If you’re considering divorce, where do you start? Should you move out of the house? Hire a lawyer? In this episode, Kevin and Pat discuss the different options for starting the divorce process, and which option is best in different situations, giving you a roadmap forward.

Episode 1 Transcript:

Kevin: I’m Kevin Handy.

Pat: And I’m Pat Cooley.

Kevin: And this is episode one of the Divorce Rulebook podcast. Where do I start? This is our first podcast, and it makes sense to start at the beginning. How do you get your divorce going if you want to get divorced?

Pat and I have both been doing this for a long time, and surprisingly, most people really don’t know where to get the divorce started. They will come into a consultations and they’ll sit there and say, hey, I’m here because I really didn’t know what I was supposed to do. Do I move out? Do you need to file a divorce complaint? What do I do to get my divorce moving?

So lots of people are confused about so that’s what this podcast is going to cover. We’re going to cover number one, what are your options for starting divorce? Number two, what are the pluses and minuses each option? And number three, how do you figure out which option is right for you?

But before we get into the substance of the podcast, it makes sense for Pat and I both to sort of give a little bit of background about ourselves and why we’re doing this. So again, I’m Kevin Handy. I’m an attorney. I’ve been an attorney for 22 years. And during that time, I’ve handled probably hundreds of divorces. And after a while, I got really tired of seeing couples waste money on divorce, be involved in unnecessary litigation, being involved in unproductive court hearings, and really subject to a very high level of stress for two, three, four years. And I really think most divorce attorneys get to that point where they think the system is really bad. They don’t like seeing people waste money on cases.

One case in particular that I can think of that really led me to start SnapDivorce was I had a case where it was clearly a 50/50 distribution of assets in the case and there’s not going to be any alimony. The couple both made similar amounts of money. They had a sizable estate, but for whatever reason, the wife had had more money in her retirement accounts. And so there needs to be a transfer from wife to husband to just even out the 50/50. Well, I don’t know if she was getting bad advice from her lawyer or the other side wasn’t having it. And we end up having to go to court and the couple probably spent each of them $10,000 fighting about an issue in court that was really obvious, at least to me from the outset, of how it’s going to be resolved. And of course it was resolved as I predicted, she had to transfer money from her retirement to him to make it a 50/50 split. And that case really sat with me. I thought, geez, they spent what would have been a college education for their children or they could have bought new cars or whatever, litigating some issue that was really just simple to resolve if they just got sort of neutral advice. And that was really the straw that broke the camel’s back. That led me to start SnapDivorce, which is a firm that focuses exclusively on divorce mediation and designed to help couples avoid everything bad about divorce.

Now, this podcast is really an actual extension of SnapDivorce. So the idea behind it is we’re going to give you practical information about the divorce process, the ins and outs, the sort of the behind the scenes type of information that you won’t get from anywhere else and you don’t get from your lawyers. And really there’s nothing like this out there. So really hoping that this podcast will help you avoid the common mistakes that people make in divorce, help you not waste money on unnecessary lawyers and court fees, avoid the incredible stress and hostility of divorce, avoid damaging your children, and avoid becoming bitter and disillusioned. So, the podcast is really meant for you, the listeners, to get through the divorce process as easily and amicably as possible. So Pat, I’ll turn it over to you.

Pat: Thanks, Kevin. Yes, I’m Pat Cooley and I’ve been practicing family law for over 35 years. During that time, I’ve handled hundreds and hundreds of cases and I’ve seen just about everything you can imagine. So during that process, I became frustrated with litigation and thought there’s got to be a better way. The reason we’re going to engage in this podcast is to try to give you information. Information on how you go through the process, information on how you should behave and things you should avoid. We’re going to try to help educate you so that you know the process and you can begin to think about other ways yourself to get through to the end. We want to give you pointers on how to handle yourself during the process, how should you behave, because that’s really key in streamlining the process. We’re just going to try to give you ideas on how to manage your case yourself and ideas on how to get to the end without a lot of expense and a lot of acrimony. So we hope that at the end of this podcast and frankly, this series of podcasts that you’ll have knowledge, you’ll have an idea of what your options are, you’ll have an idea of how to behave during the process, and we will have helped you navigate the process in a much more amicable, peaceful, less anxiety provoking manner.

Kevin: Thanks, Pat. I think with that, I think we’re ready to get into the substance of this podcast, which again is, where do I start?

So if you’re listening to this podcast, you probably made the decision to divorce or at least you’re thinking about it seriously. So the question is, what do you do? What is your first step? And a lot of people are confused about what the first step is. We’re going to discuss those options.

So really, if you want to get going, there’s probably five main options on sort of how to start your divorce, and I’m going to list them from least dramatic to most dramatic. So number one would be talk to your spouse. Number two would be consult with a divorce mediator. Number three be consult with a divorce lawyer. Number four would be go to the courthouse and file for divorce. And number five would be move out. Just move out of the house. So they’re kind of the five major ways to how do you get your divorce moving along. We’re going to talk about the pluses and minus of each of those.

Which option is right for you really depends on your relationship with your spouse and only you know, your own situation and your spouse. So only you are going to be able to make that decision. No one else is going to be able to make this decision for you. In fact, I consult with people. It’s one of the things I talk about in a consultation. What’s your spouse like? Are they willing to sit down and talk? Are they going to freak out? Is there going to be violence? Things like that? So thinking about those things, is your spouse cordial? Has your relationship become adversarial? Is your spouse abusive, deceitful? Is your spouse a spendthrift, meaning do they spend a lot of money? Is finance going to have to be a major consideration to get this under control immediately? Is there some kind of combination? How do you guys handle finances? What is your financial situation that’s going to dictate a lot about how you saw a divorce? Can you afford to move out? Things like that. And then has the seed for divorce been planted? Have you and your spouse discussed divorce? Has there been indications about divorce or is this going to be some out of the blue surprise to your spouse? I’m surprised how often that really does come sort of as a surprise to the other spouse that there’s going to be a divorce. And then where are you in your own mental process of deciding whether or not to divorce? Are you just thinking about it or are you ready to go.

Pat: So these are all important considerations. And if you’re meeting with an attorney, things you should really discuss because starting the process hopefully on the right foot is important. Just by way of example, I’ve had people tell me that the spouse doesn’t know and they don’t know how to talk to them. So, I write what’s called a limbo letter. I reach out to the person’s spouse and say, I understand your marriage is in a state of limbo. We’d welcome the opportunity of sitting down and discussing things with you. All that is meant to do is kind of alert them to the fact that a divorce is happening. Sometimes you’re ready to go and you’re amicable and your spouse will accept service. Sometimes you’re amicable enough, but you can’t really communicate with each other. So certified mail works. But there’s all different ways to commence the process. You just got to be open about knowing your mentality and the mentality of your spouse as you begin the process.

Kevin: Knowing the mentality of your spouse can be very important. Let me just add my own little theory in here and there’s. The seven stages of grief. I don’t know what they are, but I know the last one’s acceptance. But basically there’s a process of grieving. There’s a process of sort of coming to terms with a divorce. You think about it, most people who are getting divorced have thought about for a long time and then they get serious about it and then they go see a lawyer. But by the time the person who has seen the lawyer and is filing a divorce complaint, they’re at acceptance. They’re ready to move forward, they’re ready to go. The spouse may not even have thought about it. And so they might be contemplation or they might be at the anger stage at the marriage. And so now you got two people one of who wants to move everything forward. Maybe they’re moving with a paramour or something like that. That can really cause problems in divorce. It’s just getting to knowing your spouse, knowing where each of you are in the process that’s going to really guide sort of how you can best go about starting divorce process, causing the least amount of disruption as possible.

Pat: That’s a great point, Kevin. The only thing I’ll add is it’s an important thing to keep in mind throughout the process because as you say with those stages of grief, sometimes people get stuck in one of them. Sorrow, don’t want to deal with it. Anger constantly combative. So just keep that in mind as you go through the process as well. Always gauging the mental status of your spouse, right?

Kevin: And really the mental status of your spouse and yourself is really going to gauge throughout the divorce process how much do you push, how much do you let things ride, that kind of thing.

So let’s talk about the options in detail. Number one is talk to your spouse about divorce. So if this is possible, I personally think this is the best option to sort of talk to your spouse before anything gets going. What do you think about that?

Pat: It’s absolutely nothing worse than a process server showing up at your door and handing your papers, and you knew nothing about it. You thought you had a happy marriage. So absolutely something, say something, even if it’s not, I’m filing for divorce. You can say, I’m not happy. Things aren’t going well. But you got to start I mean, if you can, you got to start highlighting that something’s coming down the road, right.

Kevin: That reminds me of the joke about the cats on the roof. You start off by saying, well, the cat’s on the roof and the cat fell off and the cats so I don’t mean to make light of it, but if you’ve thought about divorce and you haven’t laid the groundwork, you should start doing it. Like Pat said, hey, what do you think about the marriage? I don’t think it’s going well. Have you ever thought, should we stay together? Start laying the groundwork if you can? Maybe it opens up conversations.

Pat: We know and we acknowledge it’s not always possible. Obviously, there are situations let’s go to the worst as a violent situation where, okay, maybe you can’t do it, but this is a suggestion as kind of the best way to move forward if you can, right.

Kevin: Obviously, if you can. And I would say this one opens up the most options, too, for resolving your divorce, because once you start talking, if you can talk before you’ve gone and seen a lawyer and filed divorce, it opens up options like divorce mediation or frankly, just resolving your divorce, sitting at the kitchen table and discussing, all right, well, we’re going to get divorced. We both agree. Let’s talk about what are we going to do with custody, how are we going to share custody, how are we going to divide up the property. You can start talking about things before you ever see any divorce professional.

Pat: Right. And it’s the beginning of being able to get to an agreement that works well for both of you before you throw it to some court or judge to make the decision.

Kevin: Yeah. So that is the best option if you can do it.

So the next one I have down is consult with a divorce mediator. So I think this is going to be the second best option. If you can’t talk to your spouse, at some point, you’re going to have to talk to your spouse about doing divorce mediation. But if you think, a lot of people have difficulty sitting down with their estranged spouse and talking civilly, they can say, I want a divorce, but that’s pretty much as far as they can get. And they need someone who’s a neutral party to sort of help them bridge that gap.

Pat: And that’s an important term, Kevin, neutral and the good thing about that is you’re not taking sides. You’re having someone help both of you so you get a more comfortable feeling than going into that litigation process.

Kevin: Just for a little bit of background, just in case the listeners don’t know. A divorce mediator is going to be generally someone who has experience with divorce. You have to watch out because there are not that really any rules or laws governing who can become a divorce mediator. So if you are going to look for one, you really need to look for one who is a divorce attorney or has been a divorce attorney. You don’t want just some person off the street, which a lot of mediators out there that really have no actual divorce experience. But the mediator theoretically is going to be someone who has experience in divorce, handling divorces with the court system, and they’re going to be, like we said, a neutral party. So if you get into divorce mediation, you and your spouse will sit down with the divorce mediator and the divorce mediator will kind of guide you through the issues that have to be resolved in your divorce. So they’ll sit down and say, hey, I see you’ve got kids, I see you got property, I see there’s unequal distribution of income. So, we’re going to have to talk about custody, property distribution and support. So let’s talk about custody first. Where do you guys plan on moving? They will lead you through a discussion on sort of important issues and they’ll ask you about important facts that will help resolve the issues. That’s how it works.

Pat: They’ll get you thinking about things that may not have occurred to you as well because preliminarily you’re just discussing the prospect of divorce or custody of children. But when you get to a mediator, like I said, very often people will say they hadn’t thought of certain things. So the mediator can kind of expand what you need to consider.

Kevin: Yeah, that’s especially true if you’ve been able to sit down and sort of talk out a rough agreement with your spouse. And sometimes people will bring that to a mediator and the mediator will say, well, okay, you want to sell the house, but if you thought about this or you thought about that or what’s the timeframe or who’s the realtor, they’ll fill in all the gaps and they’ll point out some certain things you have to do through the court if you dividing retirement accounts and things like that. The great thing about a mediator is they’re generally affordable for most people, especially compared to hiring a divorced lawyer and going the litigation route. And, generally, they give free consultation. So, typically, you and your spouse will both have to be present at a consultation. This is a great option if you can at least talk to your spouse. Hey, number one, I want to divorce. Number two, why don’t we try divorce mediation? Let’s go see this person and I think a lot of people are able to sort of get their divorce moving that way.

Now, that being said, there is probably the majority of people, I’d say over 50%, are not able to do either one of those first two options. They’re not really not able to talk to their spouse. One of them is either them or their spouse is not willing to do divorce mediation. It’s going to be a contentious process. So, the next option is consult with a divorce law. You want to take this one?

Pat: Sure. So you don’t want to go through the process without knowledge, understanding of the process, and without some guidance. So it ought to be an early step. If your situation is not right for moving ahead amicably with mediation.

Kevin: Then even if you’re amicable, you could still go get a consultation. So at least you know kind of what your rights are.

Pat: That’s a good point. And as an aside to that, even if you’re in mediation, you’ll often be referred to talk to your own lawyer to kind of make sure that you’re going down the right direction. So, it is good. It never hurts to have a consultation with a lawyer, even if you decide to pursue a different avenue. Because first of all, you’re going to gain knowledge. You’re going to gain knowledge of not only how to act, how to behave, how to move forward, but how the process works and what to expect.

Kevin: Typically, they’ll give you a good idea of if you’re getting a good consultation, the lawyer should give you a good idea of how your case is going to come out. They might run support numbers. They might say, hey, here’s a list of assets and values approximate, and here’s kind of where I see the split going down. If you get a good consultation, you should really have a good idea how your divorce is going to turn out.

Pat: That’s right. And they can gauge the situation and help you understand how to behave as you’re beginning and going through the process.

Kevin: But generally, along those lines, they can answer a lot of the sort of initial questions you may have, like, hey, can I take money out of this account? I want to move out. Can I take the kids? They’re going to be able to answer some of those immediate upfront questions that you may have if you’re sort of ready to jump into getting divorced and you have a bunch of things you have to do right away.

Pat: And on the other side, what if my spouse takes all the money out? Or what if they try to run off with the kids? So absolutely an invaluable thing to do. Cost you a couple of hundred dollars, maybe to $300. Well worth the price.

Kevin: Typically, divorce lawyer consultations fall into two categories. One where they charge you, and one where it’s free. And you get what you pay for.

Pat: Yes. I say this to all the clients. That’s exactly right. You get what you pay for.

Kevin: A consultation that costs two or three hundred dollars. You’re going to get one and a half, two hours of lawyer time. They’re going to really analyze your case. The free consultations are going to get ten or 15 minutes of sales pitch, and you’re not going to come out of it with any knowledge. And I know you’ve had experience with people coming to you after the free consultations.

Pat: Oh, absolutely. And I’ve had people been involved with a lawyer for considerable period of time, and they just have no idea what’s going on in their case. It’s just definitely worth spending the money, getting the information, getting the knowledge. And eventually, when you start researching attorneys’ hourly rates, it’s definitely a good price for the information you’ll get.

Kevin: Yes. So the one thing that you have to be careful about is what’s the saying, if you have a hammer, everything looks like a nail. If you’re a divorce litigator and people are consulting you for litigation, the lawyers are going to be inclined to push you towards litigation. Hey, I’ve had people come to me later in their case or after they had a constitution to, and they said, hey, the lawyers were like, you have to file something right away. You got to give me a retainer. We got to move. Right. And I’ll look at their case and say, there’s no reason to move forward. In fact, why don’t you go talk to your spouse? Because maybe they’re in an amicable situation. So you have to watch out for lawyers who just want to get your retainer in the door, get you on board so they can start billing on your money. And it really does happen.

Pat: And as an aside to that, stay rational. Don’t throw all the reason to the lawyer. You got to analyze it yourself. That will help you make sure that it doesn’t look right, what this lawyer wants you to do, analyze it. And don’t relinquish all of your power, all of your control to your lawyer. Your lawyer is there to advise you of what you can do. Different avenues.  But you’re the decision maker, so don’t lose that sense of reason when you’re going through the process.

Kevin: Yeah. I will note we are planning on doing an entire podcast about how do you pick a lawyer, how do you deal with them and stuff like that. So that will be covered in another podcast. We’ll give you lots of information about that.

Pat: Right.

Kevin: So, do you have anything else to add to that?

Pat: Not really. You just take it all in in the consultation, see if they seem overly juice. It’s hard to judge. I’m going to say it’s hard to judge. It’s almost like a crap shoot. But do your homework before you meet with the lawyer. Look at their website, read their biography.

Kevin: For a couple of hundred dollars for the consultation, I would personally go and see two or three different lawyers.

Pat: Yeah, a lot of people do that. And I recommend it, frankly, after my consultations, I always invite a second opinion.

Kevin: Yeah. If someone say, yeah, it doesn’t hurt. And then you’ll really get a sense of who you’re going to work well with, whose personality matches yours, that sort of thing.

The next option I have now is go to the courthouse and file for a divorce. And something people can do themselves. It’s a little difficult. I mean, I wouldn’t recommend it, but typically most people who are going to file for a divorce are actually going to do that. They’re going to see the lawyer for it first, and then they may file for divorce before they talk to their spouse. It may be like, hey, I want to file for divorce. We’re going to need some things done right away, like getting my spouse out of the house or freezing a bank account and stuff like that. So you may very quickly go from seeing a divorce lawyer over to filing for divorce.

Pat: Yeah. There’s a lot of reasons for getting a divorce started, but two things come to mind. One is if you’re already both ready for the process and you just want to get it going, a time type of thing to get it done quickly. And another reason would be because one side might be in denial and finally the divorce sends a message and it sort of gets the ball rolling.

Kevin: Yes. You mentioned before there are a lot of people who they know divorce is coming, but they put their head in the sand and they will literally do nothing. Ignore it, ignore the problem. So, filing that divorce complaint would be like literally just to get things moving. And Pat just mentioned too, filing a divorce complaint can start the clock running on certain waiting periods. It can cut off the time for the acquisition of marital assets. So, it does have a lot of important legal implications. So, if you’re thinking about filing divorce, if you’re not already with a mediator, you should discuss with an attorney about, should we do this now? What are the legal implications?

Pat: I just want to throw out I have a case. A man came to me recently, and he really didn’t want the divorce, but he’s concerned that the house is in the other spouse’s name and she might sell it. So, he might start the divorce even though he’s not the one who wants the divorce. So ironically, sometimes that happens because you want the power of the court. And I think that was to get some immediate relief. You might have to file it.

Kevin: Yeah. Once the divorced complaint is filed, it gives the court jurisdiction or power over your case and really you and your spouse. And so the court can immediately start to order things if you file for special relief or motions in court, they can order someone not sell a house. They can order an account be frozen. They can order somebody out of house. Really, almost anything you can think of.

Pat: They can order a parent to return from taking off with the kids.

Kevin: Right.

Pat: A lot of help that the court can give you. Even if you’re not the person really who’s thinking they want the divorce, it might be something you have to do because of what’s going on in your situation.

Kevin: Yeah. Now, filing a divorce complaint can cause other consequences. Obviously on the personal side, it can be really shocked for your spouse to get a copy of the divorce complaint. And you have to be careful. I don’t know if they’re still doing it, but for a while, lawyers in our state were monitoring dockets and they would see a divorce complaint was filed and they would send a letter to the spouse.

Pat: Yeah. I had that happen in a case and it didn’t go over very well. We wanted to serve the spouse. The client wanted to talk and say, it’s coming. But before we were able to serve it, the spouse got a letter and boom, that just blew it all up.

Kevin: It seems unethical to me. I don’t know if they’ve done it. But you have to assume that once the divorce complaints filed, your spouse is going to find out about it pretty.

Pat: Quickly and it’s going to interrupt the relationship. So either there’s going to be great sorrow, great anger, some hostility, you can’t talk now, so just be aware of all those possible emotional changes as well.

Kevin: Yeah. The divorce complaint comes, at least in our state, it comes with the first pages. It’s like big warning, like, you’ve been sued in court, you should go see a lawyer. This is going to have legal implications when someone gets that. I mean, it’s kind of scary and it really makes them usually angry, upset, worried. And so, if you’re hoping to do your divorce amicably, to do it through mediation or sit down, talk to your spouse, you should really be trying to do that before the divorce complaint is filed. And that’s why I get back to what I said earlier.  When you go see a lawyer and they’re rushing you to file a divorce complaint, give them a retainer. Let’s file right away. You have to really be careful because supposedly the lawyers are supposed to be working for your interests, but the lawyers have financial interest to get you on board and get things moving. And so you need to be really careful about that.

Pat: You definitely don’t always need to file right away. And I agree wholeheartedly that sometimes starting into negotiations because it starts to make people feel more comfortable as they begin to know what’s going to happen. So, the negotiations kind of opens up, what are we doing with property? What are we doing with kids before that shock of that divorce complaint?

Kevin: Yeah. I mean, in our mediation practice, we don’t file anything until the divorce, until we’ve resolved all of the issues, and there’s a marital settlement agreement signed for that very reason is that once the divorce complaint is filed and served on someone, it really is clear it’s going to be an adversarial process. Even though it may not be. It seems like it would be. Just be wary about that.

So, then the next one I have is move out. And I’d say this is a pretty common way to start a divorce. It’s literally just somebody moves out of the house. And it typically that happens when number one, like, there’s some sort of danger abuse. Things have gotten so uncomfortable that it’s just not tenable for one spouse or the other to remain in the house. So they’ll move out. It could be just that, hey, you’re ready to move on with your life. You’re tired of living with a spouse, so you decide to move out. Moving out raises lots of issues – custody, what do you take with you.

You want to handle some of these?

Pat: Sure, for obvious reasons. If you have children and you’re moving out, you need to consider that. So many people don’t consider it. They move out and then all of a sudden they want to address the kids. And this falls back on what we just talked about, talking to a divorce lawyer before you take this step, it kind of helps you get everything in check. In other words, what’s the proper procedure? But moving out, taking the kids without a court order, unilaterally, could cause a disruption, obviously, in the relationship and somebody to file things like, what do you take with you? Can I pull up the moving truck and wipe out the whole house? So, we usually like in litigation advise don’t take everything. If you have two TVs, take one.

Kevin: We’ll do another podcast on moving out. It’s big enough for that step and complicated enough that we’ll do a whole podcast about moving out of the house and how to approach that.

Pat: But I think the important point is, it has legal consequences.

Kevin: It does have legal consequences.

Pat: And you should know what those are.

Kevin: And a lot of practical consequences. Like I said, what do you do with the kids? They’re a mesh between legal and practical, but it can be very complicated.

So, I think there’s a nice segue into sort of the financial considerations and how that might guide someone towards how they’re going to start their divorce process. How are you going to pay for things? That’s a big question. If you want to move out, how are you going to pay for a house or an apartment? If you want to hire a lawyer, how are you going to pay for that? It’s important to take stock of your finances. I think most people are implicitly do that with anything about divorce. The next thing is like, how am I going to live?

Pat: Where are you going to live? Is another issue. Once you decide if you can move out in that consideration, do you stay close? Are there kids so that you can share the kids? If you go really far away, you’re going to be out of the jurisdiction. So there’s going to be travel time.

Kevin: Yeah, the finances will guide a lot of that. If you go hire a lawyer, you’re probably looking at retainer, depending on where you live. So you have to think, where am I going to come up with that money? And obviously, you’re going to move out. You’re not only going to have to come up probably with money for a lawyer, but also for a down payment. And then the mortgage company or the leasing company is going to want to look at your finances, and then how are you going to support yourself? So that’s a big consideration with starting a divorce, is how much money do you make and how much money do you need to live. Frequently, we’ll have the lower earning spouse come in for a consultation, and one of the first things I’ll do is run support numbers to say, like, all right, you’re bringing in, whatever, $4,000 a month, but you’re going to need $8,000 between getting a place to live and buying food, and you’re going to have primary custody kids, and the kids are going to daycare. How are you going to bridge that gap, how are you going to get support? And then you start thinking strategically on, like, when do I file for support? When do I move out, when do I get in court? Those sorts of things. So, all those financial considerations are going to really go into your decision on what the best way is for you to start the divorce again, going back again, it’s easiest to talk these things out. If you can do it amicably over the kitchen table or through divorce mediation, you can sort of work these things out before you’re taking big steps in making decisions that will affect you financially. So, Pat, I think I just gave that away, but the answer to the question but do you think there’s a best way to do it?

Pat: Absolutely do it amicably, work it out. And if you need a little help, get some mediation. Have somebody, a professional who knows a little bit more than you do about the process, help you through it. But definitely try. The best thing to do is try to put aside the emotions, try to put aside your differences and understand that this is a partnership that we’re breaking up, and you got to figure it out. And if you can do it on your own, it’s something that you can live with.

Kevin: So ultimately, you may never know for sure what the best way to do it is. Eventually, you’re just going to have to make a decision. You’re going to have to pull off the band-aid, just start and then adjust, change courses needed throughout your divorce. So you’re going to have to think about all the considerations, balance what you think is best, and then make a decision. Something else to add?

Pat: No, I think that’s about it.

Kevin: All right. Well, I hope this podcast has been helpful. I’m Kevin.

Pat: And I’m Pat.

Kevin: Thank you for listening to this episode of The Divorce Rulebook Podcast.