So you've decided that divorce is the way forward.  You are swimming in stress and confusion and fear about how to go through this struggle.  You've heard so many horror stories about people going through ugly divorces that take years and cost 10's of thousands of dollars and leave the two parties in utter hatred of each other.   Is there another way?  Couldn't two people separate amicably and with their finances and credit scores intact?    The answer is yes. 

I was able to complete my divorce in 4 months for less than $750.  While I have a great deal of anger toward my ex for her lies and betrayal, the divorce itself was amicable and fair and worked out very well.  I want to share my experience and advice in hopes that I can help some folks go through this in the future.  

Before I go into details let me make some very clear statements. 
1.)  I am not an attorney.  Please don't take any of what I write as legitimate legal advice.  
2.)  Every state/country has it's own laws and methodology for divorce.  What worked for me in my state might not work for you in your state. 
3.)  An amicable divorce requires two willing and respectful parties and some level of trust.  Clearly this is a rare thing when couples decide to divorce, but if you can put aside the emotional pain and consider this a business transaction and approach it professionally, then you can do it amicably.  If one party is exceedingly greedy or hateful it will not work.  If you have zero trust in your spouse then you must get an attorney to protect you.  If you have millions of $ at risk, get an attorney.  If you have very complex finances and you don't have full visibility, get an attorney.  If you think your spouse is hateful and out to ruin you, get an attorney.  
4.)  I am not trying to say that attorneys are bad people.  They are professionals and will protect you.  They have knowledge that you and I do not that could be very valuable in some situations.  However, their services come at a great expense and their use often harms the relationship between the two parties. 


First you need to understand what divorce really is:   Divorce is a legal agreement to dissolve a marriage.  It governs the split of financial assets and liabilities.  If you have children it sets up custody (legal and physical) and financial support for the kids.  Divorce is really a business transaction.  You have two parties who need to come to an agreement over money and childcare.  

Here's the reality of divorce.  There are three ways it can go.  The best is if you and your spouse can sit across a table and make the decisions together and on good terms.  The norm is when you and your spouse spend $10k (each) to have attorneys get involved and teach you and coach you so that you can sit across a table and make these decisions.  The worst is when you and your partner cannot make these decisions and spend $20k to $50k each and ultimately require a judge to make the decisions for you.  
Which of these ways do you want to have your divorce go?


Here's my story of my amicable divorce:
After my ex decided that she wanted to file for divorce we agreed to have a preliminary discussion at the kitchen table to talk about our options.  I told her right away that my goal was to avoid using attorneys and I wanted her to take a couple days to consider that request.  A few days later we sat down and had a conversation. 
I told her the following.  "We have to make some very important decisions about the kids and then about money.  We can either do this together here in the kitchen and if necessary with a mediator, or we can both get attorneys, turn things into a fight and ultimately wind up spending more in legal fees than we really have to fight over.  If we can't agree completely to everything, our next step would be with a professional mediator who will hopefully be able to help us come to an agreement.  Which way do you want to go?"    She agreed that her desire was also to do things amicably and without an attorney. 

With agreement that we both wanted to try to do things amicably, I suggested we begin in one week.  The reason for the week delay was to give each of us time to think about all of the things we needed to decide and to start listing what we wanted and felt was fair.  We agreed to print out bank statements and loan records to understand what our finances looked like.  We agreed that we would maintain status quo for all finances.. no big withdrawals or abnormal spending.  Anything over $100 required approval by the other party.  

During this time period I visited a couple of attorneys.  Sounds contrary to my desire and plan right?  I knew that most attorneys offer a consultation for free or low cost.  You typically get 30-60 minutes with them to ask a ton of questions.  I went to my state and county website to learn as much as I could about the divorce process ahead of time.  I read a lot of articles on google as well.  Many attorney's write good articles online to education people and advertise for themselves.  Then I made a list of questions to ask..   "Does fault matter?"  "How can I avoid alimony?"  "What mistakes should I avoid?"  "How long does the process take?"  "Am I allowed to file for myself?"  The idea was to educate myself ahead of time and also to have an attorney on the ready if things broke down and i was forced to hire someone.  

A week later we sat down at the table..  I laid out two pieces of paper.  The first had a title across the top saying "What We Agree On".   The second had a title of "What we still need to discuss".   The wording was very important to me.  I didn't want any negativity or pessimism.  It's the disagreements that make people run to a lawyer.. I wanted both of us to see that we had a very long list of agreements and a very short list of things that we didn't yet agree to. 

The first thing we talked about was kids.  This should always be first.  We agreed to 50/50 joint custody for legal and physical.  We hadn't yet worked out a calendar, but having the equal distribution agreed to meant that i was confident we could work out the rest easily enough later.  So I wrote on the Agree paper "Custody".   For child support, every state has a calculation to determine this and we both agreed to abide by the state calculation.  Another agree!  We talked about custody in the event of a change or move and agreed that their stability came first, so if either party moved, the kids would stay in the schools they were in.  We wrote down a few more items on the Agree list. 

Then we moved on to Finances..  We talked about who was going to stay in the house and who would move.  Who would keep which car and the payment associated with it.  How would we divide retirement assets, 401k, pensions.  How would we divide inheritance money.  Then we each had a list of personal items that we wanted to keep.  Then we talked through other belongings.  Alimony was a big one.. this could have been a major point of contention.  I told her right off that this was all her fault and if she expected me to allow her to destroy my life and my family and run away with her lover AND expected me to pay her to do it..  that I would die on my sword for it.  I also found an article stating that in our state, alimony is typically only paid for a year or two to help the spouse get back on their feet and get a job to support themselves.  She agreed to pass on alimony.  In return though, I was generous about not fighting over some inheritance money she got that I technically had legal claim to.  

In the end, as I expected, we had about 100 items on the Agree page and 3 items on the "To discuss" page.  While the 3 items that we hadn't yet agreed to were a big deal, the visual confirmation of the huge list of things we had already agreed to was a great help.  It showed that we were close and I think made each of us realize that paying a attorney fight over these last items was definitely not worth it. 

We agreed to meet again after a few days to talk about the 3 items.  We were able to agree to one of them with ease after a little more time to consider.   That left us with two items.   My ex suggested that we go to mediation to finalize.  I think we could have made the final agreements on our own, but to her credit, she suggested that going to a professional would be wise anyway.  Her thought was that the professional could help us think of issues that we hadn't yet considered.  They might help us make agreements now that might save us stress later in life if we had things come up that we hadn't talked about.  This was a very wise suggestion and I agreed to it.  I went to the county court website and found a list of preferred mediation practices.  We picked one that had very low rates ($150 an hour).  We scheduled an appointment and off we went.   The mediation did take 3 hours because we wanted their expert advice on the topics we had already talked about and some that we hadn't.  At the end, they typed up the mediation agreement and asked us if we wanted to sign and make it official right then and there.  We both signed it. 

Having a signed mediation agreement was a huge relief.  This meant that we had completed the negotiations and decision making part of the process.  I'm not sure if it was 100% binding legally or not, but it would now be very hard to change, which was a relief for both of us.  

Next was the legal forms and process.  We had to fill out a complaint for divorce, which is the actual legal document for filing.  We had to decide who was the plaintiff and who was the defendant.  We found a website that had forms you could fill out online (for free actually).  There are a lot of websites that offer this service with advice and training.  Some are free and some charge a fee, but in comparison to the huge fees of getting attorneys this was all pretty cheap.  I've actually heard of some people hiring an attorney only for paperwork and paying them jointly, which is another good option if you don't feel comfortable studying paperwork and laws yourself. 

We each filled out a divorce complaint with her as the plaintiff and me as the defendant.  We then sat down and compared how it was filled out.  We wrote in that our mediation agreement was attached and would detail our agreements.  We agreed on a version that was best for both of us and she went off to file it. 

We both found that the employees at the courthouse and judges offices are very helpful if you let them know that you are representing yourself and had a couple questions.  They can't give legal advice, but they can help you understand the forms and the process.  If you are polite they are usually happy to help you out.  

Once the forms were filed, the case was entered into the system and we were assigned a judge and a "Friend of the court".  They issued a date for the final hearing as well.  The FOC was because we had kids.  We were given a date to attend a FOC hearing and mandatory educational parenting session.  Since we already had decided on everything, these meetings were not very stressful.   

With the paperwork files and the FOC sessions done we just had to wait for the final date.  I actually took it upon myself to try to speed up the process.  Our state has a mandatory waiting period for parents with kids, but one of my attorney consultations revealed that you could petition the judge to waive part of that.  So I made that request and moved up the hearing date. 

We showed up to the hearing date, the judge asked a few questions about our agreements, told us that our job was to be good co-parents and that kids were the only thing that was important between us going forward and signed the papers and declared us divorced..   Done.. 

In the end, it cost about $250 for legal paperwork, filing and court fees.  We paid $500 for the mediation session.  All in..  $750.   We walked away with a fair and amicable divorce. 

You can do this to.