Category: Divorce

A Few Good Divorce Tips

Posted by admin on

On behalf of Ronald H. Kauffman, P.A. posted in Divorce on Wednesday, September 4, 2013.

You can get divorce advice all over the place. What you may not know is that no two divorces are the same. What happened to your friend, co-worker or manicurist in their divorce is completely different from what you’re going through.

You can also find advice about divorce all over the internet. Some is good, but most of it is bad. When you are in the business of divorce though, you see the same lessons being learned over and over. And, when I see other professionals offering advice that I think is good, I like to give them the credit they deserve.

Nicole Noonan, executive director of divorce finance company BBL Churchill Group, recently appeared on TV, and had some good advice for anyone suffering through a divorce.

Surprisingly, her first tip is to make sure you hire an attorney who is not too aggressive. This is surprising advice because most people think you will be better served by an over-aggressive lawyer. People learn the hard way that’s not true.

“Your attorney not only represents your interests, they also represent your style, she said on “The Couch” Thursday.” So if you hire a pit-bull attorney, it doesn’t mean you get a better settlement necessarily. You can have a long drawn-out legal battle…and it’s not always the right choice.”

She also advised against a take-it-all mentality in court.

“Pick your battles. Just because you’ve been wronged in the marriage doesn’t mean the court is going to look at that,” she said.

Divorce involves big decisions. You are always better served by identifying ahead of time what is most important to you and your children.

That decision involves knowing you and your spouse’s finances, identifying what you and your children’s needs are, and hiring an attorney who will help you identify and meet your needs.

You can watch the video here.

What Can You Learn from Rupert Murdoch’s Divorce?

Posted by admin on

On behalf of Ronald H. Kauffman, P.A. posted in Divorce on Thursday, August 29, 2013.

What interests me about divorce law is that it impacts all parts of society. It affects the rich, the middle class, the poor alike . . . pretty much everyone.

Rupert Murdoch, owner of News Corp and a billionaire, is going through his own divorce with wife Wendi Deng. No doubt before he married Wendi, Rupert had excellent advice. What can you learn from a billionaire’s experience that could help you through your own divorce, or perhaps save your marriage?

The New York Times recently ran a story and I thought it had some good lessons:

Agreements

The Murdochs not only signed a prenuptial agreement before they got married, but after their marriage they signed two additional postnuptial agreements delineating the separation of assets in the event of a divorce.

Agreements make the separation of assets cleaner. They do more than divide assets though, they can spell out each person’s obligations during the marriage, things like who pays for which expenses.

But if there is only one prenuptial agreement, it could be so old it’s useless. Also, prenups can be challenged. Prenuptial agreements are routinely enforced in Florida, and you are allowed to make a bad deal.

Dividing Assets

Dividing assets between spouses is not as simple as deciding to split it 50-50 – even with agreements. Very often assets have appreciated over the course of several years.

When property appreciates, you need to distinguish between passive and active appreciation. A passive asset could be an investment account which is never traded.

A business, on the other hand, is an active investment, and the percentage a spouse is entitled to may depend on different things.

Even with the most sophisticated couples, such as the Murdochs, unless you clairvoyant, issues will arise that no one considered in earlier agreements, and are prime for negotiation.

Children

The care of any young child is the primary concern of the courts. The Murdochs are rumored to have some custody arrangements and child support for their daughters.

Custody arrangements and child support are rarely part of prenuptial agreements, and are often used by the less-moneyed spouse as leverage in negotiations – a practice sometimes called “linkage”.

Florida has child support guidelines which mandate what the minimum support for children should be. The basic child support payment does not include private school and extracurricular activities, which can be more than the child support.

When it comes to agreeing on what people believe is their rightful share, think of it this way: If you’re 10 percent apart, you’ll settle. If you’re 20 percent, there’s a chance. But if you’re 50 or 75 percent away, you’re going to war.” Knowing this, the Murdochs time and expense in signing agreements will help them avoid trial.

Divorce Costs . . . in 1845

Posted by admin on

On behalf of Ronald H. Kauffman, P.A. posted in Divorce on Friday, August 9, 2013.

Think divorce is expensive, time consuming or difficult for most people? Today it’s a breeze compared to how it used to be. Believe it or not, getting divorced used to be so expensive; it was out of reach for most people.

A clever judge in England in 1845 wrote a sly opinion complaining about how difficult and expensive it was:

Prisoner at the bar, you have been convicted before me of what the law regards as a very grave and serious offence: that of going through the marriage ceremony a second time while your wife was still alive.

You plead in mitigation of your conduct that she was given to dissipation and drunkenness, that she proved herself a curse to your household, and that she had deserted you; but I am not permitted to recognise any such plea.

The law in its wisdom points out a means by which you might rid yourself from further association with a woman who had dishonoured you; but you did not think proper to adopt it.

You ought first to have brought an action against your wife’s seducer if you could have discovered him; that might have cost you money, and you say you are a poor working man, but that is not the fault of the law.

You would then be obliged to prove by evidence your wife’s criminality in a Court of Justice, and thus obtain a verdict with damages against the defendant, who was not unlikely to turn out a pauper.

But so jealous is the law of the sanctity of the marriage tie, that in accomplishing all this you would only have fulfilled the lighter portion of your duty.

You must then have gone, with your verdict in your hand, and petitioned the House of Lords for a divorce.

It would cost you perhaps five or six hundred pounds and you do not seem to be worth as many pence. (Editor: about $72,000 today) But it is the boast of the law that it is impartial, and makes no difference between the rich and the poor.

You have thus willfully rejected the boon the legislature offered you, and it is my duty to pass upon you such sentence as I think your offence deserves, and that sentence is, that you be imprisoned for one day; and in as much as the present assizes are three days old

We may complain about the costs of no-fault divorce, but things are much improved now. Credit goes to the Volokh Conspiracy for the post.

Is the Marriage Rate Increasing or Decreasing?

Posted by admin on

On behalf of Ronald H. Kauffman, P.A. posted in Divorce on Tuesday, July 9, 2013.

You can’t have a divorce without marriage. So it is interesting to see what the marriage trends are. In the United States, the marriage rate is at a low point.

Worse, the number of marriages across the U.S. fell more than 5% during the recession. But a new analysis projects that pent-up demand and the large population of marriage-eligible couples, means the marriage rate may start to increase. The article can be read in USA Today.

Projections from the private company Demographic Intelligence of Charlottesville, Va., says a 4% increase in the number of weddings since 2009 is predicted depending on the economic recovery. They also expect this trend to continue through 2015.

A closer inspection of the marriage rate reveals that it differs among socio-economic groups and by education levels. Rates decline among those with a high school education or less, younger Americans, and the less affluent. However, among women ages 25-34, the college-educated and the affluent, the numbers are increasing.

“Declines in weddings are likely to set in towards the end of the decade, even though the number of young adults is increasing, because of the nation’s ongoing retreat from marriage,” the report notes.

From 2007 to 2009, the number of marriages each year fell The new forecast predicts the marriage rate to remain at the record low of 6.8 marriages per 1,000 population for 2013 (where it’s been since 2009).

This projected increase in weddings may mark a turnaround, but it’s not going to boost the low marriage rate, experts say.

New Florida Evidence Rule 702 Can Impact Your Divorce

Posted by admin on

On behalf of Ronald H. Kauffman, P.A. posted in Divorce on Wednesday, July 3, 2013.

Divorce law in Florida is becoming so complicated, that the use of expert witnesses – like accountants, vocational experts, and psychologists – are becoming very common to determine values, need and ability and parenting issues.

The Florida rule for experts is Rule 702 of the evidence code, and it was just amended. In fact, it is so new that it just became effective on July 1st. There are some interesting things about the new rule.

1. The amendment was made by the Florida Legislature, not the Florida Supreme Court. That’s unusual because rule making authority is the court’s job.

2. The way the the Rule came into being by the Legislature could create a constitutional challenge to the rule down the road.

3. The new rule forces Florida courts to abandon the Frye test for admitting expert testimony, a test we’ve used for around 70 years.

4. The new rule requires Floirda courts to apply the standard developed by the U.S. Supreme Court in Daubert; something the Florida Supreme Court has said it doesn’t want to do.

5. The Frye test was a very lenient test, especially as applied here in Florida. In Florida, Frye allowed in all expert testimony – even some “junk science” opinions – as long as they were generally accepted standards.

6. The new (for Florida) Daubert rules, require judges to act as gatekeepers, and focus on an experts qualifications, the relevance of the testimony and the reliability of the testimony using a multi-factor test.

7. The rule change will require state judges to become familiar with the new evidentiary test, and even brush up on the scientific method.

8. For family lawyers, the Daubert test offers an opportunity to challenge the qualifications, relevancy and reliability of experts which we never had before.

9. The change will also force expert witnesses to stay on top of their professional literature, and be able to defend their choice of methods, tests or evaluation techniques.

The Florida Legislature seems to be on a mission to re-write family law, trying to pass alimony reform, change equitable distribution, and modify Rules 702 and 704. Big changes have occurred, and clients need to discuss with their family attorneys about any new issues and strategies to consider.

Unseen Problems with DOMA

Posted by admin on

On behalf of Ronald H. Kauffman, P.A. posted in Divorce on Monday, June 24, 2013.

Because many people are familiar with divorce, either through their own divorce or living through their friend’s divorce, it can be a prism to understanding legal controversies.

I was involved in a case on behalf of a client who was in a 9 year relationship, and this client has a 2 year old. There is a house and a rental apartment, and two 401(k)s to distribute. We are also going back and forth about the amount of child support and alimony to be paid.

In other words, this is a typical divorce. Except for one thing, both of the parties are women. Under the federal Defense of Marriage Act (otherwise known as DOMA), the law we apply in every other divorce doesn’t apply to this relationship. This form of discrimination can lead to unfairness which directly impacts your bank account.

In a typical divorce, one party might have to pay alimony to the other. Under our tax code, alimony when paid pursuant to a court order or written agreement, is tax deductible to the paying spouse, and is included in the taxable income of the payee spouse.

The tax-deductibility of alimony allows divorce lawyers to use the tax deductibility in ways to maximize the dollars available to everyone. Sometimes the payor spouse may actually want to pay more alimony because the overall payment for both child support and alimony could be less after you tax effect the payment.

However, under DOMA any support payment paid cannot be construed as alimony in Florida, and would not be deductible under our Federal tax code, because the couple is homosexual. Under DOMA certain tax advantages available to every heterosexual married couple are not available to homosexual couples by law.

Many people have different views about same-sex marriage, but there are a few far-reaching effects of DOMA that many people may not be aware of. Sometimes, putting it into perspective of a divorce, which many people are familiar with, can give people a better understanding why people oppose DOMA.

In the next week or so, the U.S. Supreme Court will announce its decision in the federal DOMA case. The name of the case is United States v. Windsor, and can be followed here.

Reducing the Stress of Your Divorce

Posted by admin on

On behalf of Ronald H. Kauffman, P.A. posted in Divorce on Monday, June 17, 2013.

Divorce is not a sprint, it’s an endurance race. Sadly, divorce is also one of the most painful you may have to go through. Even couples who are amicably divorcing suffer through major divorce-related stressors.

Believe it or not, dealing with stress can help be the difference between resolving the divorce successfully or not. I’ve seen clients do some of the most harmful and self-destructive things to themselves and their case solely because of the stress of the divorce.

So, how do you overcome stress? Recently, Huffington Post asked some of their readers on Facebook how to keep calm during the most burdensome days of their divorces.

“From repeating simple mantras to finding solace in their favorite Pandora station, click through the slides below for some of our favorite answers, then head to the comments and tell us what helped you de-stress during your divorce.”

Some of the best suggestions I read:

  • Exercise: “A 10-15 mile bicycle ride (and boy was I fit!)”
  • Being Proactive: “planning my future”
  • Music: “Pandora.com and a long walk”
  • Self-improvement: “Massage therapy school”
  • Entertainment: “classic movies”
  • Friendship: “My best friend”
  • Family: “My daughter”
  • Staying Active: Painting

There are many stressful situations in life. Finding your stress relief can help you deal with stress ad hopefully resolve problems. Sometimes it may not seem hard, but it isn’t too difficult to find pleasure in this world. Even simple things such as chatting with a friend, watching a good movie, or going for a long walk or run can ease the burden of splitting up.

Five More Ways to Lose Your Divorce

Posted by admin on

On behalf of Ronald H. Kauffman, P.A. posted in Divorce on Wednesday, June 12, 2013.

Anyone can tell you how to win your divorce. Few people ever tell you what not to do . . . until it’s too late. This could leave you wishing someone had warned you beforehand. So, if you want to learn 5 MORE ways to lose a divorce, pay attention.

6. Hire that mean lawyer you heard about

Run-of-the-mill divorces are boring. But everyone loves a good fight! Retaining the most litigious attorney in town will ensure that you will spend a lot of time contesting even the smallest and insignificant issues, and alot of money too.

Better still, once you’ve taken the gloves off, you’re guaranteed to get an equally aggressive response. Judges love it. What would you rather do, cheer on a couple of fighting lawyers, or deal with some dull legal issue?

7. Represent yourself

There is a quaint saying out there that: “the person who represents themself has a fool for a client.” Lawyers are for sissies and celebrities. I’ll let you in on a little secret: if you can divide by 2 and read, you can handle your own divorce. It’s really that easy.

8. Lie to your lawyer

There’s another old saying that: “in the middle of every client is a lie.” We expect it. And, lying to your attorney has two big advantages:

First, lying to your attorney will surprise your attorney in court, and we lawyers love to be surprised in court.

But there is another advantage: It tells your lawyer to watch out because you’re the type of client who will lie about anything. This will cause your attorney to drop your case as soon as possible, leaving your case dead in the water.

9. Lie to the judge

Let’s face it; if you want to lose, there’s really no substitute for lying to the guy or gal deciding your case. If you sprinkle a few lies in your testimony, pretty soon the judge will catch some, and start questioning everything you’ve said.

This is exactly what you want: to have the judge doubt everything about your case. Not only will you lose, you could win a free night’s stay at the Turner Guilford Knight hotel.

10. Bring the kids into it

Unfortunately, children are not parties to a divorce. That’s a shame, because kids love parties. In fact, the “Rules” require a court order to even bring your children to court. And we all know how much kids hate to be kept out of things.

So, bring the kids to court, let them read the court papers, and be sure to tell them what the other parent said about them. Involving the kids tells the judge that you will probably violate the judge’s order.

Play your cards right, and you can lose your case before you’ve uttered the first word.

Divorce to Save Taxes? The Marriage Penalty Tax

Posted by admin on

On behalf of Ronald H. Kauffman, P.A. posted in Divorce on Friday, May 31, 2013.

Being married comes with joys, sacrifices, tax penalties and . . . wait, tax penalties?

The marriage penalty is the situation where a married couple pays higher income taxes than they would have paid if they were un-married and filed individual tax returns. Should you divorce to avoid this penalty?

The new American Taxpayer Relief Act of 2012 sort of reduced the marriage penalty by making permanent the Bush-era expanded standard deduction and the expanded 15% bracket for joint filers.

But for high income earners, the new law raises taxes on couples making more than $450,000 and individuals making more than $400,000. As it turns out, some couples are discovering they could save over $25,000 a year if they divorced.

Think about that for a second. If a couple could save over $25,000 a year on their taxes, they could take a Celebrity Cruise to Italy, ski Deer Valley, put a little cash away towards Penn, and still have some mad money to spend just by divorcing and turning their marriage into a long term relationship.

There are a lot of risks though, known and unknown. I would encourage anyone – before they even thought about speaking to their spouses – to think about a few things:

  • The impact on your relationship. I don’t know of a good way to ask for a divorce: “Honey, I want a divorce. No, no wait, come back, it’s to save big bucks . . . really!”
  • There is no fake divorce. Once the court signs the final judgment of divorce, you are divorced. Once you’re divorced, your Ex may find someone who thinks marriage is more valuable than 5% adjusted gross income.
  • IRS rules regarding your filing status have something to say. IRS publication 504 warns that if you obtain a divorce just to file as unmarried with the intent to remarry the next tax year, you have to file as married individuals.
  • State law. All no-fault states have minimum requirements for getting a divorce. Florida, for instance, requires at a minimum that your marriage be irretrievably broken before you can get a divorce.

In addition, there are estate planning issues, retirement and social security complications, and many other issues besides the mere tax savings.

Most people who marry do so forever, and with the sincere intention of honoring their vows. Is the money worth it?

What is a Florida No Fault Divorce?

Posted by admin on

On behalf of Ronald H. Kauffman, P.A. posted in Divorce on Monday, May 20, 2013.

Florida abolished fault as grounds for filing a divorce. The only ground you need to file for divorce in Florida is to prove your marriage is “irretrievably broken.” But is no fault divorce the reason the United States has a high divorce rate? Many people think so, and want to return to the old “fault” system to promote families.

A new bill in Iowa, Iowa House File 338, would require one of five conditions for a divorce to proceed in a marriage involving children: adultery, physical or sexual abuse, imprisonment, if one spouse is missing more than a year or if the couple has lived apart for more than two years.

The bill’s author, Rep. Ted Gassman, says he will continue to push for banning no-fault divorce if minor children are involved, saying:

This basically is an attempt on my part to keep fathers in the home. I sincerely believe that the family is the foundation of this nation and this nation will go the direction of our families. If our families break up, so will this nation.

There’s a 16-year old girl in this whole mix now. Guess what? What are the possibilities of her being more promiscuous? What are the possibilities of all these other things surrounding her life that a 16-year old girl, with hormones raging, can get herself into?

Despite the attack no fault-divorce laws are under, no fault laws exist in all 50 states to make it possible for one party to get a divorce without proving any bad behavior took place, and without getting the permission of the other spouse.

Before the no-fault divorce era, people who wanted to get divorce either had to reach agreement in advance with the other spouse that the marriage was over, or throw mud at each other and prove wrongdoing like adultery or abuse.

No-fault laws are the result of trying to change the way divorces played out in court. No fault laws have reduced the number of feuding couples who felt the need to resort to distorted facts, lies, and the need to focus the trial on who did what to whom. We will have to see if Florida, like Iowa, will introduce a bill to eliminate “no-faul” divorces.