Are You Working With A Divorce Solo Practitioner Attorney | Santa Clarita Divorce

Posted by Tim Blankenship on

When it comes to family law attorneys in the Santa Clarita valley, you only have a handful of choices.  Don’t get me wrong, there are still plenty out here, but it is still a small community.

Many divorce attorneys in the Santa Clarita Valley are what you call “Solo Practitioners”.  This means that they practice alone without a partner attorney.  In most cases, this also means that they do not have any staff such as a receptionist or paralegal to assist them.

This brings me to the topic I wanted to address.  If you are working with a solo practitioner who does not have a staff or paralegal assisting them, you are going to end up paying the attorney’s hourly rate for everything that is done on your divorce case.

Case in point.  I had a new client that had me file their divorce case.  She just wanted to file the petition and get things started with our company because she felt there was a good chance she would need a divorce attorney down the road.

So we filed the summons and petition and had her spouse served.  She then went on a consultation with a divorce attorney in Santa Clarita.  The divorce attorney was a solo practitioner with no staff or paralegal to assist him.  So she asked what his hourly rate is.  He responded that he charges $300 per hour.

The next step for her was to complete her financial disclosures.  This is hardly a process that requires and attorney to prepare.  What shocked me was that the attorney actually advised her to continue working with us to prepare her financial disclosures because it would be cheaper.

If she was to use this attorney’s services at this point, she would be looking at spending around $1,500 to complete her financial disclosures.  We can do that for a fraction of that cost.

I have talked about this many times in the past.  There is no reason to hire an attorney until you need them for legal advice or to represent you in court.

This client did exactly what someone should do who is looking to save money on their divorce, even if they need an attorney.  She hired our divorce legal to get the process started.  She had us file the summons and petition and have her spouse served.  We are preparing her financial disclosures and serving those as wel and are completing the filing with the court.

Now she can take her completed documents over to her attorney who can now litigate her divorce if necessary.  For more information you can read the article where we discuss having us start your divorce in Santa Clarita even if you know you will need an attorney by clicking on this link.

Important To Remember What Happened In Court | Santa Clarita Divorce

Posted by Tim Blankenship on

We have had several of our clients go to court lately.  No matter how many times I tell them to remember what happens in court, they often forget.

I don’t blame them.  There is a lot going on and they are nervous and in unfamiliar territory.  The problem is that we need to know what orders the judge made so that we can do what they said to do.

Most recently we had a client go to court and the judge made some orders.  Our client called us to inform us that he was not sure exactly what the judge said he had to do.

All he could remember is that a new trial date was set and that he was supposed to complete his judgment before the trial date.

When this happens, we want to make sure what was said in court so we can complete whatever the judge informed us to.  So what we did was have our attorney service go to the department and ask for a copy of the minute order.  Click on this link for more information of what a minute order during a divorce hearing is.

When we received the minute order, it said that he was supposed to give his spouse notice of the next hearing.  He did not hear that part.  Here is the problem with that.  If he had not contacted us to help him with his divorce, he would have not known about giving notice of the next hearing.

Seems harmless enough, but had he shown up to court without giving notice of the hearing and trial, he would have shown up and the court would have realized that the other party was not informed of the hearing and had to continue the case to yet another court date.

Representing yourself during your divorce can be very challenging and have significant setbacks.  No wonder it takes people representing themselves during divorce so long to get through the process.

We recommend you use a competent divorce firm to help you with your divorce paperwork.

SCV Legal Doc Assist

27240 Turnberry Lane, Ste. 200 Valencia, CA 91355

We Only Handle Divorce In Palmdale & Lancaster

Posted by Tim Blankenship on

If you are going to get divorced, shouldn’t you use a company that specializes in divorce?  I believe your should.  Like I have said in the past, if you are going to have surgery, wouldn’t you want the most experienced you could find?

That said, I was doing a routine Google search to see who is offering divorce services in Palmdale and Lancaster.  I noticed there are a handful of companies that market themselves as document preparation services.

I further noticed that these document preparation companies offer all sorts of legal services.  They are saying that they can do just about any type of legal filing you need.

Here is my question.  How can you be good at any one thing when you offer so many different services?  The answer is that you cannot.

Look, we only do divorce cases.  Day in and day out it is divorce.  Divorce is a complex and difficult process to get through and the rules are changing all the time.  You have to know much more than just which boxes to check off.

We have worked for the Los Angeles County Superior courts and understand not only how to expertly prepare the divorce forms, but we understand the why behind them.  We also know how the actual procedure of divorce works with the court.

All we are saying is that if you are going to get divorced anywhere in Palmdale or Lancaster, you should be using our service.  We don’t cost anymore than the other folks.  So it is not going to cost you any extra to work for the best divorce company in the Antelope Valley.

Our main divorce offices are in the Santa Clarita Valley and are now offering our services in the Antelope Valley.  Most of our divorce cases are handled completely online or over the phone.

Join Our Santa Clarita Divorce Service Community On Google Plus

Posted by Tim Blankenship on

We continue to find ways to help people going through divorce in Santa Clarita.  As we dive into the social media scene we have decided to build a community on Google Plus.  We have created the first Santa Clarita Divorce Service Community on Google+.

To check out our Santa Clarita Divorce Service G+ Community Click This Link.

Google Plus has not seen a very large audience yet.  We are definitely getting in early on this and hope that it eventually develops into something.  As it stands now, we are the only company that posts our divorce self help articles on Google+ anywhere in the Los Angeles County Area.

If you hashtag #SantaClaritaDivorce or #LosAngelesDivorce or even just #Divorce, we are one of the only companies that comes up.  We have posted videos, podcasts and our blog posts to Google Plus which can all be found by searching by hashtag or by joining our Santa Clarita Divorce Service community.

This is just one more way for us to get the word out about our affordable divorce service in Los Angeles County.  We are still the only non-attorney legal service in Santa Clarita and are the only legal service that specializes only on divorce in all of Los Angeles County.

Were not sure if the whole divorce community thing will take off or not.  I mean, will people really post their questions there so we can help them out.  Because you have to have a Google account there may be a lack of privacy.  Divorce is a private matter and I am not sure if people will post questions if their profile can be seen by others.  Only time will tell.

At the very least, we can post our own comments and link our blog articles there so people can simply visit the G+ community.

If you have questions about divorce, we would love to hear from you whether you join our Sana Clarita Divorce Service Community or simply give us a call.

 

 

Divorce Judgment Gives People The Most Trouble | Santa Clarita Divorce

Posted by Tim Blankenship on

If you have tried to prepare your own divorce or are considering doing so, you will learn how confusing and difficult the divorce paperwork can be.  But the worst is yet to come.

Most people will have some problems with the initial divorce documents.  They will have items rejected, not file them correctly and not fill them out right.  But the final test will be when you go to prepare the divorce judgment.

The divorce judgment is the last set of divorce documents that can be up to 25 pages long or more.  These final judgment documents give everyone  a problem.

But there is a bigger issue when completing the final divorce judgment forms and doing them wrong.  When you submit the final judgment documents, they will go into a huge pile of judgments that are also waiting to be approved.  The current wait time for your divorce judgment to be reviewed is 3 months to as long as 6 months.

This means that every time you submit your final divorce judgment, you will have to wait several months before your learn if it was done correctly or not.  I know people that attempted to complete their own divorce and have submitted their judgment 3 times.  They have been trying to complete their divorce for over 3 years.  They have been trying to get their final divorce paperwork approved for over a year.

Some people figure it out really fast that they need help and others are a glutton for punishment and keep asking for more rejection.  That was an attempt at humor, but you have to hand it to these folks that keep on trying.

Whether you have not quite gotten to the final divorce judgment phase or are one of these folks that have had the judgment rejected numerous times and are ready for help, please give us a call.

We do a lot of judgment reviews where we will take a look at your entire divorce case from beginning to end and complete and correct all the documents so they can be submitted and approved by the court.

Divorce Process Starts When Spouse Is Served | Santa Clarita Divorce

Posted by Tim Blankenship on

One of the things that keeps coming up when I am helping clients with divorce is explaining when the divorce process actually starts.  There is some confusion on this as well as what document to file to let the court know your spouse has been served.

The divorce process does not start when you file your divorce case.  When you go to the court and turn in all your papers and pay your filing fee, you will receive a comformed “stamped” copy of your divorce filing.  You and everyone else in this world feels like they have filed their divorce and therefore the divorce process has started.

The divorce process actually starts when your spouse is served, not when you file.  Everything is hinged off the day your spouse is served.  Even the 30 days to file a response or when you want to file a request to enter default.  None of these things can occur until your spouse is served.

When you file a lawsuit (which filing for divorce is) you have to give the other party notice.  Notice that you have filed for divorce and what you are asking for such as your requests in the divorce Petition.

So three things I want to clear up here.

  • The six month waiting period does not start until your spouse is served.
  • You can’t file for a default unless 30 days have passed since your spouse was served.
  • The Court won’t know your spouse was served unless you complete a proof of service and file it with the court.

These are the big three things to watch out for.  And make sure to complete your proof of service correctly.  There are several boxes you need to complete and many the person who will be doing the serving needs to complete.  I see a lot of people who do this wrong or forget to put the dates and times of service, etc.

I hope this clears up the issues of when the divorce process actually starts.  When does it start?  When your spouse is served!

Should You Use A Divorce Self Help Book | Santa Clarita Divorce

Posted by Tim Blankenship on

There are tons of self help divorce books on the market these days.  But is a book the best way to get through a complicated divorce process even if you are using the self help divorce book to complete your own divorce?

I recently went to the Santa Clarita Library and checked out at least 10 different “How To Divorce” books to see if they would be helpful to someone who was trying to complete their divorce on their own.  Here is what I learned.

First let me say that I know a lot about filing out divorce forms and divorce procedure.  That said, these do-it-yourself divorce books were super confusing.  I had to double check several times to see what they were talking about.

First off, they all start off by talking a little bit about California Law.  They give you a few tidbits about spousal support and child support and other general information.

Then comes the worst part.  The part where they show you how to complete the divorce forms.  This was very funny to me because it the pages looked more like a geometry lesson.

There were lines drawn from words of instruction  on one page to spots on the form they were talking about.  There were lines and arrows all over the page explaining what goes where and a lot of “if this, then that” scenarios.   It was very confusing and i would feel bad for anyone that spent money on these books.

Most of the self help divorce books included a CD (that was missing because I went to the library) but the common theme throughout each of the books was that their was a phone number you could call if you needed help.  They are all written by lawyers and the number you would call was to their law firm or lawyer referral group.

It makes me wonder, due the confusing nature of the books, if they really want to help people going through divorce or just want to make a little money on the sale of the book and hope people call for divorce assistance when they can’t figure it out form using the divorce self help book.  Sort of a lead generation tool if you will.

If you are looking for assistance with your divorce, there are better ways than using a book.  Books are so old fashion anyways.  For instance, how about blogs or videos about divorce.  We have both blogs and videos about divorce and the process and how to fill out the divorce forms.  Don’t you think a video will be much easier to understand?

And if you get tired of watching our how-to-divorce-videos, you can always give us a call, and we can assist you in preparing your divorce for a flat fee.  No attorneys here to charge you by the hour.

We are a licensed and bonded legal document preparation company that specializes in divorce in Los Angeles County and look forward to helping your complete your divorce.

No Need To Figure Everything Out Before Filing For Divorce | Santa Clarita Divorce

Posted by Tim Blankenship on

Are you one of those people that have to have everything figured out before you do something.  Well, when it comes to getting a divorce, that is not something you have to worry about so much.

When folks call me, many of their questions are about the end game.  Meaning that they are thinking about how they are going to reach a final agreement on their divorce.  While it is good to have an understanding of how you want the divorce to conclude, it is not necessary to have every single detail figured out before filing for divorce.

If you are trying to figure out every last detail of your divorce before you file, you will never end up filing for divorce.  I recommend that you break down the divorce process into a couple of steps so the divorce process is more manageable.

This is how we operate our divorce files for our clients.  The first thing we do is only complete the necessary divorce documents that are required to get a case number issued.  There will generally only be 3 or 4 forms you have to complete in order to file your divorce with the court.  That is all you should be focusing on at first.

Then, after the divorce is filed, focus on getting your spouse served.  These  two steps are the first thing you should do.  Having your spouse served is what will start the 6 month cooling off period.

Now that this is done, you can start on completing your financial disclosures.  This is your preliminary declaration of disclosure and is where you will list all the assets and debts of your marriage.  This will be used as a template so the parties understand what there is to divide.  Until you have completed your financial disclosures, there is no sense trying to come to an agreement on the division of property.

I have some clients who call me and say they are waiting to file for divorce until they have a complete agreement.  Again, while it is a good idea to be thinking of what you want out of the divorce, don’t let this stop you from filing for divorce and getting the process started.

We are a licensed and bonded legal document assistant company in Santa Clarita and serve all the courts in Los Angeles County.

How To Streamline Your Divorce | Santa Clarita Divorce

Posted by Tim Blankenship on

The more I talk about it and write about it, the faster word is spreading on how to streamline your divorce using the Hybrid Divorce Judgment.

The hybrid divorce is simply that.  A cross  between a Uncontested divorce and a Default divorce case.  So lets back up a little first and talk about these two types of divorce cases which will help you better understand the Hybrid divorce.

An uncontested case is one where both parties have entered the case.  One party has filed the Petition for divorce and the other party filed a Response and they will enter into a written agreement regarding the terms of their divorce.

A default case is where one party has filed for the divorce and the other party does not respond. This can be intentional or because the other party is not going to participate or has not participated at all and you want to move on.

Now, on to the hybrid.  The hybrid divorce is one where the Petitioner files for divorce and the other party is not going to respond and default (purposely) but the parties are still going to enter into a written agreement.

So you can see it has the elements of both the default divorce and the uncontested divorce.  The difference between a true default and a hybrid is that in the true default, you can submit the request to enter default after 30 days where with the hybrid divorce, you will submit the default along with the written agreement and judgment.

The only difference between the uncontested case and the hybrid divorce case is that there will be no response filed with the hybrid divorce.  Aside from not completing a response, you will do all the same paperwork as the uncontested divorce case.

The reason this streamlines you divorce is because you do not have to file a response and once the case if filed you can start working on your financial disclosures and toward a written agreement.  The other aspect of the hybrid divorce is that you avoid paying that second filing fee for filing the response.  This saves you $435.

How To Amend Your Divorce Paperwork | Santa Clarita Divorce

Posted by Tim Blankenship on

I get a lot of clients coming in for our divorce service who have already started the divorce process in Santa Clarita.  One thing that I frequently find is that the initial divorce paperwork that they have filed in incorrect.

For instance, you may have spelled one of the parties names incorrectly or perhaps used the wrong date of marriage on the Petition. (Don’t worry, you’re not alone). If you have made a mistake on any of the divorce documents and have already filed them with the court, you will have to correct the issue and re file them. And if you have already served the documents, you will have to re-serve them as well.

So I thought I would discuss the proper way to amend your divorce paperwork.  Let’s talk about the initial documents, the Summons and Petition.  On the Petition itself, if you make a mistake and need to amend the form, they already have a box for you.  In the box that says “Petitioner for” you will see there is a big “Amended” box there as well.  So this form is easy.  Simply fill out the Petition correctly and mark the “Amended” box. Re-file it with the court and you are good to go.  But wait, if you amend the Petition, you have to file another Summons.

So make sure to also file an amended Summons.  There is no box on the Summons, so you can simply write the word “amended” above the word summons.  Now because these are the initial documents to be served, make sure you serve them again together, even if you had already served the first Petition and Summons.

And one last thing on this.  Don’t for get to file the amended Proof of Service of Summons.  If you fowled up these initial forms, you will have to wait another 30 days before moving forward after serving them again on your spouse.

You can amend any of the divorce documents that you file just like this by following the instructions above.

If you ran into trouble on these initial documents, you are not alone.  But so you know, these are the easier of the documents to file in your divorce.  That said, you are a good candidate for our divorce service if you had trouble with your divorce forms right out of the gate.

Please give us a call to discuss how we can help you make your divorce as pain free (and error free) as possible.