Preparing for Divorce

Ecstatic-Shopping313 · 2023-12-06T19:45:07+00:00

Why would applying for college affect things? I doubt it will change things. She'd have to already have the debt. Yeah, if you're going to get divorced then go ahead and file.

Just stay in the house if you want to keep it. If you move out, a judge can make you pay the mortgage still, regardless of new expenses. Plus it can incentivize her to speed things up or leave.

I did some financial fuckery and it didn't hurt me. I moved all assets into a separate account she couldn't touch. Left her completely desolate when she left. Judge just made me hand it over to my lawyer for safe keeping rather. That was it. It will get divided at trial.

Since she left, I switched over everything into my name. Got new locks, took her off my cell phone, etc. You might want to talk to a lawyer first though, because that can be bad if your ex is smart. Mine is dumb as hell, so I'm sitting pretty.

acg34 · 2023-12-06T20:28:50+00:00

During the separation period, my ex accused me of hiding money. I wasn’t. But thinking back on it, I wonder if she was projecting. I don’t know how she paid for her attorney and we had 2 credit cards with over $20,000 balances at the time. She had worked various part time jobs off and on after the kids were in school. My paychecks went into a joint account and all bills were paid with that. I never thought to ask if she had a secret bank account.

techrmd3 · 2023-12-07T00:42:20+00:00

things I wish I did -

Get a cash fund together that only I knew about and was secure

Plan for not being able to live in your own home, scope out apartments in an area you want to live in. Start thinking about logistics of work, hobbies, life etc of you not living where you are right now.

Make sure you have a vehicle that you can rely on that is in your name

gather up important documents (birth cert, passport, bank docs, will, SSN card, drivers license info etc) put them in a place that is secure and only you have access to

create a bank account only you control

change your payroll to auto deposit to an account you control only

get a "Go Bag" together with basic clothes, toiletries etc - FYI if police are involved to get you out of house you will have 10-20 min response time + whatever time the officers allow for you gather up your life and EXIT your HOME... and there is NOTHING you can do. Best to leave on your own terms

tell a trusted friend of your plans and ask them for advice (it's a good idea to tell SOMEONE your plans in case authorities get involved and mistakes happen)

not a bad plan to get ready for psychological games from wifey, not a bad idea to play a few psychological games yourself (e.g. I still care for you dear but I HAVE to file you know we aren't working out)

DONT even think about taking the foot off the gas on Divorce once started GET IT DONE.

Gattsama · 2023-12-06T21:26:54+00:00

Just got divorced in WA Nov 2022, 12 years married, no kids. I did not use this group, but they have lots of articles and videos on divorce in WA. Check them out for info:

https://www.genesislawfirm.com/divorce-washington-state

WA is a standard no-fault state. Either of you can file, but I suggest you file and, if possible, request a court date when you file (which will be 11mo after filing). There is a mandatory 90-day wait / cooling off period before the final settlement.

Kids are grown, so skip that nightmare

All martial assets and debts are split 50/50. Home equity, 401k, stocks, cars, credit cards, mortgage, etc. Add up every asset and every debt. Divide by two, and that's how much you each get. You don't have to divide everything equally. It just has to balance out to that number. So you could keep your 401k in exchange for her keeping more home equity. Or you could take additional debt to keep your boat.

The equity in the home needs to be divided. If you want to keep the house, you need to buy her out. If that's not possible you have to sell the house. You can also use an unequal distribution in lieu of alimony.

The big issue is alimony. There are no firm rules in WA. She needs to qualify for spousal support. Which is based on her need and your ability to pay.

There's the length and the total amount. The general rule of thumb is 1 year of support for every 3-4 years of marriage. So, in your case, at 20 years, 5 - 7.5 years owed. The amount is all over the place. Based on both your imputed incomes.

There are no rules, but in general, the amount is based on a max of 50% or your gross or 40% of your net, minus her imputed income. And the lower amount is zero. The higher the delta between what you each are imputed at, the more you owe. In my case, she didn't work, but was imputed to $42.5k/yr = $3542/mo gross. In the end, I owe her $315k divided over 3.5 years (42 months) = $7.5k/mo.

Read the articles and watch the videos on the link above. IF you are both agreeable to divorce. Just file yourself, go to mediation, work out a deal, and get it done.

Again, no kids, but the eX wasted just under $400k of potential wealth by getting the attorneys involved, dragging shit out, refusing to respond, refusing to work on selling the house, etc etc.

GoldDigger304 · 2023-12-06T19:53:19+00:00

My response probably won't help you, but I am just trying to add some realism in.

You can do everything right, however if your case goes to court, all it takes is one biased judge to ruin all your hard work and legal fees. This will be a bitter pill to swallow and could take you years to mentally, emotionally and financially recover.

Ideally, you want things to be as amicable and fair as possible. However this is much easier said than done.

These types of cases really to highlight the importance of pre-nups and post-nups.

You say you have kids, please make sure they get pre-nups before they get married. This will save so much stress, worry and legal fees.

pk2at · 2023-12-06T21:05:10+00:00

Think you had posted here previously, but my advice in WA state King County is to get two signatures on a legal separation form from your wife and file online with option to 'keep assets under your control as separate'. If you file online, jointly and say you don't need to be notified of court decision, it takes only two online filings to get a legal separation.

Once you have a legal separation, its permanent and binding for a future divorce in WA state.

The advantage you have is the asset split can be 98-2 or more in your favor, no alimony and the Judge will simply stamp a joint filing without question. You can use this same asset split during divorce and you don't even need to go to court

Salty-Rutabaga-3329 · 2023-12-07T05:05:44+00:00

Create a Google account. Organize Google Drive into folders. Document everything. Her SSN. Kids SSNs. Make copies of tax returns. Dump statements for everything in there. Take photos of pink slips. Put those in there, Document all insurance policies (especially health). 401ks. IRAs. Stocks. You'll need to do this eventually anyway.

Get a password manager going. Use it to manage passwords and PINs. If you can change passwords without tripping her alarms, do so.

Make sure you control your phone number. My ex controlled mine. And ... yeah, not good. Two factor authentication and everything else bombed. That was an awful day at work.

If you have kids in college, move any money that was implied as going to the kids school into a separate account and put their names on it. I disclosed these accounts but made it clear it was my kids' money. And that played out in my kids' favor.

I didn't hide money or clean out any accounts. My ex did. She cleared out the bank account. She got $5000. Didn't matter. Small transgression amongst a sea of hemorrhaging money. There were bigger fish to fry.

Expect your credit rating to go down. Plan ahead. Expect a cash crunch.

CA theoretically locks everything down during divorce. This prevents selling RSUs or extra cars for example. I /could/ sell stuff with her written agreement. But that went down something like this. "Hey, so that third car has been parked for three months now. How about we sell it and divide the profit?" And she replied, nearly verbatim, "STOP CONTACTING ME! STOP CONTACTING ME!" And I got a letter from her lawyer threatening a restraining order a few days later. So that never panned out.

My credit score went from 800+ to 650. And that tripped a few automated things. Citi cut my credit limit from 10k to 500 (five hundred) which caused further problems. FICO is a surprisingly stupid algorithm. Having a $400 balance on the Citi card with a $500 limit makes the credit score plummet. Not sure why. Total credit limit was $80k or something.

I eventually thought about borrowing cash from family. But I hated the idea. I tried a signature loan and lucked out. My credit union gave me an incredible $29,000 signature loan at 4.8%. But then again, Feds were at 2.5%.

Anyway, you'll get plenty of good advice. Good luck with it all.

Royal_Win5362 · 2023-12-19T21:49:02+00:00

The most important thing is to get a thorough understanding of your marital assets/debts, income & expenses, home equity, etc. This tool may be helpful
Don't trust everything the divorce attorney says and watch the legal fees. See this post. https://www.reddit.com/r/divorcefinance/comments/18cdmjv/divorce\_attorneys\_are\_they\_worth\_it/

Title	Preparing for Divorce
Author	Hamsterknee
Upvotes	4
Comments	24
Date	December 6, 2023 6:52 PM UTC (2 years ago)
Subreddit	Posted in /r/Divorce_Men
Original Link	https://old.reddit.com/r/Divorce_Men/comments/18cb4hs/preparing_for_divorce/
Archive Link	https://theredarchive.com/r/Divorce_Men/preparing-for-divorce.1240226 https://theredarchive.com/post/1240226

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