# Threatening with lawyer



## Hopelessus (Oct 29, 2014)

For the last few days he suddenly has been pushing for a divorce. He moved out of the house, his own free will, November 2014. He sees the kids 2 nights a week and drives them to school every morning. I also ask him if he wants to take kids for dinner or other activities on "my days" or after school. I pretty much am letting him do what he wants with kids. They miss him. My daughter is verbal about what's going on. 

My question is when we are talking to a lawyer or mediator, how is child custody, visiting time and support decided?


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## PBear (Nov 16, 2010)

How old are the kids?

It's much cheaper and easier if the two of you agree in advance on things, and just get a lawyer to iron out the legalese. Since you seem fairly amicable now, why the need to "threaten" with a lawyer? Have you talked to him about formalizing your agreement?

C


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## HandyMan (Nov 23, 2014)

My STBXW and I did exactly what PBear said. We planned everything out and went to one lawyer. She threatens to change this and that all the time when she gets angry which is a lot lately cause I'm actually am happy now and not miserable. But so far nothing has changed. 

Using 1 lawyer was the difference of $1200 combined vs $3-6K each. So yeah it's worth it but it doesn't work for everyone.


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## Hopelessus (Oct 29, 2014)

The lawyer said we need separate lawyers to proceed. Maybe its a state law here in NY. It is getting hard for agreeing now. He wants to see kids more often. Great. But he seems to spend more time with them than me and they live with me. All week its go,go,go with my work, their school work, dinner,etc. By the time kids are in bed I am also. His time is spent on recreational activities. I wish I had that time with them.


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## Pluto2 (Aug 17, 2011)

Lawyers aren't permitted to represent both sides to any litigation. I had my attorney draft the agreement that we agreed upon and included offering a conference with the attorney of his choice to make sure everything was on the up and up. My attorney had no problem with that. Your attorney can't advise STBX on whether or not its a good deal, or if he's getting everything he needs. With enough disclosing I bet your attorney would. No different to the attorney than proceeding with an unrepresented person.


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## happy as a clam (Jan 5, 2014)

Hopelessus said:


> The lawyer said we need separate lawyers to proceed. Maybe its a state law here in NY. It is getting hard for agreeing now. He wants to see kids more often. Great.


It may be true that in New York you "need" to lawyers to proceed... I have no idea of NY laws.

However, I can tell you no matter WHAT state you're in, it is FAR MORE productive and FAR LESS costly if you and your STBXH can sit down civilly and hammer out your OWN agreement -- whatever the two of you KNOW what is best for the kids. Otherwise, the court will IMPOSE what THEY think is best for the kids.

You will save TENS OF THOUSANDS OF DOLLARS (future college tuition for your kids) if you can both be smart, civil, logical and THINKING OF YOUR KIDS.

Then you meet with your individual lawyers (if New York truly requires this) and YOU tell them what YOU want, in the BEST interests of the children.


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## Hopelessus (Oct 29, 2014)

The lawyer basically said I will get child support and alimony. Our salary differences are so far apart. I have already taken over half the bills and still try to maintain, groceries, gas, kids, doctors,etc. It's very hard to make ends meet. My toilet pipes just went and I need new tires. There is always something. It's hard to put money away for emergencies when it goes so fast.


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## FormerVictim (Jan 13, 2015)

happy as a clam said:


> It may be true that in New York you "need" to lawyers to proceed... I have no idea of NY laws.
> 
> However, I can tell you no matter WHAT state you're in, it is FAR MORE productive and FAR LESS costly if you and your STBXH can sit down civilly and hammer out your OWN agreement -- whatever the two of you KNOW what is best for the kids. Otherwise, the court will IMPOSE what THEY think is best for the kids.
> 
> ...


Clam,

NY State REQUIRES you to retain an attorney when you purchase real estate.

They're in the lawyer protection business up there.


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## Hopelessus (Oct 29, 2014)

Things are getting a bit rough though. The lawyer advised me to sell the house. But the property value has gone down so much I would walk away paying fees instead of getting anything back. Plus the cost of paying rent and utilities out here would be the same as paying a mortgage. At least if I pay my mortgage I will be paying my mortgage instead of someone else's.


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## Hardtohandle (Jan 10, 2013)

Hope, 

I live in Brooklyn and work in NYC.. 

We started off with one lawyer but eventually my Ex wife wanted her own.. My lawyer gleefully wanted this as once her lawyer agreed to stuff as it was set out, my Ex wife could never go back to court and say she was misinformed by MY lawyer per say.. No judge ( which is an appointed lawyer ) is going to say a lawyer gave improper information.. Lawyers can get disbarred for things like that.. 

I just called Brooklyn family court today ( 2/6/15) regarding my GF getting divorced as her and her husband pretty much agreed on what he is going to pay each week and some custody stuff.. The person on the phone and the website sort of said the same thing.. 

You basically go in and create a petition stating what you both agreed upon.. You then get a court date in front of a judge and then once in front of the judge you can request a mediator once the judge says the paperwork is okay.. Or the judge can just make the ruling and make it official. 

It cost me 7k for my lawyer.. My Ex paid a few hundreds of dollars for her lawyer to review the paperwork. But in the end the kids never left the home and my Ex wife pays me child support.. So everything we agreed upon sort of fell out the window.. 

Just so you know as well. Anytime you go to court its only for a specific thing.. So you don't talk about custody and child support in the same hearing.. It is one or the other.. You get a new court date for each issue.. 

If we both went to court with lawyers it would have cost 15k to 25k for EACH lawyer.. The judge would probably make your husband pay the retainer fee, but you would then have to pay out the rest.. So lets say it was going to be 25k, the judge might tell your husband pay a retainer of 15k and you have to figure out a payment plan with your lawyer for the other 10k.. 

But I will tell you I NEVER stepped a foot inside a court room up until recently.. 

I basically got the paperwork written up that we agreed upon and my Ex brought it to her lawyer, She signed and I gave it back to my lawyer.. Then we waited until the divorce papers came in the mail. That was it.. My lawyer did all the leg work of dropping it off and getting it indexed and such..

We went through some issues as well with taking stuff and such.. I just rolled over and kept quiet.. I'm a Detective and didn't want to get into any trouble of any sort.. The only thing I wanted was the TV's, computers and gaming devices for my kids.. She could have taken everything else.. 

So you DO NOT need two lawyers, but it is recommended. But you can use ONE lawyer if you both agree.. 

So you understand the courts already have heard EVERYTHING and figured out a plan for just about any situation.. These things are written in stone and plain and simple.. 

The courts make you fill out financial paperwork listing every income and expense. They ask you some more questions and then they determine the percentage.. I do not think that NYC has alimony any more or they call it something else.. 

As a real life example. I made 120k and my Ex wife made 25k.. She pays me ( yes I typed that correctly ) 1350 a month starting march, but only has to pay me 14% of any co pay for medical bills. 

The judge had asked her to get a full time job in Sept of 2014.. She mentioned at our last court date of January, she will might be getting more work in June of 2015 from her boss.. Though the judge didn't complain or comment. I know the judge was waiting for her to say something negative and she would have shot back about looking for a job.. When the judge asks you to look for a job, you need to look for a job or show proof that you are looking and didn't get hired.. So from Sept 2014 to Jan 2015 she just couldn't look for 1 job, it had to be several. 

Once the judge seen she neither was looking for a full time job and was maybe getting more work in June, the judge just went ahead and increased her Child support. The simple thought process is if you only make 1800 a month we know you are not living on that kind of money here in NYC.. So it is obvious you are being supported.. So if you can survive with 1800 a month, you can survive with 450 a month.. If you can't then go get a full time job.. 

Hope this helps you out and you can ask me anything else if you need to.. I don't hide anything and I'm very open..


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## EleGirl (Dec 3, 2011)

It is less costly to come up with an agreement between the two of you. However some good guidance is needed to craft it.

If you got an attorney for yourself, you could have that attorney file NOW for you to start getting child support and alimony NOW before the divorce is final. It sounds like he and his attorney have been stringing you along not letting you know that you have had the right to interim spousal support (alimony) and child support the entire time had you filed immediately upon him walking out.

This is why you need an attorney on your side.. even if you two do a lot of the negotiation between you.

Your attorney will also have the wording you need for the child custody and visitation stuff. One thing that you have to protect against is exactly what is going on. You have the children for all of the 'work' and he has them for all of the play. You need to have them for as much of the play time as he does. Vacations, holidays, birthdays, school breaks, need to be split so that you and your children can enjoy good times together as well.


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## Malpheous (May 3, 2013)

You aren't "required" a lawyer in NYS for a divorce. If he has one though, and you are having issues with agreeing on terms, then you may be best served by seeking some form of legal assistance.

I drew up all of my divorce papers, we agreed to terms, and had them reviewed by a lawyer prior to filing to be sure they were properly written, formatted, etc. 

Selling the home is a decision you'll have to research extensively. You need to determine the true equity. NYS is a mutual property state so you share the equity 50/50. Positive and negative.

I may have overlooked the info but the ages of your children should be considered in parenting schedules, since you mentioned fun time vs the rest. Have you considered locking a school district, combined with a residential restriction? Then go for 50/50 on a week on/week off schedule using a Friday school bus exchange?

For example you would have a section where it says something like, "ORDERED, ADJUDGED AND DECREED that pursuant to..." and get's into the residential and legal custodians, etc... add these lines as items. They'd have a letter in front of them. Like a bullet in a Word Doc.

'... the children, <insert names here>, will attend school district <x>.'
'...the parenting schedule(or Custody) is dependent on the parents residing in the school district assigned herein.'


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