What was the cost of your "Contested" Divorce?

Mmitchtexas · 2025-04-28T20:06:12+00:00

30K right now and just started a fresh post divorce custody suit.

Thats just lawyers fees, not including property loss, childs support, etc.

Dapper-Ant-113 · 2024-03-29T20:24:35+00:00

900k.

Long story short, you are buying your way out of indentured servitude/slavery. What is the rest of your life worth to you?

Have you ever heard the old joke, “Why is divorce so expensive? Because it’s worth it.”

And it was worth every damn penny…

LVDivorced23 · 2024-03-28T02:37:10+00:00

Mine was about $18.5K, after a fee reduction discount for the balance to pay in one lump sum from $16K down to about $7,500 after already paying a $2,000 retainer and $500 a month for 1.5 years (18 * $500=$9,000).

Edit: After about a year and half, I started to do a "Return on Investment" (ROI) method to figure out if it was worth fighting for X, Y, and Z. In the end the things I wanted were not worth fighting for since I already had shared (50/50) custody of my kids.

ADHD_247 · 2024-03-28T02:23:18+00:00

I'm at 70k and unemployed SAHD who looked after the kids.

brettfish5 · 2024-03-27T17:13:55+00:00

Plan on paying the $300 for the dissolution and be done with it. Fortunately she's somewhat sane and we're working through the split amicably. I've been the only one working, so I'm definitely not trying to give any of my hard earned money to two lawyers.

HerbEverstanks · 2024-03-27T16:24:24+00:00

826k including lost house lawyer fees, me paying part of her lawyer fees, and spousal support. Not done paying lawyer fees yet. 10 years of me paying for everything.

So when asked the question was the affair worth it for her? It sure was.

Just posted this same thing 11 days ago.

Edit - no kids and she has 16 years of work experience and an associates degree, but now somehow can't work any job. She is healthy enough to have sex with multiple other guys tho.

My average income for the 1st 5 years of marraige was about 37k and about 115k for the last 5 years. Unfortunately, court's look at your last paystub - even after 3 judges and her having 4 lawyers. The laws let her have as many liars (<---- lawyers) as she wants.

judasholio · 2024-03-27T12:59:12+00:00

My children and my entire life. I give up. There’s no reason to really “live” other than existence itself.

Data_Fan · 2024-03-27T11:28:18+00:00

I’m a high earner, so the numbers pale anything here. I don’t want to say…just understand that if someone wants to drag you through the mud, a scumbag lawyer will latch on and create ways for drain your finances….its awful.

Deezcleannutz · 2024-03-27T09:01:07+00:00

A friend’s was about 125k. No idea how much she paid her attorney. She was the antagonist. It hurt to discuss this with him, at the time, because it was pretty bad. Took over a year.

upvotersfortruth · 2024-03-27T04:47:20+00:00

We had a multijurisdictional one involving international parental abduction (hague convention) that went for four years and about 225k USD - only our fees in Thailand. There were also Swedish, British, American, Greek and Chinese lawyers (and private investigators) involved. He got sole custody after finally finding his kid and she did time (about two years).

Left-Signature-5250 · 2024-03-27T04:45:40+00:00

90k in assets, 550k in child support over the next 15 years.

DistributionSpirited · 2024-03-27T01:24:43+00:00

40,000 and 3 years but I am majority custody of my 2 of my 2 sons. It was worth every dollar!

warwww · 2024-03-27T01:11:08+00:00

I’ll never understand why she fought me so hard and dragged it out when she was the one that wanted a divorce. It was as if I was guilty for saying “ok”. Maybe it was her ego?

She wanted a divorce and money, I wanted to be in my kids life in a meaningful way, be their father. That was our impasse. I’m not sure who tricked her into thinking I would budge on it, esp when I grew up without a dad. That’s a feeling I couldn’t put on our kids. I was willing to go to trial and appeal if it came down to it.

All in all close to $200,000 from both of our sides.

Me fighting to be in their lives and her fighting to keep me out. There were 9/10 motions throughout our divorce case. 2 filed by me. Those two being show cause orders when she was withholding the kids from me. Longest period I went without seeing them was 58/60 days. I would show up where I needed to be to pick them up and she would not show up. She went so far as to check herself into a domestic violence shelter saying she was in fear of her life. I never even raised my voice at this person, much less called out anything outside of her name. Some real pathological stuff. Oddly enough she was the one to exhibit aggressive behavior throughout the relationship. She would attend some of the zoom hearings from the back of her car saying she had no place to stay and that she was in fear for her life. Bear in mind she makes over $150k per year.

The sun would have to burn through all of its fuel before I could ever take her serious again.

I’m still in shock that she turned out to be this way. I mean, I know new sexual partners causes people to flip their marbles but this has been a whole other level. I keep it cordial for our kids sake but I don’t let her within 5/6 feet of me. The allegations she lobbed had brought me down to my knees. Thank God I didn’t let them break me.

Mister_Vandemar · 2024-03-27T00:04:08+00:00

WTF? A divorce is supposed to cost less than $10k?!

Adventurous_Fact2083 · 2024-03-26T23:06:24+00:00

$23k on her side for criminal and divorce. She had 3 separate retainers. I had one $4800. Mediation $2400. Had we went to court for custody it would be another $10k retaining fee for me and $10-$15k for an expert witness per side. You can do the math.

rsmiley77 · 2024-03-26T21:33:48+00:00

I paid right around 22k. I assume my ex with a ‘high priced lawyer’ paid around 30k.

TechnicalAd5152 · 2024-03-26T21:06:40+00:00

So far, $3500 to lawyer, now he wants another $3500 retainer, $1760 to mediator that did absolutely nothing except create an agreement that the stbx went back on almost immediately, and now $1500 to child's lawyer, and mind you we both combine for less then 150k income and no assets

2024-03-26T20:50:49+00:00

up to $20k - already had custody determined to only have to go back to deal with custody again.... defended against false dv charges....

basically no progress - and all she complained about was cost of divorce. my response was it only costs alot if someone is unreasonable - i know i wont be. well... here we are... guess who was unreasonable?

i put my attorney on notice - only so much money to go around. get it done.

godspeed

warwww · 2024-03-26T20:45:14+00:00

$102,000

Roughly 25k to defend against false domestic violence charges

Another 75k or so defending against child abuse claims and me pushing back on her wanting sole custody.

She took out loans and borrowed from her 401k to fight me on joint custody.

Truly sad and terrible.

Honestly tried to give her the smoothest divorce a woman could ask for but all I got was animosity.

i80west · 2024-03-26T20:28:24+00:00

My 6000 retainer is mostly gone and we're a couple weeks from trial. She's paid her lawyer 14,000 so far. I don’t know if we'll get a deal before trial but I'll probably be out another 6000 at least. 12k here, 14k there, pretty soon you're talking about real money. Ours is also gray. We sold the house and will probably split everything 50/50 once she realizes she can't "take me for everything I'm worth".

lobotomizedjellyfish · 2024-03-26T20:11:27+00:00

So far mine has already cost 22,500. If she doesn't get her head out of her ass and quick, I can see this going to 50 or 60k.

jimsmythee · 2024-03-26T19:50:23+00:00

We had to go to trial. I paid $5000 for my attorney. She paid $5000 for hers. Only thing I really lost was half of my 401k, and 15% of my house equity.

The $0 alimony and the 50/50 custody? I made out like a bandit.

Title	What was the cost of your "Contested" Divorce?
Author	Decon_SaintJohn
Upvotes	19
Comments	47
Date	March 26, 2024 7:33 PM UTC (2 years ago)
Subreddit	Posted in /r/Divorce_Men
Original Link	https://old.reddit.com/r/Divorce_Men/comments/1bogs0q/what_was_the_cost_of_your_contested_divorce/
Archive Link	https://theredarchive.com/r/Divorce_Men/what-was-the-cost-of-your-contested-divorce.1513313 https://theredarchive.com/post/1513313

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