Do You Need An Attorney For Your California Divorce?

Posted by Tim Blankenship on

Do You Need An Attorney For Your California Divorce?

Hi, my name is Tim Blankenship and I’m licensed in bonded legal document preparation firm located in Santa Clarita and serving all of Los Angeles County.

I wanted to discuss with you a few statistical facts in regards to divorce and let you know that you do have some alternatives if you’re looking or thinking you need a divorce attorney for your case. I want to let you know that you have some alternatives in helping you.

Now quite obviously is to use a company like myself and have someone to assist you with your divorce.

Now statistically speaking, I want to give you a few facts; I wanted to let you know that, only five percent (5%) of divorce cases ever go to trial.

So what this means is you’re either going to settle in your case or your case is going to go to trial but only five percent of cases that are filed here in California ever go to trial.

So what that means is there is that ninety-five percent chance that you’ll never see court when you go into your case. That said, why is it you think you need a divorce lawyer in your case?

Another fact, eighty-five percent (85%) of all divorce cases that are filled are done so without an attorney.

So here’s another fact saying that in most cases it’s going to be filed by someone representing themselves and that’s where we specialize, folks that are going through the divorce process in California and are self- represented, we help those clients who are in pro per, we help them get though the process. We help them with the paperwork and completing the divorce process from start to finish.

Again, eighty-five of folks are filing on their own.

Now again, I wanted to discuss with you alternatives. If you think you need an attorney and if you’re on this page, you’re probably sitting watching this video. You probably searched for a divorce attorney in our local neighborhood and you’re considering possibly filing for divorce.

I want to make a suggestion, I want you to call my office and see if there’s something we can do for you before you speak with an attorney, or even after you speak with an attorney. It really doesn’t matter when you call us.

I just want to let you know that you do have alternatives to hiring an attorney and many times in fact, the statistics say that there’s only a five percent chance you’re case will go to court, and eighty-five percent of folks filing for divorce are doing it on their own. Therefore you’d be better assisted by our firm who can help you go through the process and represent yourself.

Don’t get me wrong, if we feel you need an attorney, or if you call us and you’re asking for assistance and we find that we’re unable to help you, we’ll be the first people to let you know that you should seek an attorney or at least get a consultation for your particular case.

Well give us a call, we’d be happy to discuss your particular circumstances, everyone is different. We are very experienced at this we have worked for law firms, we had worked for the court systems. So we’ll be happy to let you know if it’s something, if your situation is something we can help you with, or if we think you need better served with an attorney.

Worst case scenario is you get a great referral to an attorney by calling our firm and discussing your particular circumstances.

Again, Tim Blankenship, divorce661.com. Be happy to talk to you, give us a call. My direct number is 661-281-0266. Thanks for reading!

More Changes To California Divorce Forms

Posted by Tim Blankenship on

More Changes To California Divorce Forms

Divorce661.com, we are a California divorce document preparation firm.

And today I want to talk to you about changes to the California divorce forms. We recently received some updates today; this will be for July 1st, 2013.

There are generally about two to three updates to the California divorce forms per year, and the reason that I’m bringing this up is there are many people that use either automated document assembly services where you go online and pay a fee to have your documents, your divorce forms done for you online.

You know there are many online companies that will do that. The problem is that they do not update their documents and there has been some specific changes to the California divorce forms as of change of July 1st , that if the forms are not updated by these online legal document companies, your forms will be rejected.

Routinely, I have to help people fix mistakes and errors when they went online and used an online service or some type of divorce document assembly service; and this particular update to the form is going to cost some significant problems for those of you that from this point forward are using these online divorce services who have not updated their forms.

You’re going to have real trouble getting your divorce finalized; it’s just going to get rejected left and right.

So I want to make folks aware of these changes. If you’re going to use one of these online divorce services which we are trying to help people to avoid as often as we can because we get a lot of business from folks who abuse these services. Lost their money, found out it was worthless service, and came to us to fix, and had to pay us as well, which is unfortunate.

So hopefully, you’re watching this video because you’re considering using an online service and we’re going to want to dissuade you from doing that, because it’s going to give you a lot of heartache.

Please give us a call; we’d love to help you with your California divorce.

My name is Tim Blankenship. We specialize in divorce document preparation; you can reach me direct at 661-281-0266 and thanks!

2 Years Tax Returns Now Required In California Divorce Cases

Posted by Tim Blankenship on

2 Years Tax Returns Now Required In California Divorce Cases

We are a California divorce document preparation firm, we do specialize in providing divorce services in California.

And I wanted to talk to you about some changes in regards to family law and the paperwork when you’re filing for divorce.

In July, 2013 we received updates from our software provider regarding the forms software we use for filing divorce papers, and realized there have been several changes to the forms. So, part of divorce is filling out your financial disclosures.

This is called the declaration of disclosure. That said; there are certain documents that need to be served. What they’ve added to the declaration of disclosure, and if you want to look this up, you can look up family code section 2104, but what they’ve added is really two things.

Number 1, is you now have to serve two years of tax returns. So on top of your, with your income and expenses declaration, and your schedule of assets and debts, along with the documentation, you now have to serve two years tax returns, that wasn’t a required in L.A. County as far as I know, until these most recent changes.

It had been part of the disclosure process in counties such as San Bernardino which we filed cases for as well. There has been that rule there, but this seems to be a new change for Los Angeles County.

The other thing that they’re requiring is now that we have – as far as when those declaration of disclosure needs to be served, they are now giving you sixty days, from the day of filing the petition to submit your schedule of assets and debts, and your income, expense declaration.

Normally, or in the past I should say. That wasn’t required; there wasn’t so much of a time frame. You could file your petition, serve the other party and there wasn’t really a time frame in which that had to be done. But now there is a family code section 2104 that also indicates that you have to serve your preliminary declaration of disclosure.

Of course, included here is the two-year tax return within sixty days of filing the petition. So I guess what we’re seeing is the family law court starting to follow suit, more closely aligned with civil procedure as opposed to kind of being left a little more loose.

Again this is Tim Blankenship, divorce661.com. We do prepare divorce documents in California.

Please call us if you have any questions 661-281-0266 and thanks!

Don’t Waste Your Time Filing Your Own Divorce | Santa Clarita Divorce | Los Angeles Divorce

Posted by Tim Blankenship on

Don’t Waste Your Time Filing Your Own Divorce | Santa Clarita Divorce | Los Angeles Divorce

Hi, Tim Blankenship with divorce661.com we are licensed and bonded legal document preparation company specializing in California divorce.

And today I wanted to talk to you about doing your divorce yourself.

You know we’ve done over a hundred videos (now over 300 videos), self- help videos helping people figure out their divorce, if you’re inclined to do it on your own.

As I tell people on the phone, they call. If you have more time than money, you may want to consider doing your divorce yourself.

Other than that, I’m going to tell you, don’t waste your time doing this yourself. If you’re on the fence, and you know, should I do my own divorce? It looks like I can do the paperwork. Don’t get sucked into that. You’re not a professional at this. Whatever business you’re in, I’m sure you’re very good at. And we’re very good at what we do. So let the professionals to this.

You’re talking about court forms; and the divorce process; and separation of assets and debts; and yes you may be saying. “Well Tim, I have an easy case, there’s no children, no property”; and I’ll tell you, people tell me that it’s not as easy, and as seamless as you think, it’s not as simple a divorce as you think, even when you have very little assets; or no assets; or no children, and even a short-term marriage, the divorce forms are complicated, serving your judgment is complicated.

So I’m just going to say, if you’re on the fence, or you have a job, or you don’t have the time, don’t mess with doing the divorce yourself, don’t waste your time. We have people that have attempted for several years to do their own divorce.

They filed, four, five years ago, they started the process, they had issues with the court and they just stopped. We don’t want that to happen to you. Let the professionals do it, give us a call, anywhere in California, we can take care of that for you.

Give me a call 661-281-0266. Go to our website divorce661.com for more information. And we’re looking forward to helping you.

Thanks!

We Serve All Divorce Courts In Los Angeles County

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We Serve All Divorce Courts In Los Angeles County

Hi, Tim Blankenship with divorce661.com; and today we’re talking about what courts we serve in Los Angeles County.

So, there are twelve family law courts in the Los Angeles county area. There is of course a central branch which is in downtown Los Angeles, and then there are eleven branch courts throughout Los Angeles County.

Up north there is Lancaster, down going south you’re looking at long beach. Out west you have Venice, San Fernando. And then to the east you have as far as Pasadena and Pomona. So, we handle all twelve branches as far as our divorce filings in Los Angeles County.

So regardless of where you live, if you’re in Long Beach; or Lancaster; or Palmdale; or Pasadena, Pomona. You know, any of the cities that are served by those courts, we can help you.

We have, we are centrally located in northern Los Angeles County. So we’re in L.A. area. We’re in Santa Clarita to be specific but we have clients all over Los Angeles County and we have filed in all of these courts. We do this primarily by e-mail, phone, fax to get your documents done.

We have a seamless process where we do that. In fact, we have clients that are in Germany; and Australia; and serving in the military that never stepped foot in our office. So, we do have an attorney service that picks up all our documents everyday from our office and they file them with our courts. If you’re wondering how we achieve that, that’s what we do. And we file your paperwork.

What we’ll do, let’s say you’re out of the area, you don’t want to travel to our office, we’ll simply complete your documents over the phone, e-mail them, or fax them to you. You sign them, mail them to us and our attorney service picks them up goes to court, you don’t have to go to court at all.

So if you’re anywhere in Los Angeles County, please give us a call. We are the number one divorce document preparation firm in L.A. County. We’d love to help you out and get you through the process regardless of where you live in L.A. County and we can take care of business for you.

My name is Tim Blankenship, divorce661.com go to our website. And you can reach me direct at 661-281-0266.

Thanks!

What Is A Divorce Minute Order In California

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What Is A Divorce Minute Order In California

Hey there! Tim Blankenship with divorce661.com.

Today I want to answer the question: “What is a minute order?”

I just happen to see that someone landed on our blog by typing that in. They did find our blog. I don’t know if we answered it well enough. I know we haven’t done it on video so I’m going to do that today. Talk to you about what a minute order is and what you would need one for.

So, a minute order essentially, and I’m looking at one now. I Just had a client have to pick one up. If you have to go to court, let’s say you filed a motion for child support or spousal support or something along those lines and you had a hearing and let’s say the judge made some orders regarding the hearing.

The minute order is essentially the written document that records what was it that the judge said at the hearing.

So, there will be things that say it is stipulated that the commissioner may hear it to determine and a subsequent matter is judge pro tem, this marriage called for hearing, the petitioner sworn and testifies… and then it will go in to what was said sometimes, but mostly about what the judge ordered after hearing the testimony.

So, in this particular case we needed the minute order because the judge made some orders and we needed to get a copy of the minute order so we can see exactly what it was that the judge said was the order of the court.

Because in some instances, when the judge makes an order, that has to be written up on what’s called an order after hearing which is simply an order written up after the hearing. Makes sense.

And then that needs to go through a legal process wherein the other party needs to sign it and if they don’t sign it in a specific amount of time then you can file it with the court with the declaration and I won’t bore you with all the details of that. But that is what a minute order is, there may be other times when you need one. If you want to see what was it that the judge said specifically what was the order. You’d want to get the minute order.

And to do so, you simply go down to the court. If you had a recent hearing and it usually take them two to three days to get the minute order in the file. But you can go down to the court, walk into the court room. Don’t go to the clerk, the clerk’s office. Go to the court clerk, let them know you were recently there and you need a copy of the minute order, give them the date and they should be able to have a copy for you.

If you have any other questions about minute orders, feel free to give me a call 661-281-0266.

Again, my name is Tim Blankenship and you get more information about the divorce process off our website at divorce661.com

Thanks for reading!

Start Your Santa Clarita Divorce With Us Even If You Need An Attorney

Posted by Tim Blankenship on

Start Your Santa Clarita Divorce With Us Even If You Need An Attorney

Hey! Tim Blankenship here with divorce661.com in Santa Clarita, California. We specialize in divorce document preparation in all of Los Angeles County.

And today I’m going to make a bold statement. I’m going to suggest that regardless if you know you will need an attorney for your divorce case, that you at least start with us.

Start with us to get your initial documents served, filed, processed and completed before you have to go out and hire an attorney.

Now, we’re not saying don’t speak to an attorney first. It’s always a good idea to speak to an attorney if you have legal questions. But once you’ve done that, do you necessarily want to go out and retain them to prepare your initial filing documents, your summons, your petition, all these forms or check boxes?

The next step is doing your financial disclosures, again, forms that you can use our expert services to complete for you and a fraction of the cost of an attorney.

So what we suggest is, spare your checkbooks, spare your bank account, use us for the initial few steps of your divorce and that is getting the legal documents prepared, get them filed, get them served, get that process done and then go hire an attorney.

Then let them do what they do best, let them represent you in court if that’s what you used to happen, let them appear in court, let them give you legal advice, but why do they need to prepare the legal documents in  $200, $300 or $400 an hour? That doesn’t make sense to us.

So what I’m saying today is, come to us to start your divorce. Whether, if you know, hey this is going to be a battle, we’re going to go to court. I know it. There’s nothing that’s going to keep us out of the court. There’s no sense in having an attorney preparing those initial documents.

Their check boxes, we can take care of that for you and we’ll let you know when it’s time to move on from our service and go speak to an attorney or have attorney represent you.

Tim Blankenship, divorce661.com. Give me a call if you have questions – 661-281-0266 and thanks for reading!

Why You Should Watch Our Santa Clarita Divorce Videos

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Why You Should Watch Our Santa Clarita Divorce Videos

Hi, this is Tim Blankenship with divorce661.com.

And this is officially our 100th video upload to YouTube.

And we do lots of videos as you know, if you’ve watch our videos. We cover a broad array of issues related to divorce and today I was reminded why I do all the videos I do.

A client just left my office and he was fully aware of the divorce process and how we work and everything to do with divorce as far as what he’d seen off our videos. Everything he learned was off our videos.

I’m guessing he probably watched twenty or thirty of our videos. Because when he called us originally, he said, he knew what we want to do. He want to do a particular style of divorce because he thought one thing and then he asked, he thought maybe he should do another but after watching our videos he knew exactly what he wanted to do.

He has watched the videos on how to prepare the forms, He was kind of deciding, should I try and do this myself. Because we have so many videos, you can literally complete your entire divorce process on your own.

But after watching the videos, he decided, he’d rather just pay someone to do it professionally and take care of everything for him in the end.

The benefit to us is, we have very informed clients. By the time they come into our office they have already decided to use our service. It’s not a meet-and-greet-and-tell-me-how-the-process-works.

We either had a long conversation on the phone after they’ve watched our videos and read our blogs or both. We’ve talked to them, we’ve directed them to our blogs; watch some videos, get informed. We really want you to understand the process of our divorce because at the end of the day you’re the one technically filling out the forms. We don’t exist, we’re just doing this for you and you’re representing yourself.

So, we adjusted, recopied. We’re glad we put these videos out there. It does help us. We do find clients this way, by getting this information out there but at the same time, folks who wanted to do their own divorce can completely do all the forms, all the filing and we cover everything from A to Z on how to do it.

So, we’re helping the community, but at the same time people wanted to help themselves by working with us. They’re free to do that as well and of course we’d love to help you with our divorce service.

So, make sure you watch our videos, get informed, go to divorce661.com website, go to our YouTube channel which is: youtube/divorce661 and you can, again there’s over a hundred of videos as of now where you can learn about the divorce process and everything there is to know about it.

My name is Tim Blankenship, divorce661.com.

Please give me a call if you have any questions, we would like to get it started. 661-281-0266.

Thanks for reading!

California Uncontested Divorce Judgment Checklist

Posted by Tim Blankenship on

California Uncontested Divorce Judgment Checklist

Good morning! This is Tim Blankenship with divorce661.com.

And today we’re going to talk about the checklist you can use for the uncontested divorce judgment in California.

I’ve been getting a lot of calls from folks who are asking me, folks who want to do these themselves of course, if there is a checklist online or what checklist do we use that you can use to submit your judgment make sure you have all the forms necessary.

So, I’m going to go over this step by step in this video, go over what the uncontested dissolution judgment checklist has on it.

There is one thing that is missing. They’ve updated the judgment forms for Los Angeles County anyways, actually it is going to be for California and so I want to go over everything that is on here and I’m also going to put a link in this video. If you just go down to the text below, I’ll put a link in the text and it’ll take you to my blog. And I will have this PDF available for your viewing.

I’d recommend you just print it out and actually what I do is I write the client’s name at the top, I highlight uncontested dissolution judgment or whatever the case is. I’m going to be doing another video on all the different types of judgments you can submit, because each of them is different, all the forms are different and I’m letting the court know when they get the judgment package, “Hey, this is the type of judgment we are submitting. So, these are the forms you’re going to be looking for.” – Just to kind of help them understand what we’re doing so they don’t think we missed a form when we didn’t.

So, on the uncontested dissolution judgment, here’s the list of forms you’re going to need.

And just so you know an uncontested dissolution is defined as this: a petition was filed, a response was filed and the parties have a written agreement.

So, this is what you’d use when you file for divorce, your spouse filed a response and you’re entering into a written agreement. You have to have an appearance stipulation and waiver, the FL-130. If children are involved, you need a declaration of uniform child custody and jurisdiction act FL-105.

Now, just as a note, you would have already done this when you first filed for divorce, this UCCJEA. You would have done that already, you only need to update that if there have been some changes.

You’re going to need a declaration regarding service of preliminary declaration of disclosure. You’ve already done this after you filed your petition and your spouse would have done it after they filed their response. It’s the declaration of disclosure. It’s the form you filed that said you’ve prepared all your financial disclosures and served them. Make sure that’s filed before you submit your judgment.

The declaration regarding service of final declaration of disclosure, you probably won’t need that. I’ve never had to complete that form, we always are using the next one on the list, the stipulation and waiver of final declaration of disclosure.

So, whatever the case may be, just include the proper form. The declaration for default or uncontested dissolution, it’s FL-170 and you need a judgment form, the FL180 which will be essentially your cover sheet.

Notice of entry of judgment, FL-190. And if there is child support you’re going to need the stipulation to establish or modify child support, FL-350. Or you can use the child support and order attachment, FL-342.

I know these are a lot of forms, I would just suggest you go down and click, if this is something that you need, you know it’s uncontested, you know that a petition was filed, a response was filed, and you have a written agreement.

Just click the link below and you can get this PDF off our blog.

If you have child support, you may want to include the dissomaster, income withholding in order, all those are necessary.

Just remember, if you have child support, you’re going to need the FL-341 attachment. If you have spousal support, you’re going to have a 343 attachment and what’s not on this form is the FL-345, which is a property order attachment. It’s a new form, what the courts are trying to do is get away from the written narrative in the judgment and everything is an attachment, a form attachment to the FL-180.

So, hope that helped. We do provide the service where we can submit your judgment for you and take care of this for you if you like. Otherwise, feel free to use this judgment and take a shot in getting it submitted.

If you have any question, feel free to give me a call. My name is Time Blankenship with divorce661.com.

You can reach me at 661-281-0266.

Thanks for reading and have a great day!

Proper Order When Submitting Divorce Judgment Forms In California

Posted by Tim Blankenship on

Proper Order When Submitting Divorce Judgment Forms In California

Today we’re talking about how to prepare the divorce judgment in California and specifically this is going to be in regards to what order they need to go in.

I’m seeing a lot of clients having trouble with filing their divorce judgment and half of it is doing the wrong forms and the wrong check boxes. But the folks that get that part right are not getting the order correct and not collating the divorce judgment package correctly and not attaching the right forms to the documents that needed to be enclosed in the divorce.

So, I’m going to go over that and this is going to be about the order that you need to essentially staple your documents together.

So, if you’ve had your divorce case rejected and it says it wasn’t in the right order or it says the FL180 was not the top form or you’re getting ready to submit your judgment. This is the video for you just to see if have this in the right order.

So, what I want you to do is take out your FL-180. The FL-180 on the second page is going to discuss several areas: children, parentage, child support, spousal support, property division and attorney’s fees and cost. This are items J through N on page two of the FL-180, the judgment form which is essentially the cover sheet for your judgment.

So, what you are going to do is, you are going to use that as your guide for the order you are going to submit your judgment.

So, let’s assume you have all of these that apply to you.  You have child custody and visitation which is on line J, you have child support on K, you have spousal support on I, or I’m sorry in L, and property division on M. So, that’s going to be the order that you submit these.

So, let’s talk specifically about the order.

So, let’s say you have child custody. So, the first thing you are going to have in there is not on this form but it’s the FL-190. It’s regarding the children; it’s kind of a notice regarding responsibility for children. So, don’t forget that form.

The next thing you’ll have in there will be your child custody visitation attachment and that’s going to be the FL-341, that’ll be your first attachment, and behind that, you’re going to have your child support order, the FL-342, behind that, you’re going to have spousal support, that’s the FL-343. And then behind that you’ll have property division which is FL-345.

None of the other forms, well let me make it back up. So that’s what’s going to consist of your actual judgment package. So you have the judgment, you have all the attachments behind it and that’s going to be its own attachment, and you’re going to staple that together.

Everything else that’s part of the judgment package is going to be submitted individually. They are not going to be attached to this package with the judgment FL-180 on top.

If it’s a default case or a hybrid case, you’re going to have a request to enter default, you’re going to have a notice of entry judgment, you’re going to have a stipulation waiver, a final declaration of disclosure and you’re going to have the declaration for default and uncontested dissolution or legal separation.

All of these will be submitted with the package but individually, so, each of these will be stapled with three copies of everything behind them, this one, all of these will be separate from the actual judgment package.

So, if you got it rejected it’s probably because you got of these all stapled together and the court didn’t want to take the time to unstaple it and put it in the correct order. So, just keep that in mind.

We’ll be talking a lot about the judgment packages, we’re seeing a lot of clients get this rejected. People that are doing this on their own. So, we’re going to try and cover all the items of rejection that are covered on the three page rejection sheet that the LA County Courts have. And you’ll find that, even if you are anywhere in California that you’re going to find a lot of these rejections to be very similar wherever you are at in California.

I hope this was helpful, if you have any questions about submitting your judgment or your looking for a service to help you prepare your judgment or any part of your divorce case please give me a call.

My name is Tim Blankenship. You can reach me direct at: 661-281-0266. And of course you can always get more information off our website at divorce661.com.

Thanks for reading!