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| The Basics | No-fault divorce leaves fewer financial scars
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If the honeymoon is really over, divorce software packages can save a lot of money in attorney's fees. But the split must be amicable and can't involve young children.
By Tom Taulli
"The judge says keep her, I think its cheaper, than makin' whoopee."
-- Gus Kahn
We all know the grim odds. Half of all marriages will end in divorce. Over a million couples will split this year.
The Adamses have just joined the club. After 15 good years together, and two happy, healthy kids, Joe and his wife Jane decided they could no longer make a go of it.
While the split was wrenching, it was at least amicable. There were few assets: Joe and Jane quickly agreed on who would get what and how much Joe would contribute in child support. End of story? No way.
After interviewing some lawyers, the couple discovered that their simple divorce would cost $2,000 at a minimum, probably closer to $3,000.
Joe and Jane went looking for a better way, without a lawyer.
The Internet seemed like a great place to look for help, and soon Joe found Divorce Online. It offers a lot of solid advice and information on divorce and chat lines for users, but no clues on how to get divorced lawyer-less.
DivorceNet is another useful site for the soon-to-be divided, which has plenty of information that is state specific. It also includes a directory of attorneys near you. But it has nothing on the do-it-yourself divorce.
Finally, Joe stumbled on a software package from one of the biggest publishers of legal self-help books in the United States. Price: $29.95. Joe snapped it up.
Its cheap, but it isnt easy
Following the kits instructions to the letter, Joe gathered the necessary documents -- tax returns, bank statements and so on -- and filled out the appropriate forms. He took his time and proceeded carefully.
But near the end he hit some snags. The kit did not include some forms specific to his home state of Florida. And he wasnt sure where to get them and how to fill them out. His $29.95 kit could only take him so far.
Blame the lawyers, blame the courts, blame society. None of them wants to make it easy, or cheap, to get divorced.
The appearance-challenged truth is that even in this open information age, unless you have the tenacity of a pit bull, you will still need a lawyer to get you through a divorce.
In most cases, thats probably healthy. When in the throes of a divorce, most folks are not in a good state of mind and prone to bad decisions. Your attorney can be your champion, fighting for your rights, and will have expertise in the legal system.
Lawyers can de-fang predatory spouses
We all know of cases where one strong-willed spouse tries to give the financial shaft to his or her mate, only to be rescued by a bomber lawyer who gives the louse his or her comeuppance.
What's more, divorce law is evolving. For example, alimony is becoming less common (20% of today's divorces include it). There are the complexities of determining health insurance coverage (usually the policy is in the name of one spouse). What about the spouse's stock options and retirement funds? How are these divided? Lawyers encounter these kinds of problems every day.
Still, that doesn't mean you don't have to buy your lawyer a Mercedes to get your divorce, especially in cases like the Adamses.
Some lawyers will help do-it-yourselfers
As Joe found out, however, legal software can demystify the system and save a lot of expensive time. In fact, the odds are high that your own attorney also is using legal software (if not, you might want to retain another one who does).
According to Altman, Weil, a management consulting firm, the average attorney spent about $4,400 on technology in 1996. With about 700,000 attorneys (a scary thought), this amounts to $3 billion per year. A good chunk of that spending goes for legal software.
There are a number of programs geared for the layman that will at least permit you to reduce an attorneys billable hours. But as Joe discovered, there is only so far most of us can go. How far depends a lot on the local courts attitude toward do-it-yourselfers.
In Joes case, he paid for about two hours of an attorneys time. She turned out to be very supportive of his attempt to do his own divorce, provided him with suggestions and looked over the documents he filled out. And then she encouraged him to march right into that courthouse and file his papers.
Total cost for the split: $229.95
Joe was nervous. Would the court accept his work? Would he get laughed out of the room? Indeed, when he talked to the clerk, she gave him a hard time. She mentioned that other people had tried to do their own divorces, but all had done them incorrectly. Then she shut up and looked over the documents. To her surprise, everything was in order.
Then Joe went before the judge, who gave him an exasperated look, expecting a lot of headaches. But when the judge looked over the documents, he, too, found everything OK. It took only five minutes before he signed off on the divorce. That was all there was to it. In all, Joe spent $200 on an attorney and $29.95 on the software kit.
You may not get off as cheaply as Joe, but even divorce lawyers admit that a small investment in software can pay big dividends.
According to Rick Snider, an attorney who deals with many warring spouses, software will help you define the issues and tell you how to organize necessary information for an attorney. That alone will significantly cut the number of billable hours.
Also, legal software will shed light on the divorce process -- thus making it less scary.
The software divorce
There are several kits offering do-it-yourself divorce software, but there are generally strict requirements:
- The divorce must be uncontested. This means that both spouses agree on basically everything. Or, the spouse may be missing (in which case, the spouse is divorced by default).
- There are no minor children (Custody and child support are complex legal decisions).
- The property is easy to divide. If you have a sizable estate, then you need legal advice.
- There is no need for financial support from your spouse (such as alimony).
Legal forms to fill out
Generally, the forms included in the kits meet the legal requirements for all states and include the following:
- Financial affidavit: This form allows the court to ascertain the reasonableness of the financial agreement.
- Notice of hearing: When a date is set for a court hearing, some states mandate that both parties receive notification, which is done with the notice of hearing.
- Final judgment or decree: This makes the divorce final once signed by the judge.
- Answer and affidavit in support of judgment: In some states, so long as the divorce is uncontested, you can use this form to waive formal service by summons.
Basically, this document submits your spouse to the jurisdiction of the court and thus means he or she acknowledges the validity of the divorce and any related court orders. In other words, the document makes divorce easier (in fact, once the spouse signs the document, he or she need not participate any further in the divorce).
- Certificate of corroborating witness: This document affirms -- under oath -- that you resided within the state long enough to qualify for a divorce in the state.
- Marital settlement agreement: This is the big one. This document sets forth the terms of what you and your spouse have agreed on.
- Divorce complaint or petition: This is the formal request to terminate your marriage. States vary tremendously. The software does not provide any forms for this, but gives advice on how to prepare one.
- Child custody jurisdiction: This determines whether the court has proper jurisdiction pertaining to the children (this form is required by all states because of the Uniform Child Custody Jurisdiction Act).
- Certificate of divorce or marriage dissolution: This document is mandated in many states when a final divorce is granted (since this document is state specific, it is not included in the software).
Other useful legal packages
There are other software programs that offer family legal help and that cover such issues as separation, custody, premarital agreements and other aspects of divorce. The best after divorce is Quicken Family Lawyer, part of the Quicken 2002 suite ($99.95). It is available on CD-ROM and requires a minimum of 24MB of RAM and 145MB of hard-drive space.
Divorcing couples will find a lot of useful advice, a legal dictionary and a whole host of forms in the software. One nice feature is the Document Advisor Interview.
As the name implies, you answer a variety of questions, such as: Do you rent? Are you married? Do you have a trust? Do you have kids? The software will process this information and then indicate what types of agreements you should consider.
Unfortunately, there are not enough documents for a do-it-yourself divorce. "Our attorneys are very conservative," says Lynn Jahn, director of legal software development for Intuit. "We don't want any loose issues with our forms."
Moral: Even at a cheap price, divorce can be an expensive proposition. And no software package is going to ask you the first thing a decent lawyer will: "Are you really sure you want to go through with this?"
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