A person can get a legal separation the way he or she can get a divorce. All they have to do is file a petition for legal separation. And the only difference between a legal separation and a divorce in the final analysis is that in a legal separation, obviously you don’t get a divorce. Now, when people come to us we actually advise against it, except in very special cases.
For example, I had a case once where a 55-year old couple were splitting the blanket and were in complete agreement that they should have a legal separation because the wife had cancer and the husband was a top executive for Motorola.
Motorola has an outstanding medical plan and so she couldn’t get that kind of coverage if they were to get a divorce because insurance companies are not going to ensure anybody after the divorce. She couldn’t continue to carry his insurance. She could have what we call COBRA, it’s an expensive temporary application for a short period of time, but that’s one reason why obviously you’d decide to have a legal separation. Could be religious. Catholics, they often don’t want a divorce.
Only in special situations do we advise it because they don’t work out, unless it’s something serious like that. They’re going to come back in less than a year probably and tell the judge they want to change it to a divorce. But, it’s one of the things people can always come talk to us about and have up front information before they start trying to make decisions.
By: CD Owens
A person can get a legal separation the way he or she can get a divorce. All they have to do is file a petition for legal separation. And the only difference between a legal separation and a divorce in the final analysis is that in a legal separation, obviously you don’t get a divorce. Now, when people come to us we actually advise against it, except in very special cases.
For example, I had a case once where a 55-year old couple were splitting the blanket and were in complete agreement that they should have a legal separation because the wife had cancer and the husband was a top executive for Motorola.
Motorola has an outstanding medical plan and so she couldn’t get that kind of coverage if they were to get a divorce because insurance companies are not going to ensure anybody after the divorce. She couldn’t continue to carry his insurance. She could have what we call COBRA, it’s an expensive temporary application for a short period of time, but that’s one reason why obviously you’d decide to have a legal separation. Could be religious. Catholics, they often don’t want a divorce.
Only in special situations do we advise it because they don’t work out, unless it’s something serious like that. They’re going to come back in less than a year probably and tell the judge they want to change it to a divorce. But, it’s one of the things people can always come talk to us about and have up front information before they start trying to make decisions.
By: CD Owens
In most circumstances, you can’t keep your spouse’s health insurance after a divorce. You can, however, convert your spouse’s health insurance to your own plan under HIPAA, the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act. Most people know this as COBRA. It’s a wonderful thing to be able to keep your insurance for another (36) thirty-six months. Unfortunately, it’s also very expensive. For details, contact me, Greg Davis, at (602) 279-1900.
By: Greg Davis
In most circumstances, you can’t keep your spouse’s health insurance after a divorce. You can, however, convert your spouse’s health insurance to your own plan under HIPAA, the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act. Most people know this as COBRA. It’s a wonderful thing to be able to keep your insurance for another (36) thirty-six months. Unfortunately, it’s also very expensive. For details, contact me, Greg Davis, at (602) 279-1900.
By: Greg Davis
Hi, I’m Mitch Reichman. I’m a State Board of Arizona Certified Specialist in Family Law, and I practice at Jaburg and Wilk.
Yes, typically you’ll have to appear in court at least once. Judges in Maricopa County in divorce cases are very proactive, and so they call the parties to appear in front of them early on in the case to assess what their positions are and what other services might be required to help process the case, such as appraisers or custody evaluators. That appearance is not an appearance where you have to testify, but you will typically have to appear at least once in front of the judge.
One of the things that we do in your case is we put orders into place so that there is predictability while your case is proceeding. Those are called temporary orders. Orders for child support, orders for spousal maintenance, who gets possession of the house, how the bills get paid, these things need to be done in an orderly way, and we like to have court orders so that we are able to enforce people’s obligations during the process. That would typically require a hearing of some kind, and at that hearing, you would have to testify. That does not necessarily mean that you’ll have to testify for a long time, or that you would have to testify in a trial. It is possible to complete your divorce without having a trial. In fact, we prefer that our clients complete their divorces without having trial, because trial is the most unpredictable way to resolve your divorce. There are a number of different alternatives, all of which we will explore. One is mediation. Another is arbitration, which is essentially hiring a private judge to make the decisions in your case. We can also ask our judge to appoint someone – called a Family Law Master – to essentially take the place of the judge, and have hearings, and make recommendations in terms of findings. So there are a lot of different ways to settle your case or resolve it without having to go to trial.
Hi, I’m Mitch Reichman. I’m a State Board of Arizona Certified Specialist in Family Law, and I practice at Jaburg and Wilk.
Yes, typically you’ll have to appear in court at least once. Judges in Maricopa County in divorce cases are very proactive, and so they call the parties to appear in front of them early on in the case to assess what their positions are and what other services might be required to help process the case, such as appraisers or custody evaluators. That appearance is not an appearance where you have to testify, but you will typically have to appear at least once in front of the judge.
One of the things that we do in your case is we put orders into place so that there is predictability while your case is proceeding. Those are called temporary orders. Orders for child support, orders for spousal maintenance, who gets possession of the house, how the bills get paid, these things need to be done in an orderly way, and we like to have court orders so that we are able to enforce people’s obligations during the process. That would typically require a hearing of some kind, and at that hearing, you would have to testify. That does not necessarily mean that you’ll have to testify for a long time, or that you would have to testify in a trial. It is possible to complete your divorce without having a trial. In fact, we prefer that our clients complete their divorces without having trial, because trial is the most unpredictable way to resolve your divorce. There are a number of different alternatives, all of which we will explore. One is mediation. Another is arbitration, which is essentially hiring a private judge to make the decisions in your case. We can also ask our judge to appoint someone – called a Family Law Master – to essentially take the place of the judge, and have hearings, and make recommendations in terms of findings. So there are a lot of different ways to settle your case or resolve it without having to go to trial.
Hi, I’m Mitch Reichman. I’m a board certified family law specialist and I practice at Jaburg and Wilk.
The way a client can make the most of their first meeting with me is to be organized and to bring me basic general information. So I want a simple statement of their assets and their liabilities. I’d like to see the most recent three years of tax returns. And I recommend the client bring notes. At least bullet points of the topics the client would like to cover in that first meeting.
I don’t ask them to bring a lot of documents to the first meeting. We’re going to follow up and gather a lot of documents during the process. Certainly I would not want the to bring a box of records to the meeting. It would be very inefficient, very expensive for the client for me to be thumbing through a box of records in that first meeting.
We’re looking for broad strokes of information. We want to identify in that first meeting what the assets are and what the liabilities are. To find out about their children. To know about income and expenses. To see if someone is going to be needing spousal maintenance for example. So just broadly identify the topics we’re going to need to address. We’re going to gather a lot of details along the way, but that wouldn’t be a useful way to spend our time the first meeting.
Hi, I’m Mitch Reichman. I’m a board certified family law specialist and I practice at Jaburg and Wilk.
The way a client can make the most of their first meeting with me is to be organized and to bring me basic general information. So I want a simple statement of their assets and their liabilities. I’d like to see the most recent three years of tax returns. And I recommend the client bring notes. At least bullet points of the topics the client would like to cover in that first meeting.
I don’t ask them to bring a lot of documents to the first meeting. We’re going to follow up and gather a lot of documents during the process. Certainly I would not want the to bring a box of records to the meeting. It would be very inefficient, very expensive for the client for me to be thumbing through a box of records in that first meeting.
We’re looking for broad strokes of information. We want to identify in that first meeting what the assets are and what the liabilities are. To find out about their children. To know about income and expenses. To see if someone is going to be needing spousal maintenance for example. So just broadly identify the topics we’re going to need to address. We’re going to gather a lot of details along the way, but that wouldn’t be a useful way to spend our time the first meeting.
For divorce cases in Arizona, the court is required to enter orders as to three basic issues, or even better, if the parties can reach an agreement on those issues, the court can adopt that agreement as the court order.
The first issue is the parenting-time arrangement. This agreement should include which parent will have the child during the week, which parent will have the child on weekends, how the children will be divided up for the holidays, and other issues as to the transportation and the division of the children.
The second issue that the court will look at is the legal decision-making for the children. In Arizona, generally the court will give both parties joint legal decision-making, which means that both parties should be involved in making major medical decisions, major educational decisions, and major religious decisions. Only in rare circumstances will the court give one person sole legal decision making of those major decisions for the child.
The final issue is child support. In Arizona, we have a guideline adopted by the Arizona Supreme Court that gives us an opportunity to based on your income, the other party’s income, and several other factors we can figure out based on that formula real close what the court is likely to order for child support in each case.
If you’d like more information regarding child related issues in your divorce case please contact me at (480) 733-6800 or you can reach us online.
For divorce cases in Arizona, the court is required to enter orders as to three basic issues, or even better, if the parties can reach an agreement on those issues, the court can adopt that agreement as the court order.
The first issue is the parenting-time arrangement. This agreement should include which parent will have the child during the week, which parent will have the child on weekends, how the children will be divided up for the holidays, and other issues as to the transportation and the division of the children.
The second issue that the court will look at is the legal decision-making for the children. In Arizona, generally the court will give both parties joint legal decision-making, which means that both parties should be involved in making major medical decisions, major educational decisions, and major religious decisions. Only in rare circumstances will the court give one person sole legal decision making of those major decisions for the child.
The final issue is child support. In Arizona, we have a guideline adopted by the Arizona Supreme Court that gives us an opportunity to based on your income, the other party’s income, and several other factors we can figure out based on that formula real close what the court is likely to order for child support in each case.
If you’d like more information regarding child related issues in your divorce case please contact me at (480) 733-6800 or you can reach us online.
My name is Jason Castle. I’m an attorney at Jaburg Wilk, and my practice areas are family law and criminal defense.
A resolution management conference – often called an RMC – is one of the first times the parties will end up going to court. Most of my clients when they come in are scared of court and don’t want to go. So the RMC ends up being their first opportunity to be a party in a lawsuit, and to go to court. The RMC sounds scary as well. It is not. It is primarily just a scheduling conference.
However, it is an important step in the process towards litigation. It typically is scheduled somewhere between 45 and 60 days after the Respondent files his or her response, and the order setting the RMC will require the parties to have a settlement meeting prior to the RMC.
During the settlement meeting, depending on where the parties are in the litigation process, some people come in already having an idea of what they want to do in order to resolve their divorce. Others do not. That’s a good time to set what are called temporary orders.
Temporary orders are the rules or the orders that will apply between that point in time and the final decree. During the RMC, you will then go to be in the court. They’ll tell the court, These are our issues. This is how long we need for trial. The court will look at its calendar, talk to the parties to find out when it’s good for them, and schedule the trial.
By: Jason Castle
My name is Jason Castle. I’m an attorney at Jaburg Wilk, and my practice areas are family law and criminal defense.
A resolution management conference – often called an RMC – is one of the first times the parties will end up going to court. Most of my clients when they come in are scared of court and don’t want to go. So the RMC ends up being their first opportunity to be a party in a lawsuit, and to go to court. The RMC sounds scary as well. It is not. It is primarily just a scheduling conference.
However, it is an important step in the process towards litigation. It typically is scheduled somewhere between 45 and 60 days after the Respondent files his or her response, and the order setting the RMC will require the parties to have a settlement meeting prior to the RMC.
During the settlement meeting, depending on where the parties are in the litigation process, some people come in already having an idea of what they want to do in order to resolve their divorce. Others do not. That’s a good time to set what are called temporary orders.
Temporary orders are the rules or the orders that will apply between that point in time and the final decree. During the RMC, you will then go to be in the court. They’ll tell the court, These are our issues. This is how long we need for trial. The court will look at its calendar, talk to the parties to find out when it’s good for them, and schedule the trial.
By: Jason Castle
Hi. My name is Larry Hirsch, and I practice exclusively in the domestic relations group at Jaburg & Wilk. Arizona has a case called [?], and that case has allowed the spouse that doesn’t own the business to actually have an interest in the appreciation and value of that business during the course of the marriage. What we’re looking at is labor, toil, and efforts of the community. Best way to think about this is, if I have a sole and separate business and I’m actually doing something to help that business, my spouse may have a claim to my sole and separate property.
This same situation can occur with separate property homes. So let’s say that you get married, and you have a house that’s worth $500,000. Your community earnings bought the new pool, the new landscaping, and put in the addition, and when you file for divorce that house is worth $1.5 million, so you’ve got $1,000,000 of appreciation during the marriage. Is it fair that the spouse who owned the house coming into the marriage receives all $1,000,000 of appreciation? The courts in Arizona don’t typically think so. So those are two situations where your sole and separate property is not necessarily 100% your sole and separate property. Always be wary that there may be what we call a community lien on your separate property.
Hi. My name is Larry Hirsch, and I practice exclusively in the domestic relations group at Jaburg & Wilk. Arizona has a case called [?], and that case has allowed the spouse that doesn’t own the business to actually have an interest in the appreciation and value of that business during the course of the marriage. What we’re looking at is labor, toil, and efforts of the community. Best way to think about this is, if I have a sole and separate business and I’m actually doing something to help that business, my spouse may have a claim to my sole and separate property.
This same situation can occur with separate property homes. So let’s say that you get married, and you have a house that’s worth $500,000. Your community earnings bought the new pool, the new landscaping, and put in the addition, and when you file for divorce that house is worth $1.5 million, so you’ve got $1,000,000 of appreciation during the marriage. Is it fair that the spouse who owned the house coming into the marriage receives all $1,000,000 of appreciation? The courts in Arizona don’t typically think so. So those are two situations where your sole and separate property is not necessarily 100% your sole and separate property. Always be wary that there may be what we call a community lien on your separate property.
Reclaiming a maiden name is very simple. You need only make the request. You can make the request in a petition for dissolution or a petition for legal separation. Similarly, you can make the request in a response to either one of those petitions. However, if you don’t make a request in any of those documents, you can wait till the final day, the final minute that the court is entering a final decree, make the request then and you’re fine. It’s important to consider that once you have a final decree, you’ll probably need to send certified copies of it to various state agencies like social security. If you have any other questions about this matter or any other family law matter, please do not hesitate to contact me at Hildebrand Law. The number is (480) 305-8300. Thank You.
If you wish to reclaim your maiden name, please visit this attorney’s profile and complete their contact form.
Reclaiming a maiden name is very simple. You need only make the request. You can make the request in a petition for dissolution or a petition for legal separation. Similarly, you can make the request in a response to either one of those petitions. However, if you don’t make a request in any of those documents, you can wait till the final day, the final minute that the court is entering a final decree, make the request then and you’re fine. It’s important to consider that once you have a final decree, you’ll probably need to send certified copies of it to various state agencies like social security. If you have any other questions about this matter or any other family law matter, please do not hesitate to contact me at Hildebrand Law. The number is (480) 305-8300. Thank You.
If you wish to reclaim your maiden name, please visit this attorney’s profile and complete their contact form.
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