How to Prepare for Divorce & Move Money
While divorce is rarely easy, the ability to execute a planned retreat from a marriage can minimize the emotional and financial devastation that usually accompanies the breakup of a marriage. Much like a city with a natural disaster plan, spouses with an awareness of their legal rights, an idea of how to deploy the financial resources at their disposal and a reliable action plan will find themselves better able to handle the end of their marriage.
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Instructions
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Plan For Divorce
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Prepare yourself mentally for the process of divorce. Divorce preparation is less about war than disaster planning; commit to a course of action that avoids damaging the other party wherever possible.
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Educate yourself on the legal aspects of divorce. Go online and read your state's domestic relations code. Consult with a family law attorney licensed in your state even if you think you understand everything. Acting without the advice of counsel can lead to mistakes that could ruin your case and cost you hundreds or thousands of dollars more than the attorney's fee over the course of your lifetime.
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Assemble a financial inventory. List the remaining balance of all your debts, the monthly payment on each one and whose name is on each account. List all your financial accounts, including retirement plans and the amount of money in each one. Write out a current accounting of what you and your spouse have actually been spending to live during the marriage. Sign up for a credit monitoring service to ensure your financial snapshot does not change without your knowledge.
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Develop a projection of what you will need to live after separation. If you have children, include a worst-case child support projection. Depending on your case, you may need to include a spousal support projection as well. Pay down or pay off debt in your name and refrain from major purchases until you can put divorce behind you.
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Gather essential information. Copy your last five years' tax returns and assemble the past year's bank statements, credit card statements and retirement statements. If you can legally obtain your spouse's pay information, collect as much as possible. If you can, copy a year's worth of mobile phone records as well as legally-obtained and relevant emails, text messages and other communications.
Execute Your Plan
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Set up a post office box and redirect all your mail there. Tell your attorney, if you have one, to send mail to the box and not to the former marital residence.
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Create a bank account in your name solely and reroute any direct paycheck deposits into it. Redirect the bank drafts for your bills from the former marital account into this new account. Remove your legal share of any joint accounts. Cancel your spouse's access to any accounts in your name solely.
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Take pictures of every item of personal property you take with you when you leave. You will need these as evidence of the property and the condition it was in when you took it.
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References
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