Divorce is emotional and sometimes those emotions can cloud your judgment and stop you from settling your case, or missing opportunities to settle your case. Divorce can also be an expensive process, and the longer it drags on, the more expensive it gets. If your case is going to trial, your attorney will spend days or weeks just preparing for it. More likely than not, they’ll spend days in between trial, having to re-prepare, because you won’t get “continuous” trial dates and instead will move forward in small increments—a day or two at a time. With that in mind, when is the right time to settle your case? Every case is different, but there are usually two factors you need to consider: the financial issues and emotional issues.
Financial Issues
The financial issues are usually easier to work out and make it easier to know “when to settle.” If it’s going to cost you $20,000 to prove that your spouse may have dissipated $10,000, then it’s clearly not worth that argument and expense. At the same time, the line is never clearly defined. What if you have some evidence that dissipation occurred? As the discovery process goes on and your spouse refuses to answer the questions you’ve asked, you start to think “where there’s smoke, there’s fire.” As time goes on, you start to finally get some of the answers you’ve been looking for and it turns out there’s less fire and more smoke. It’s important to be cognizant of when you have —perhaps not every shred of evidence you could ever have — but enough evidence to say “ok. I don’t think there’s going to be enough money here to spend what it will cost trying to find this evidence.” That’s when it’s time to come to the table and settle.
This is why it is critical that you have an attorney advising you on cases. Provided you and your attorney have an accurate idea of what assets exist, you can each keep track of what you would expect from a realistic settlement and compare it to the settlement offer that is made. That way, you know if you’re getting a “good deal,” or if it doesn’t quite make sense to settle yet.
The other major factor when it comes to settling on the financial issues is knowing what you need moving forward. It’s critical that you have a plan in place by asking yourself:
- Where are you going to live?
- What are you going to do for work?
- How much money do you expect to bring in?
- Is there room for growth in your job?
- How much is everything else you will need going to cost?
When you answer these questions, you may realize you need a bigger cushion, either through alimony or equitable distribution, earlier in your post-divorce life rather than later Knowing what you are going to need post-divorce is critical because that helps you determine when to settle your case.
Emotional Issues
The emotional issues can, of course, be much more difficult to handle when it comes to settlement. These issues often surround children and custody, wanting to “win” against your spouse or when one of you has an emotional attachment to certain assets or debts. Here, too, it is important to know up front what you want out of your case, as well as what you are and are not willing to compromise on.
This information gives you and your attorneys a better idea of how to resolve the case. You may be willing to give something up or take less in some areas to get something else that is more important to you. For example, you may take less in alimony if you can stay in the home you bought together or may give up an asset if that means a more favorable custody agreement. At the same time, it is important that you recognize that emotion has a cost to it and you may need to re-evaluate your position if the financial settlement makes sense or the court costs continue to climb. These issues are not easy; sometimes you need to evaluate how close you are to what you ideally wanted, and if you’re close enough, you should settle before the costs are too high. Having an attorney is a critical aspect of knowing when to settle your case, because they can advise you and work with you to determine when it’s the right time.
