How to Make Your Divorce Cost Less

By Jennifer Lazor, Lazor Rantas, PC
​Here’s an understatement: Divorce is one of those life events that that can be emotionally and financially difficult. The marital assets usually are divided in some manner and income allocated for support obligations. Financial resources that supported one household are now spread between two. Add to that lawyer and possibly expert fees, and the cost of divorce begins to overwhelm, making you feel stuck in a marriage for financial reasons. However, there are some impactful things you can do to lower the costs of getting divorced so you can move forward with your life. 

e Organized
If your attorney asks you to compile information for review, please do so in an organized manner. If you are asked to complete a form, as you need to do from time-to-time in family law matters, please make sure you answer it completely and responsively. If you need help completing a task or do not understand elements of it, ask your attorney to clarify rather than running the risk that your work will need to be redone. This might seem like a small, even nitpicky instruction. However, much of family law involves keeping track of details, including relevant dates, account numbers, and other assets. Organization translates into efficiency of time and time is the metric by which you are billed.

Keep Your Emotions In Check
This one is particularly hard. But when your emotions begin running the show, it’s time to take stock. If you cannot effectively communicate with your attorney or perform the tasks required to move your matter forward, that signals a concern on several levels including complicating or prolonging your case. If you express your anger in ranting text messages to your spouse, that could potentially harm your case and/or create more work for your attorney in trying to remediate your outburst. More work means more fees. Unchecked emotions can also cloud judgment, derail a settlement, and otherwise complicate a case. Like an athlete preparing for a race, you need to bring your best self to your divorce proceedings even when it feels like the worst of times.

Ask Questions
Understand the issues in your divorce so you become an active participant and aware of the work that needs to be done. Comprehension also helps you decide when to abandon a claim because it would cost more to litigate than its potential value. Often letters and other documents can be heavy with “legalese” and other isolating language. Sometimes communications you receive are emotionally triggering and you would prefer to ignore them. Pick a quiet moment when you can calmly review the item. Keep a list of questions for your attorney to address in a directed manner. When you understand what is going on, you are less overwhelmed when you need to make a decision about settlement, take a position, or assess an important development in your case. You will have had a foundation and context for the issue all along.

Be Responsive
Just as clients want their attorneys to be responsive, we want the same from you. For example, if there is a delay over providing comments to a draft, the information may grow stale and need to be updated. Extra work means more fees.

Know Your Bottom Line
Your bottom line may be different from what you want. Instead, your bottom line is how you answer the question, “What do I need to move on and start over?” The answer can involve the emotionally difficult task of deciding how much less time with your children you are willing to endure to settle your case. It involves looking at your expenses, understanding the numbers, assessing your income (or ability to earn income if you have been out of the workforce for a while), and projecting your financial planning. Why take such a reductionist approach to your divorce? Because knowing your bottom line on all issues empowers you to have a very important conversation with your attorney, a cost-benefit conversation. For example, let’s say you want $100,000 for an asset your spouse wants to keep after the divorce. Your spouse only wants to pay you $75,000. What you want versus what you need, then becomes a matter of what you want to spend over the $25,000 difference in value. Not every family law issue can be quantified so neatly, but some form of conversations like this example helps keeps both costs and expectations in check.

Jennifer Lazor, Esq, is Partner at Lazor Rantas, P.C., a Family Law and Divorce firm in Chatham.