If you learned Excel, you can do it all

Excell allows you to better negotiate too. You can switch the ratios “at the table” and see your total take home number

and compare it to what is acceptable to you

calculus (the spelling app!)

Yes QDRO is required. Do you know you only need to have a template ?

I did the calc myself and then I had a cpa do it independently. My calculations were SUPER close (acceptable to me)—and free.

I passed calculate with a solid B at community college. Largely bc I flirted with the TAS

All by way of saying, this is not hard ladies

QDRO

Re: above
I knew that going in. All of my incentives and disincentives behavioral (ie sfudf you know. stuff lawyers/ law have little control over)

EXc my spousal support amt - that I got in writing — as well as the rest of the large asset terms (all the big numbers). I did not care about personal property.

that was it

The problem is not the agreement. The problem is the enforcement.

I had a very specific and detailed agreement. Signed and notarized. But then XH simply decided to stop complying with the parts that weren't convenient for him.

For example, he was supposed to maintain his life insurance policy that we got when we had kids. He just quit paying the premium, saying "you don't get to win the lottery if I die".

He was supposed to pay the kid's medical insurance (by keeping them on his plan) and he didn't. When I confronted him, he just laughed. He's also not splitting the kids medical copays like he agreed to do.

When I asked my lawyer about these violations of the agreement, the lawyer said it would be long and expensive to go to court to force compliance, and very likely the result would be a court order to do what he was supposed to do. But... what happens when he ignores that? Probably nothing. So, if he ignores one legal agreement, the penalty is another legal agreement he can ignore.

In the case of the life insurance policy, after it lapses due to non-payment of premiums, I don't even think the court can do anything to put it back in force.

My advice is don't burn a lot of money on lawyers drawing up a detailed agreement that is difficult to enforce.

Anonymous wrote:You have to ask people not only what they wrote in their settlement agreement but what and how they were able to enforce. Those are completely different things.

If you write it into your settlement agreement, you merge and incorporate it into your final decree. Then when the agreement is not followed, you document sufficiently, then file for contempt in the court. That is a material change in circumstances and the court could impose fines or restrictions.

I would include a provision for decision-making with the child. That parental decisions are between the bio parents and include matters around choice of school, being listed as primary contacts over you for emergencies, or disciplining your children.

In my case, my XH’s girlfriend was listed on all paperwork as the parent, and I was excluded from pickups. That pissed the court off.

If you live in the DMV, include language that speaks to what happens if one of the parents moves from one state/DC to another since that's fairly common here. I divorced in DC but later moved to MD. ExH needed to stay in DC so that our kids could remain at their DCPS schools, and so they could access DC Tag funds for college.

+1 To thinking through the tax implications of your choices.

My BF stupidly agreed to file separately for the year in which he divorced his exW who didn't work while he earned about $350,000. They never had kids together, so she was his only dependent that was helping bring down his taxes. This means he has a much bigger tax bill than he needed to.

Maybe a life insurance policy pays out directly to the named beneficiary without getting taxed? But 401Ks are taxed when you withdraw the funds.

Further to the above pay attention to tax implications. Both cost basis of what you’re splitting up, who will be claiming kids, and impact of how any payments/streams of support are structured