playing field, not allowing power and control and all of that to try and influence what you're accomplishing. So that second component, we're going to go into a little bit more detail after the break. That becomes incredibly important. I have seen negotiations cases where we handle them, cases where the parties try to start things in an uncontested way, negotiating themselves fall apart completely simply because someone was trying to exert some level of control over the process and over the person. You want it to be amicable. You want an uncontested divorce, then you can't do that. And when we come back, I'm going to go into a lot more detail about that and these other tips, we'll be right back. Hey everyone, you're listening to our podcast, but you have alternatives, you have choices. You can listen to us live also at 1:00 AM on Monday morning on WSB.

Speaker 2 (22:03):

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Speaker 3 (22:12):

Show.

Speaker 1 (22:15):

Welcome back everyone to Divorce Team Radio, sponsored by divorce and family Law firm of Meriwether and Tharp. I'm Todd Warton, the partner at Merriweather and Arp, and if you want to read more about us, check us out online@atlantadivorceteam.com or if you want to read transcripts or listen to shows, again, go to divorce team radio.com. I also wanted to let you know that if you ever want to listen to the show live, you can listen at 1:00 AM on Monday mornings on wsb. Alright, so we're talking about uncontested divorce and we talked about communication. I mean the five tips that we're going to go into communication, well, you have to go in, like I was saying, good faith negotiations are mandatory. It's important for obvious reasons. If you go in demanding the moon, it's unlikely the other party's going to accept the offer and agree, if you're trying to do this in an uncontested way, obviously you have your own interests, you're trying to accomplish certain things you think will benefit you well, so is the other party. It's not the time for game playing. You never in any context with an attorney, without an attorney contested, uncontested, you shouldn't be playing games. But if you're trying to do this in an uncontested way, that certainly is not the time. It's not the time. Try and exert your influence to force an agreement to take advantage of any power dynamic issues between you and your spouse.

(23:57):

Usually that only pushes the parties farther away. You have to assume that if you push too hard that other party is going to wake up and say, you know what? Maybe I need to talk to somebody and then game on. They get an attorney, you feel you need to get an attorney. What was uncontested is now potentially hotly contested and it is very likely avoidable. So you need to enter into these negotiations in good faith and remember an agreement. It's a mutual negotiated resolution. As with any agreement you need to give to get you go into this process, really any process expecting you're going to get everything you want. Going in with that feeling and that thought of I deserve everything, then this is not an uncontested case and you shouldn't call an attorney or call anyone and say, Hey, it's going to be uncontested by the way. I want everything.

(25:16):

Is your spouse on board with that giving you everything? No. Okay, that's not uncontested. So you need to go into the process in good faith, and by that I mean with an open mind open to discussing settlement options. Understand again, if I am willing to give something, maybe I will get something in return. Don't get me wrong, I am not about the one-way road. I'm not trying to tell you that if the other party is making all the demands and you're just making all the concessions that that's good, healthy, advisable. But you need to go in thinking, I may not get everything. I really want the master bedroom set. I really want the living room set and the dining room table and that gigantic big screen TV we bought for the Super Bowl.

(26:24):

But I'm fairly certain that my spouse is going to want at least one of those things, maybe two. So if you go in demanding everything, understand you are increasing the likelihood, the other side is going to say no, and this is not a specific issue. I'm telling you, you need to sort of wire your brain as you start the conversation. When I say negotiate in good faith, I'm talking about just your overall approach. Go in just knowing this is the way it's going to play out. I'm going to have to be generous on some points, make some demands on other issues. And if you do that, you're going to position yourself to have not just an easy divorce, but potentially it can be uncontested. So that's that. Now let's talk about one near and dear to our heart. Education. So, so important. It's why if you go to Merriweather, andt, Tharp's website, we have thousands of pages of free information. Why we are constantly tweaking the website or even changing it just to make the information easier to get to adding more. It's why we do this show. It's why we have an intake system where people call and can talk directly to attorneys because we know the importance of education.

(28:10):

Education, how can you make decisions if you don't have data, if you don't have information necessary to make those decisions. So if you're going to handle this on your own, meaning you're going to do the negotiating directly with your spouse, you have to educate yourself if you don't understand not just the terms, right? We always break things down. Four core areas, custody issues, child support, alimony, division of property and debt. If you're doing this on your own, going to an attorney and on a silver platter handing terms to the attorney saying, yep, here's our agreement. Because remember, that's an uncontested case.

(28:58):

If you're going to do that, you need to do it correctly. You need to know what the issues are. The information is out there. Like I said, website, podcasts, books, consults with attorneys. But I can't tell you how many times people, like I said, also will call us uncontested. Okay? And in two minutes I've asked them about, alright, well what does custody look like? Legal custody, physical custody, pickup times, summer holidays, child support. Have you run the numbers? Have you run the calculation? Have you done your domestic relations, financial affidavits? How about a child support addendum? No, no, no, no, no. Okay, division of property. How about that? Have you identified all the different assets? Are some of those assets qualified accounts? Are you going to have to do a Quadro QDRO, qualified domestic relations order in order to be able to divide the asset without there being any tax or penalties for removing money from the account?

(30:13):

Those are all things that need to be addressed, and if you're not having someone do it for you, you need to educate yourself because I can tell you right now when it comes to the custody and child support custody, the court is going to make sure what you are agreeing to is in the children's best interest. Therefore, you need to educate yourself about what that looks like. We've done shows on that child support. You must strictly comply with Georgia law. You need to run the calculation. If it says child support is $427 and you say, yeah, but I'll agree to 426, the court will reject it.

(31:00):

And if you don't have a legal basis to reduce or change the amount required by Georgia Law, if it's 4 27, you can't even buy agreement. Just say, well, but we're going to do 4 26. There are some things you can do. You can consider deviations, but you have to follow the law. You have to do what is necessary to convince the court that you are complying with the law, even with this deviation that changes the child support obligation. But if you don't educate yourself, you're going to join a long, long line of people who didn't educate themselves, tried to do it on their own and presented the court with documents that were rejected. I have seen people, I swear I've been in court where the parties stand up and the judge is like, sir, ma'am, whatever it is, this is the third time you've been here. I'm sorry these documents are not done correctly. I will not sign off on these documents and incorporate them into a final judgment. Come back when they're done correctly. Well, what did I do wrong? The court is not here to advise you as to how these documents need to be filled out so the court will reject improperly prepared documents.

(32:27):

Alright, when we come back, I'm going to issue or address rather the last two issues. Number one, issue spotting and identification and then drafting. Two also along with education, incredibly important points. And if you do all five of these, remember you are setting yourself up for success. When we come back, we'll jump into issue spotting and drafting. Be right back.

Speaker 2 (32:58):

I just wanted to let you know that if you ever wanted to listen to the show live, you can listen at 1:00 AM on Monday mornings, WSB, so you can always check us out there as well.

Speaker 1 (33:09):

Better than counting sheep, I guess, right? That's right. You can turn on the show and we'll help you

Speaker 2 (33:15):

Fall asleep. There you go. I'll talk

Speaker 1 (33:17):

Very

Speaker 3 (33:18):

Softly.

Speaker 1 (33:22):

Welcome back everyone. I'm Todd. This is Divorce Team Radio, a show sponsored by Meriwether and Park. If you want to read more about us, you can always check us out online@atlantadivorceteam.com. You want to read transcripts, listen to other shows, divorce team radio.com. So we're talking about uncontested divorce and how to do that successfully. You can't just call an attorney or call someone and say, or even go into court and say it's uncontested. Okay, high five, everyone, we're done. We're done here. Mission accomplished. I know it sounds like I'm making light. This is a very serious topic. I get it. But you can't take that position, you can't have that attitude because as I was saying before the break, I've seen people walk into court numerous times presenting documents that were improperly prepared and it gets rejected. They're taking day after day after day off work to go to court to do this. I've also seen the other side, the flip side where they try and do it themselves and that's fine, but they didn't educate themselves, they didn't negotiate in good faith. They didn't do some of these other things and they're looking at me going, I agreed to this and this is terrible. So what can we do to change it? Oftentimes the answer is nothing.

(34:54):

You agreed to this, you presented the court with the signed, executed final documents and it's now been incorporated into a final order. It's too late. You may not like the terms, but they are the terms you agreed to. So we talked about communication, we talked about good faith negotiations, we've talked about these things, educating yourself, how important that is. Now let's get granular meaning now you understand you guys are in a position to talk. You feel like you're going to negotiate fairly with another. You have both educated yourselves about the issues related to your case, generally speaking. Now let's talk about the next step. Now, what you and your spouse should be doing is issue spotting. Which of those four core relate and pertain to your case?

(36:03):

What are the issues that have to be resolved? Okay, you've already agreed it's going to be every other weekend, Friday to Sunday, maybe a Wednesday dinner, maybe you've agreed to a joint physical custody arrangement, week on, week off, midweek dinner for the other party or overnight. Okay, that's fine. The parenting plan order is going to require more. That's a great start. But now you need to talk about, okay, what about pickup time? Drop off time? What about communication? Meaning as co-parenting communication goes, maybe there are tools that you can use. Let's get that into the order that will help you communicate and co-parent. What about the holidays?

(36:54):

Hey, there's kids you need to deal with child support. Okay, gross income for the parties. Are there any extraordinary expenses that need to be included? Is it deviation going to apply? You need to identify those things. Hey, each is going to keep their own property. Okay, great. I've seen people get burned by that. They put general language in that says everything in wife's possession is wife's everything in husband's possession is husband's. And after the fact, they realized that a prized collection of something is still at the house occupied by the other party. And what do you think their argument becomes later on? That was in my possession. We said everything that was in my possession at the time of execution of the agreement is mine. Spot those issues. Identify where the friction points are. Figure out in more detail now. Now that generally, if there's no kids, you already know, okay, we don't have to deal with kids, don't have to deal with child support. We both work. No alimony. Okay, we know it's a property and debt case. Is there a joint credit card? Is it going to be paid off? Who's going to be responsible? What happens if the person responsible fails to make a payment and it could impact the other person's credit?

(38:24):

There's a house. Somebody gets to stay there for six months. What happens if coexisting for an extensive period of time doesn't work? Do you have a means for the party who gets to keep the house to basically ask the other one to leave? It's time to, at that point get granular to really get into these specifics. Because an uncontested divorce, if there are issues, meaning if it's literally no kids know nothing, we have nothing. You go your way, I go my way, then there's not a lot that can go wrong. But if there are issues and you're still trying to handle this in an uncontested way, great, but that's where things can go wrong, where you can miss things. You have to be careful, you have to be good. You have to make sure you're not missing details that need to be included. And going back to custody and parenting time and child support, especially there, there are a lot of ins and outs and nuances and terms that can and should be included. And if you don't put them in, they can come back and bite you. So I don't want that to happen. That's why I'm doing the show. That's why I'm telling you these things. And again, I'm trying to set you up for successful negotiations with your spouse if that's the path you're going. So with the time remaining, let's talk about the last part of the process.

(40:14):

Drafting it is the last part because you really shouldn't jump in. That should not be, okay, I pulled up a settlement agreement. Let's fill it out. It should be you go through all the steps, talk about the intention to work on things. I'm going to negotiate, we're going to negotiate and are negotiating in good faith. So you have the communication, you have the good faith negotiations, you deal with everything, you educate yourselves, all of that. So now it's time to draft. If you go to an attorney, if you came to us and you said uncontested divorce, and now you've listened to the show, you understand what that means, great. What do you think we're asking for? We're asking for all of the terms so that we can do the drafting.

(41:10):

We're going to take those terms. We are going to reduce them to the agreements, the orders that are required, custody, we're going to do that. Parenting plan, child support. We'll fill out the worksheets, we'll do basically everything. The child support, addendum, all the other issues, settlement agreement. That's when we are. So don't think, I mean, unless it's very basic, don't think you need to just get the agreement and all the final forms done first. Of course not. Sit down kitchen table, reach an agreement, identify the issues, and then reduce it to writing. And there are several ways to handle this. You can do everything from scratch. I don't advise it and it doesn't even make sense. There are forms online.

(42:10):

Number two, you can pull forms and try and draft everything yourself. Are there companies online where you can buy forms? Yes. Some of them I would say aren't really worth the paper they're written on, but they're basic. And as long as you are careful, you can modify and amend and add or delete whatever doesn't apply or needs to be included. So you can pull the forms that way. Some counties have forms online. Again, very, very basic. But if you have a basic case, maybe that doesn't matter. And there are some firms like ours where you can go and yes, basically as part of other packages, basically we're going to give you all the forms.

(43:04):

That's for a lawyer and for the law firm, it's not about the forms, it's about offering you the help of an attorney to make sure you're doing things correctly. So the last part is, of course you can take, now you've done all the hard work, all the heavy lifting, you can take all that information to an attorney and say, here you go, silver platter. Prepare all the final documents. And the attorney will then, as a Scrivener, draft everything up, make sure it's done correctly, hopefully everything's been dealt with. And the next thing you know, you're getting all the final documents that both you and your spouse can sign. That's how to present an uncontested divorce to an attorney. And that's what's going to result in a lower cost because there's no litigation. And if you do it that way, of course, and maybe I'm biased, you're going to know it's done correctly. You're going to know if there are any whammies. It's been identified and communicated to you. I hope this helped. Thanks so much for listening.