Hi my name is Tim Blankenship with divorce661.com and we specialize in divorce in California.

We’re doing a lot of videos this week talking about California default divorce case.

A default simply is you file, you served the other party and they’re not going to be involved. And I want to talk specifically about community property as it pertains to a default case, again the default is you filed, the party was served, they didn’t respond. They are not going to be involved at all; they’re not going to sign a thing and how true default case and how community property plays a part in that.

Now, community property is property that you obtained, asset or debt, during the marriage. So, that’s the type of property we are looking at.

On a true default case, the court will require you, with very limited exception, to divide the property, the community property (assets and debts) one hundred percent evenly. They do not allow you to take more assets than the other party. They don’t allow you to give the other party more debts. It has to be cut down right down the middle.

Now, there are times where that’s fine. It is going to be split right down the middle, but most times, most of the time it’s not going to be fair, even though it seems fair to the court that you split all the community assets down the middle, fifty fifty.

A lot of times this community property is property that you want to keep on your own and it’s still fair even when your spouse says “Yeah, I want him or her to have that community asset”, even though the distribution would be fair, It would appear to be unfair to the court.

But when you do a true default case, the court doesn’t give you any leniency on that even if it is. So they’re essentially going to force you to divide property right down the middle, whether or not it’s truly fair to you or not or fair to the other party or not.

Now, true default cases where the other party is not involved at all, sometimes those cases are the only way to go, because the other party is not going to participate, you’re not on friendly terms, they are not cooperative and that’s your only option is to do a true default case.

However, we’re finding that a lot of people will do a true default case simply to save money on the fees.

In the normal course of a divorce, you would file, pay the filing fee, the other person will respond to get involved and pay another filing fee. And people would say “Well I don’t want to pay another filing fee just to get involved, we’ll just do a default.” But then you ran into this problem with community property.

So, what we suggest that you do what’s called a hybrid. A hybrid is a default with agreement. So you can have a default but you can enter into an agreement with your spouse and when you do that, you can divide up the assets and debts as you choose and the court will not get involved in how you divide up your property.

Call me if you have any questions on that, we do specialize in divorce in California.

Tim Blankenship is my name. 661-281-0266, and we’ll be happy to help you with your divorce in California whether you’re just getting started, somewhere on the middle or you are at the end of the paperwork turning in that has been rejected and you’re at wits end and frustrated with the process. We can fix everything, go back to day one and fix everything for you so please give me a call. We’d be happy to help.

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