No money for divorce attorney- how to proceed?
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Anonymous
| I'm an OP of a score of posts re: living overseas with abusive, controlling, cheating husband. I've been back stateside for four months now and want to get the ball rolling on divorce, but have no money at all for a divorce attorney. Tips? Suggestions re: DIY divorce? TIA. |
Anonymous
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I did mine myself.
In the District it was $80 total for everything. I got one of those NOLA law books from the library on divorce and another on custody rights. I downloaded the packet from the DC Gov't website and filled everything out myself. They had a free clinic once a month down at the courthouse. I went to that presentation just to make sure I followed the correct procedure, and after the class the lawyers there reviewed our stuff for free. They gave me the green light, and I filed that following Monday. A month later, I was officially divorced. |
Anonymous
| You can file yourself but it's going to be a lot harder with children and property. |
Anonymous
OP here. I'm sure it will be, but what's the alternative? |
Anonymous
| If you are in Fairfax, there are sample court documents on the website. You have to have been separated for a year if kids are involved. |
Anonymous
| It depends on where you live what your options are. |
Anonymous
|
If there are kids involved, I'd either look for a lawyer who'll allow you to do payments or at the very least attend some kind of legal aid or free legal clinic for advice.
My brother didn't have any money for a lawyer for his divorce and went in solo. He found the paperwork side to be fairly easy, but pretty much got screwed on custody and child support. |
Anonymous
| In Maryland I know of a recent divorce where the wife (SAHM) rolled in her attorney fees to the settlement. |
Anonymous
| I don't know where you live but in Va you can't even file for divorce until a year has passed, if you have kids. You should however be looking into child support. |
Anonymous
| You should scrape together money for a consult, then file everything on your own. That’s what I did. He changed his demands pretty quickly when he realized the custody threats he was making wouldn’t materialize. |
Anonymous
| You've been told many many times. You cannot be for real. File yourself or go to legal aide. |
Anonymous
I guess what I'm saying is - if your ex has an attorney and you don't, it may be very difficult to come out of the situation with what you want in terms of your children and property. Perhaps there are legal aid resources who would help for less. |
Anonymous
If there is money for HIM ago have an attorney, there is money for HER to have one too. They are married. Unless they have separate bank accounts and she doesn’t have access. But she will end up with some of that money in the end anyways. Find an attorney who will do payments, or use your settlement. |
Anonymous
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I did it all by myself. He had a lawyer, but the lawyer quit when he ran out of money. We had property and a child. We share custody, but he still pays some $400 a month child support.
The judge was pretty fair. Every time we started arguing, we were sent to the back room to hatch it out. 50/50 custody, all else mine since he couldn't prove he paid or bought it or put money into it. |
Anonymous
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Check all the local law schools to see if any have a family law clinic. Not sure how updated this list is but it says that GW and Catholic have clinics that help with divorce:
https://www.dc-attorney.com/files/legal-clinics.pdf |