Should I File For Divorce First | Santa Clarita

Posted by Tim Blankenship on

Should I File For Divorce First | Santa Clarita

Today we’re answering the question “Does it matter if I file for divorce first or is there a disadvantage to my spouse filing for divorce and me being the respondent?”.

I get that question all the time, parties calling me saying “oh I think my wife is going to file for divorce, should I file first? Is there any advantage?”

So, because I’m not an attorney I cannot technically give you legal advice but I can point you in the right direction of where to find this information. So what I will do is direct you to the court’s website and they’ve answered the question here for us.

What it says here is ‘Am I at a disadvantage if my spouse or domestic partner files for divorce first?’

  1. Normally, it does not matter who is the first to file the divorce papers. The court does not give any preference to the first person to file (the petitioner), or any disadvantage to the person who is the respondent.

So, there you have it folks. It doesn’t matter if you file it first. In fact, I had this question just come up yesterday— one of the spouses called me and he was getting ready to file and he said that he’s advised by his spouse that he is going to run out and file first and I said “That’s fine, let her do it”. According to the courts, they don’t give a preference either way. The paperwork is going to be the same. You’ll just be the respondent instead of the petitioner.

Again, this is Tim Blankenship, owner of SCV Legal Doc Assist. We do provide affordable divorce document preparation services. We can get you all the way through the divorce process at an affordable price.

California Divorce Default Prove Up For True Default Cases

Posted by Tim Blankenship on

California Divorce Default Prove Up For True Default Cases

Today we’re talking about the Default Prove Up when going through a divorce in California.

We are a licensed and bonded legal document preparation firm specializing in divorce in California. And we handle lots of divorce cases and we like to report when we see something going on or something new with the courts and things of that nature.

Today we are talking about the California Divorce Default Prove Up.

So, first let’s talk about what a default is because it’s not going to matter to you unless you have a default style of case.

So, a default in California divorce is when one party files and serves the other party and that party does not respond and is not involved and, in fact, are not involved at all. So, it’s what is called a true default case in California.

If you have this type of divorce, you may have to go to court for this default prove up.

So, a Default Prove Up simply is a short trial where the court wants you to come in because they have some questions about your judgment because in a default you are submitting a judgment without the other party’s agreement or participation in the divorce.

Sometimes the courts will have questions regarding, say the distribution of assets and debts, they may have some questions about the child custody and child visitation, child support, things of that nature that they want to have some testimony.

You know, have you go up and give some testimony. They will probably ask you some questions. Sometimes it’s very basic meaning they want to make sure because a lot of these cases are people who are representing themselves.

They may want to make sure you followed proper procedure, then ask you things like: “Did you properly serve the spouse?” “Who did you have serve your spouse?” “When were they served?” “When did you do this, when did you do that?” Because they want to make sure you followed proper procedure to make sure that it is a default and that your spouse is aware that there is a divorce going on and they decided not to participate versus they were unaware that the divorce was even happening.

Now, another way you may get a trial for a default prove up is per your request. There is a form, it’s called FAM031 and it is a request for default setting. Now, this is a form where you can intentionally ask the court to set a Prove Up hearing on your behalf, on your request for specific reasons.

Now, some of them are these:

  • Request to terminate spousal support in a marriage over ten years
  • Request for no visitation or supervised visitation
  • Request for specific amount of spousal support
  • Request child’s support other than guideline

So, these are things that are outside the normal default divorce processes, meaning, those things would have to be specially requested. They are not normally allowed in a default.

Another reason we’re using this form frequently is for what is called unequal division of assets and debts. In normal default cases you have to literally to the dollar, split the assets and debts of community property evenly or the court will reject your judgment potentially.

So, in a default prove up, you can request that they have you come in instead of just out right returning your judgment and rejecting it, to come in and explain why it’s in the best interest to have this unequal division of assets and debts.

My name is Tim Blankenship, divorce661.com. We specialize in divorce in California, and we can help you anywhere with any of the courts in California. So please feel free to give us a call. We are a full service firm. 661-281-0266 and you can go to our website at divorce661.com.

 

California True Default Cases with Marriage Over 10 Years

Posted by Tim Blankenship on

California True Default Cases with Marriage Over 10 Years

This week we’ve been talking about true default cases when going through divorce in California.

And I want to talk specifically about true default cases when you have a marriage of longer than ten years.

So, let’s first talk about that when you have a marriage of over ten years, the California courts consider that a long term marriage. Now, we are not attorneys or a law firm here are not able to give legal advice, but if you go online you can find this information readily available.

So, in the long term marriages over ten years, the court will generally retain jurisdiction indefinitely over the issue of spousal support.

But what if you are filing a default case (and a default case is where you filed and the other party did not respond and are not participating at all) but you want to terminate the jurisdiction over spouse support and you have a ten year marriage?

Generally speaking that is not allowed by the courts. If you are filing a default and you have a marriage more than ten years, it is customary and standard that you have to mark the boxes that jurisdiction will remain for both petitioner and respondent.

So, in a default case, if you’re going to ask something out of the norm, you may have to ask for a hearing which is called a Prove Up hearing, and there is a form where if you want to terminate jurisdiction over spousal support for a long term marriages in a default case, I know that’s very specific.

You’re going to want to use form FAM031 and check the box that says “Request to terminate spousal support and marriage over ten years”. The reason you need to do this is because if you submit a default judgment and you have a ten year or longer marriage and you ask the court to terminate jurisdiction, they are going to reject your judgment. We have seen it a thousand times.

If you submit this form they will set a prove up hearing. You have to make an appearance in court. It’ll just be you and the court is going to ask you why it is in the best interest of you and your spouse to terminate jurisdiction over spouse support and then they will make a decision whether or not to do that or if they will not allow it and have you go the normal process of having jurisdiction retained for purposes of spousal support.

Tim Blankenship, divorce661.com. We specialize in divorce in California. We can help you anywhere in the state of California with your divorce.

Please give us a call, we will be happy to help you out. 661-281-0266. For more information of our website at divorce661.com.

You can also tune in to our podcast on itunes at divorce master radio. Thanks for watching!

Online California Divorce Service Now Offered

Posted by Tim Blankenship on

Online California Divorce Service Now Offered

We’re licensed and bonded legal document preparation firm specializing in divorce in California and we’re going to start talking a lot about the online divorce process, online divorce services, they are also known as automated document assembly services.

In California there is no truly online divorce. Uou can’t log in to the court website fill out your form submit them and do everything online. When we say online divorce related to California divorce, we’re talking about using a software system where you can enter in your information and it can fill out the forms automatically for you.

The reason we’re bringing this up is we now have that software, there is hundreds of companies that have this. We now also have the software where people who are going through the divorce process who have a difficult time filling out the forms, what forms to use, what goes in the boxes.

Our software will basically go through the system of questions and answers. You answer the question and your answers are automatically populated into the divorce form for you so you don’t have to worry about what to fill out and what forms do you even need, the software takes care of that.

Now, we hope you find our service online and use our online automated divorce software and we used to talk negatively about companies that offered the service because we see people in the past who have difficulty getting the product, getting their divorce completed properly because filling out the form is one thing, following the process and procedure of the court is another thing altogether

But now we are offering the service. The reason we feel good about it now is because we are offering a one hundred percent guarantee that your divorce will be completed.

If you are not able to do it on your own through the software, you can upgrade to our full service at any time and we will give you complete credit for the money you spent on the online forms and we’ll simply upgrade you to the full divorce service.

We are a full service divorce firm in California and we’ll simply take over from there and we will, we’ll take care of the divorce process entirely for you at that point.

Why Use Our Online California Divorce Software? Because We Are The Best

Posted by Tim Blankenship on

Why Use Our Online California Divorce Software? Because We Are The Best

Hi, Tim Blankenship with divorce661.com and today we’re talking about our online divorce software system that we now have available for use.

We want to talk to you about if you are considering using an online divorce service, we’re talking about where you go in, pay a fee, and you get the software where you can log in and complete your divorce forms online. We now have that service.

We want to talk to you about how we are a better service when it comes to that. Now, no doubt if you’re looking online, you’ll find hundreds of online divorce software services out there. But the issue is they don’t have anyone there to help you if you get stuck or have questions about procedures or things of that nature.

When you use our service, we are a full service divorce firm now offering the online divorce service as an entry level product. So if you get stuck in using the online, using the forms, or with the process or procedure, we’re here to assist you.  And you can always upgrade to our full service process at any time.

Now the forms are available for anywhere in California and we also offer our full service process to everyone in California as well. We can work with all the courts throughout California.

So if you’re looking for an online divorce service in California, please use our service and if you have trouble and the reason we bring this up is, most people who try online divorce services, they’re out there, again there’s hundreds of them, they have difficulty getting their divorce finalized.

How do we know that? Because we have people come in that want us to clean up the mess and that’s one reason we never offered an online divorce solution.

But the reason we’re doing it now, is because we are guaranteeing that if you have difficulty, the software will do its job, but the problem becomes, how to file, how to serve and how to do all the steps of getting your divorce finalized, you can simply upgrade to our full service, and we’ll pick up and take care of the process for you.

And, if you want to continue with the online service, you have a full client support center where you can ask us questions, such as secure portals, and you also have access to an over 300 video tutorial library that we’ve created.  So we really want to make it easy for you to be successful in completing your divorce online in California.

I Have A Pension | What Is A QDRO Qualified Domestic Relations Order | Santa Clarita Divorce

Posted by Tim Blankenship on

I Have A Pension | What Is A QDRO Qualified Domestic Relations Order | Santa Clarita Divorce

Hi! I’m Tim Blankenship, owner of SCV Legal Doc Assist.

Today, we are answering the question of what is a QDRO.

QDRO stands for Qualified Domestic Relations Order. QDRO are the legal instrument which divides up a pension and this is done by a specialized attorney called the QDRO attorney.

They are essentially an actuary who will go through and determine what percentage of the pension as community property belongs to your spouse or your spouse has an interest in.

If you have a pension and this is going to be divided, this is going to be a necessary process that you go through with the QDRO attorney.

As legal document assistants, we do not prepare QDROs. Even if you were to use an attorney to go through your divorce, that attorney most likely, is not a QDRO attorney, it is a specialty and law firms always refer that out to another attorney to prepare the QDRO. And this is how it works essentially, you have the divorce going on on one hand and you have a pension that needs to be divided on the other.

The QDRO is an instrument that will be drafted by the QDRO attorney and will be included with the judgment. It can either go and be filed along with the judgment at the time it’s filed or it can be indicated in the judgment that it will be divided by a QDRO attorney and who that attorney is. And then later when that QDRO is completed, it can then be filed with the court even after the judgment has been submitted. Don’t forget that that QDRO needs to be certified by the court and filed with the pension so they’d know, at the time of distribution, who is getting what.

If you have questions about QDRO or if you would like a referral, I’d be happy to give you the name and number of the attorney we utilize for our clients when they’re going through our affordable divorce process.

I’ll be happy to give you a name and number so you have a referral of a QDRO attorney out here in Santa Clarita.

My name is Tim Blankenship, owner of SCV Legal Doc Assist. We’re a licensed and bonded legal document preparation firm. We specialize in divorce and all of Los Angeles County can reach me direct at 661-281-0266 or on our website at divorce661.com.

Thanks!

How Much Is Divorce Filing Fee In Los Angeles County

Posted by Tim Blankenship on

How Much Is Divorce Filing Fee In Los Angeles County

Hi, Tim Blankenship here with divorce661.com.

Today we are talking about how much is the filing fee for Los Angeles County.

This is a question I get, probably daily, if not multiple times a day about the cost. The other question is, who do I make the check payable to when I’m writing my check for the filing fee.

So the answer to question number one is, for Los Angeles County, the current filing fee for divorce is $435. That is as of April 1st 2013. This fee does go up. Just six months ago it was $395. So if you’re reading this, and say more than a year has gone by past April 1st 2013, you may want to check back for a more recent article, because I’m sure the cost will have gone up by then.

The next question is, who do I make the cheque payable to? It’s not payable to Los Angeles County, it’s payable to Clerk of the Court. So you’re going to make your cheque payable for $435, payable to Clerk of the Court. This is for Los Angeles County if you are filing for divorce; and this also applies if you’re filing a response. You are also going to have to write a cheque for $435 payable to Clerk of the Court.

So I hope this clarifies who you make your check payable to, and for how much when filing for divorce in Los Angeles County.

This is Tim Blankenship with divorce661.com. You can get more information off our website or feel free to give us a call at 661-281-0266.

Thanks!

How to Determine if Spouse Filed for Divorce | California Divorce

Posted by Tim Blankenship on

How to Determine if Spouse Filed for Divorce | California Divorce

Hi this is Tim Blankenship with divorce661.com and over the weekend we have been asked a question.

Someone went to our website. And if you see at our website at divorce661.com there is an “Ask Tim a Question” box, you can put in your question and put in your email and I’ll generally get back to you within 24 hours, if not the same day.

This question came in regarding how do I find out if my spouse has filed for a divorce, and there is only really one way of doing this if you haven’t been served the paperwork; and that is to go down to your local courthouse.

They have their internal computers; sometimes they’ll have one in the clerk’s office, for example with Los Angeles County there is a computer that you can walk up to and search by name and date of birth and attempt to locate a case number. You cannot do this from your home computer; the only way you can search your online case from your home pc is if you already know the case number.

There are several reasons why you may want to know if your spouse already filed for divorce.

For this question came in, this gentleman wanted to file for divorce but had a feeling that his wife already had filed and didn’t want to cross-file and have two petitions for the same family. So he wanted to see if his wife had filed. She had said she did but he hadn’t been served so he wasn’t sure if that was the case, and if she hadn’t, he wanted to go take care of that.

So what I told him is he needs to go down to the local courthouse and walk up either to the clerk and ask to have them research and see if a case has been filed under his name or his wife’s name, or sometimes like I said they’ll have a computer for your use, just outside in the clerk’s office where you can walk up to and do your own private search.

My name is Tim Blankenship with divorce661.com. If you have any questions, please give me a call, 661-281-0266.

Thanks!

Thank You For Your Santa Clarita Divorce Referrals

Posted by Tim Blankenship on

Thank You For Your Santa Clarita Divorce Referrals

This is Tim Blankenship with divorce661.com.

Today I just wanted to put a little shout out to say thank you to my clients, this is kind of a client thank you article.

I’ve been receiving tons and tons of referrals from my clients, which has really assisted my business in growing.

And we’ve been around for a while now in closing divorce cases, and getting them done, and people are really recognizing the skill and our ability to help them and that is shown by them referring their friends and family.

We really appreciate it. We will take care of your friends and family as we took care of you and we truly believe that a referral in this particular, in any business in general, but particularly in this business where it’s very intimate; you know it’s about divorce, and your family and kids, and spousal support, and all of these issues.

When you refer your friends and family to us, we know we had to have done a really good job in order for you to do that and we appreciate it.

My name is Tim Blankenship. We are in Santa Clarita, we do serve all of Los Angeles County and we specialize in divorce. You can reach us at 661-281-0266, and as always you can get more information off our website at divorce661.com

Thanks for reading and thanks to all you clients that have referred this year, have a good day.

How To Terminate Child Support Order | Getting Judge To Sign FL-195 For Employer

Posted by Tim Blankenship on

How To Terminate Child Support Order | Getting Judge To Sign FL-195 For Employer

Good morning!

This is Tim Blankenship with SCV Legal Doc Assist, divorce661.com and today I wanted to talk to you about an email that I’ve received over the weekend that was related to an Income Withholding Order.

This is in regards to a form called FL-195, and this form is used when there is an order for say child support or spousal support, and it’s going to be submitted to the court in order for the judge to sign it.

And then that order, once signed, is normally served on your employer, and that’s what your employer uses to know how much child support or spousal support to withdraw from you check if you’re on the receiving end of that.

Now, this email specifically was in regards to cancelling or terminating the order for spousal support.

This was a case where child support was ordered in the final judgement, and the child was turning 18 and we needed to get the termination of child support. So here’s the issue: if there was a previously filed and ordered, you know judge signed an FL-195 and it’s with your employer, you have to go back to court. Your employer is most likely going to require that a new order be signed by the judge indicating that child support is being terminated.

So this means that you have to go to court and file a motion to get the FL-195, or the termination of child support signed by the judge. Now this means you need to do some planning. In this case, the last payment was going to be in the next 30 days but the employer needed the paperwork much sooner to make the change and the deduction.

So what most likely is going to happen is there is going to be support taken out beyond the order should have been, and this is because the person should have done this a little bit sooner because we need to now file a motion with the court to get the judge to sign the order. This is going to take probably 60 days before this happens.

So keep that in mind if you have a child support order that you need to terminate. It’s going to take some time, so plan ahead. At least 4-5 months in advance.

Again this is Tim Blankenship with SCV Legal Doc Assist. You can reach us at 661-281-0266 or on our website at divorce661.com. Thanks!