Divorce brings significant financial and emotional challenges, but preparation can make the difference between feeling overwhelmed and moving forward with confidence. Understanding what steps to take before filing, which documents to gather, how to choose the right attorney, and why preparation matters throughout your case protects your interests and sets you up for the best possible outcome. Whether you’re just considering divorce or ready to file, knowing what to expect financially and legally helps you make informed decisions every step of the way.
Understanding Your Financial Game Plan Before Filing
Creating a financial game plan heading into divorce isn’t one-size-fits-all. Your strategy depends entirely on your unique circumstances, including whether you’re dealing with a spouse who withholds money or one who’s generous with finances. Your income-earning ability, your prospective ability to earn income in the future, and any inheritance you might receive all factor into developing a realistic plan.
One of the most important things you can do before filing for divorce is to know exactly what your financial picture looks like. This means understanding what your income is, what your bills are, and what your monthly obligations include. With this information, you and your attorney can create a game plan for what you should request from the court before you start the divorce process and certainly once you’re in the divorce itself.
Your monthly obligations might include mortgage or rent payments, utilities, car payments, insurance premiums, credit card minimums, student loans, and everyday expenses like groceries and gas. Knowing these numbers down to the dollar helps you understand what you need to maintain your household and what kind of support or division of assets would be fair and sustainable moving forward.
Gathering the Financial Documents You Need
The list of documents you might need to prepare yourself financially for a divorce can be extensive. Not all documents will apply to everyone’s situation—for instance, you might not own real estate, even if you’re a high income earner, while other people own multiple properties. However, the general rule is to grab every financial document you can access.
Documents to consider gathering include deeds to any real property, mortgage statements, electric bills, water bills, gas bills, bank statements, credit card statements, investment account statements, retirement account statements, tax returns, pay stubs, and any other records that show money coming in or going out. If you have access to documents in your home right now, copy all of them. If you can’t ultimately use certain documents in your case, that’s fine, but having them available gives you and your attorney the most complete picture possible.
Here’s an important rule of thumb: what costs you thirty dollars to print on your printer right now by copying or printing statements could cost you up to thirty thousand dollars in discovery and disclosure later. If you have access to documents in your home, grab them all and copy them before your spouse restricts your access or before these records become harder to obtain. It’s vital that you have everything that shows what goes out and what comes in every month, as this information forms the foundation of any financial discussions or court orders in your divorce.
Choosing the Right Divorce Attorney
The first thing to look for when choosing an attorney is someone you’re comfortable with. You’ll be sharing personal information and working closely with this person during a difficult time, so a comfortable working relationship matters. However, the second thing to look for might surprise you—someone who makes you a little uncomfortable in productive ways. This doesn’t mean someone who makes you feel unsafe or acts unprofessionally, but rather someone who challenges you to grow and gives you honest advice.
If your attorney isn’t telling you how you can step up and be your best case, that’s a problem. Remember, your case is you. Your case is entirely about you and how you present yourself to the court. A good attorney wants you to be the best version of yourself when presenting your case to the judge. This means if an attorney is giving you legal advice, they should also be willing to give you life advice about how to conduct yourself throughout this process.
A holistic approach to family law means looking at your case from all angles—legal, financial, emotional, and practical. If this is something you value, look for an attorney who takes this comprehensive approach. Some people just want an attorney who will tell them what they want to hear, but that may not serve your best interests in the long run.
Look for an attorney who gives you the best value, meaning you feel like you’re getting something meaningful out of that exchange. You may win and you may lose certain aspects of your divorce. You may not succeed financially in exactly the way you hoped. But if you can find meaning in this experience and work with an attorney who helps you get back what’s beyond the value of money—which is your time—you’ll be in a better position moving forward.
Why Preparation Throughout Your Case Matters
Preparation in divorce isn’t just about what happens before you file. It’s vital at every stage of your case. Too many people come to attorneys in retrospect, after their case is already done, looking to either undo it or modify it. Often they rushed through the first time, or a different attorney did the work without helping them think through every decision. When reviewing these completed cases, it becomes clear that things could have been different, and some clients feel disappointed learning about opportunities they missed.
The goal isn’t to find problems just for the sake of finding them, but to help find solutions. However, the first step to finding a solution is identifying the problems you settled for. For example, maybe your attorney pleaded for no spousal maintenance when spousal maintenance should have been requested. Or even worse, maybe your attorney requested spousal maintenance for you to receive, but then your spouse lost their job and you got a better job, and now you’re paying them because spousal maintenance was put on the table in the first place. This situation actually happens more often than you might think.
Every step you take in your divorce can have lasting consequences. Decisions about spousal maintenance, child support, property division, and parenting time all affect your life for years to come. Some decisions, particularly those involving children, can follow you for eighteen years or more. That’s why working with an attorney who helps you prepare at every element of your case and causes you to think through every step matters so much. These steps can really come back to you later, either positively or negatively depending on how much thought went into them initially.
Taking the Next Step
Preparing for divorce involves understanding your finances, gathering comprehensive documentation, choosing an attorney who provides honest guidance and challenges you to present your best case, and thinking carefully through every decision at every stage of your process. While divorce brings challenges, preparation puts you in the strongest possible position to protect your interests and move forward with your life.
