Practical Tips to Keep Your Finances in Check During Divorce (Ep. 27)

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Nobody wants to end up in family court, but if you do, you want an honest, experienced family law attorney by your side to help minimize the stress, mental anguish and legal costs that divorce and custody matters bring Welcome to in your best interest. Texas divorce attorney and entrepreneur Justin Sisemore, of the Sisemore law firm, entrepreneur Andrea Jones, freelance writer Mary Maloney and guests share insight on what to expect and how to handle family law matters, the changing landscape of family law and living the entrepreneur’s life now on to the show.

00:39

Going through a divorce can be expensive, especially when spouses disagree about child custody and property division. So what makes divorce so expensive, and what can you do to keep costs down without compromising your case? Listen to today’s episode of in your best interest to find out.

Mary Maloney  01:00

Thanks for joining us for this installment of in your best interest. I’m Mary Maloney and today Attorney Justin Sisemore, entrepreneur Andrea Jones and I will discuss why divorces can get so expensive and how to contain those costs. So Justin, for starters, can you give listeners a general idea of what it actually does cost to divorce from the retainer and the temporary, temporary order stage, and in those phases that follow.

Justin Sisemore  01:27

Sure, I think one of the things that you analyzed, it differs from divorce to child custody. And obviously, child custody cases can be rolled up into a divorce. You know, we generally charge a retainer of approximately 7500 if there’s kids and and some property issues, obviously that can go up or down depending on the complexity. But as a general rule, if there is property and there are children, you know you’re going to you’re going to be looking at that kind of retainer. And the reason that that retainer has gone up over the years is there’s just a lot more documentation that happens in the beginning. I tell clients on the initial call, you know, you can Google a draft of a petition or, you know, answers, you can even pull decrees and all that. The the big piece of that is the temporary orders, and we’ve talked a lot about having a set process and KPIs or key performance indicators in a divorce case, in business, that’s very common to talk about key performance indicators. And for some reason, in divorce litigation, they go out the window, or seem to, and you get this kind of generic, well, we can’t really estimate time, we can’t really estimate costs. And I just, I don’t patently disagree with that. You can’t nail it down to the dollar, but you can certainly get some good generalizations based on 1000s of cases and what clients spend going through the process. So when we talk about the idea and Andrea was actually very good about implementing this plan with us, is give a client a little bit of a roadmap to, you know, the upfront retainer, what that’s going to cover, and then kind of what they need to estimate on a budget going forward. So you’ll see in our contracts, and probably others, you know, an estimated about 500 to $1,000 a month on top of the general retainer. Okay, that doesn’t mean you’re going to spend all that money, but if you’re budgeting for that, and there’s not some major blow up issues. I think it really is good to help a client understand that, you know, this is before we fire off the shot. This is kind of what at minimum, you can expect. I tell clients that I’ve done, you know, 30, $40 million cases for four or five grand before, and I’ve done cases where they literally have very limited assets, limited liquidity, but they fight about everything. And the fight, I guess, is the equivalent to if a builder is building you a pool and discovers a bunch of rock underneath. And, you know, we thought we were going to be digging in dirt, and four feet down we discover the rock. That happens in divorce litigation. It certainly happens with child custody cases. And, you know, I think the biggest estimator, or the biggest indicator for a client going forward is if you know you have a spouse that that’s on fire coming in, you know, it’s it’s really important you don’t call and say, this is an uncontested case. I think it’s important for the client to really understand because once you, once you turn the spigot on or you file the initial petition, you can’t. You can’t roll that back. And a lot of things happen very quickly. I say you can’t. You can certainly reconcile and whatnot. But if the client’s not prepared and they don’t have the bullets for their gun, ie, the finances ready to move forward, not only from the temporary orders phase, but also just write post temporary orders, because obviously in family law, where you have associate courts, we have three days to file it a de novo, okay, so you go try the case in front of an associate judge. You sit there for several hours, there’s 20 people coming in and out, and all of a sudden the client decides, well, I don’t really like that result. Result. And it may not be the whole piece of it, it may just be a part of it, but you only have three days to base to file the notice of appeal. And the reason that’s significant is because we’re getting all of this stuff ready on the front end, right? So all your timelines, all your summary exhibits, mini trial, if you will, you’ve got to have that ready in a very short order of time. So a good estimate just to get through phase one of the case, which is a very significant phase, it can last months and months and months and sometimes years or a year, if you’re going through and you have a long trial setting. So I think that kind of that understanding before you fire off the shot, specifically, if you’re the movement or the petitioner, go through some of that analysis with the attorney. They’re not going to be spot on accurate, but they can certainly help you understand what you need to prepare for the cost going forward.

Mary Maloney  05:51

So now, there are other fees that are associated with divorce, and a lot of those pertain to certain specialists that would be involved in the case, depending on how complex your divorce or child custody issues are. Can you kind of touch on those different fees that might be involved with the different specialists?

Justin Sisemore  06:06

So going back to the specialist or addressing the specialist question, one of the things that we need to remember about specialists is they have increased their cost over time, just like everybody else has increased their cost over time, because things are just more expensive. And so one of the things I feel that is our job as attorneys is to really GC, or generally contract the specialist. Now, I’ve used a specialist a year ago, and all of a sudden this next year, they’re not the same specialist. And so, you know, sometimes, unfortunately, the client has to experience that because you don’t know you’re going off the last case that you used them for, and they did a great job, and their fees were reasonable, and then all of a sudden, now it doesn’t feel that way. So we, we will make a move or a shift if I see that, if I see any kind of shenanigans going on with costs associated with experts and specialists. But I will say this, you know, I’ve often said sometimes, when we get into, you know, the highly complex valuation cases, I’m in the wrong business. We don’t make a dime off of an expert. The only reason we would bring an expert in is for the benefit of the client, and the reason I choose the expert, you know, obviously there’s some costs and associated with it, and some expertise about the cost and how they charge clients, but the bigger piece is how well they communicate to a court. So sometimes we’ll pay a little bit more for a really good expert, or to get into that expert a little quicker, maybe you need the report a little faster, because you’re midstream on a case. And you know, I don’t, I don’t change on those costs if, if I tell you that we’re not receiving a dime from this person, I don’t get any kickbacks for from them. Candidly, I’m trying to wrangle them in and get them to show up and get the reports on time. You know, the reason we’re using them is because they’re very, very thorough in the child custody end. We used to have family court services that were, you know, kind of a an arm of the court. A lot of that’s become privatized in Tarrant County, for example, and you have kind of weighted averages. They’ll look at the costs of the expert. It’s their self, what their what the parties are seeking from that expert, psychological evaluations, child custody evaluations, home studies, those are some variations of what you may use one of those individuals for. And those costs generally are weighted based on the income of the parties and kind of the judges opinion or take on what you’re trying to prove and why you need it. So you’ll see some sliding scales. You’ll see some malleability from the courts in assessing the fees on that. But generally speaking, you know, I think the courts really like both parties to be engaged in the cost of specifically in child custody of the experts, I am always, always willing to share experts at inception. That doesn’t mean we stick with those experts, but sharing experts Inception gives the clients kind of a good foundation of you know what the business valuation is, and we may totally disagree with that, at which point we may have to pay a different expert to go say, well, we didn’t like what that first person said. So you’ve got to be flexible in that regard. And those expert fees are on top and above what you pay an attorney. So if we know that we have multiple businesses, or we know that we’re going on a fishing expedition to go find some accounts that may not have been disclosed or hidden, and we need some forensics, or we need to do a psychological evaluation, have a child custody evaluation. You need to talk about those things up front, because those are they’re not hidden. Fees. They’re just fees, and you need to be prepared for what those look like.

Mary Maloney  10:05

So next question is, and I’d love for both you guys to weigh in on this one, is that attorneys and their staff bill by the hour. So what tips do you have for keeping those hourly costs down?

Justin Sisemore  10:17

Well, I would first say, you know, we talk a lot about timelines, touch points are probably the biggest thing, or the biggest indicator of rising costs in a divorce case or child custody case. So what I mean by touch points is, if you are putting together a box of papers and a bunch of emails and you’re touching it 10 times, or the attorney’s touching it 10 times, and then their paralegal is getting it organized. And it’s just, it feels like chaos. It probably is, so I beat the word timeline into clients head. I do it for multiple reasons, though. Okay, it’s not just, it’s not just getting all of the facts down on paper, although that’s highly significant. It’s getting it in chronological order. It’s thinking about the themes of the case, and it’s explaining to the client which stage you are in the case. If you’re, for example, if you’re in temporary orders, you’re not talking about all the adultery and the affairs right now, if he’s he or she is blowing through the current finances on the other party or on on the person he’s having, or he or she’s having an affair with that can that can come into play, but it’s very important to understand where you are in the case and specifically what you need from that. So if the client gets organized with their summary timeline in chronological order, and then you sit down and you talk with the client about which stage of the case they’re in, what you will immediately find is a couple things. One, it drastically cuts down on costs. Two, the client knows that the or at least should know that the lawyer has received the information and understands at least the facts as the clients assert, right? And we, you can’t just stop it. Client do timeline, you gotta dig. And, you know, I have some people, if you’re like me, we just kind of throw four things up on the wall and see what sticks. And then I get 15 phone calls and say, No, we need to know all this stuff. And it’s hard when you’re going through, you know, raising kids and working and, you know, you’ve got court coming up in a couple weeks, it’s, it’s difficult to get that information down on paper. And so what I would suggest to clients in that regard is, is, is front load that do the consult. Don’t say I need to file for divorce tomorrow, unless you really need to. And if you, if you are thinking this through, and you’re not making a sporadic or exigent decision, you know, I would say that that getting that information down would really help you. The third and final piece to that timeline is, really, is really making it where the client understands what they’re going to testify to. And so when you’re reviewing your timeline, and you’re going over it, and the attorney goes back through with you, what the key points are that you’re going to pull out, you know, that seems to, that seems to cut down on the calls and emails. So, you know, we talk about, you know, the final pieces of explain the ingredients of the soup, how the soup is made, tasting the soup I be, ie, the client does that. I know this sounds simple, and then wiping the client’s face afterwards and seeing if they like the ingredients, seeing what we can do better. That’s customer service or client service, that’s client relations. And when you when you front, load the hearing with preparation, and you back, load it with explaining what the ingredients were and how the other side was, or what the client other side was asking for, and how you overcame that, it really kind of buttons up the client’s concerns. I’ve done consults, probably for this last week, where the result was actually pretty good from from their current or existing lawyer. And what ended up happening in that case was, you know, the client doesn’t know what the order is. They don’t get explained what what was, what the results of the order are. And that then turns into, I didn’t like the result of this, or I didn’t feel like my lawyer asked the right questions or understood what what my agenda was. And, you know, my simple question is, well, the result. What do you think about the result? Well, the result was fine. And so what we need to think about here as lawyers and as service, you know, servants and administrative staff and paralegals is getting all of those pieces in the client, having follow up, that’s just that’s critically important, and then all of a sudden you get to kind of breathe a little bit, and when it’s time to breathe, as a client, to save money, breathe, don’t, don’t pick up the phone every 12 minutes because the wind blows. And by the same token, if you don’t know what the strategy is, you’re not getting clear insight, you need to have a meeting with with the team. And I’m big on team meetings. I’m big on onboarding with the team, and I’m very big on everybody in my firm should be able to pick up a case at any point in time, because our timelines are there, our summaries are there. The billing is there to explain what’s happened, what is happening, what. Will happen in the future,

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and from from a client perspective, because I’ve been there, done that, I think the timeline think about, think about, you have to explain your entire marriage in three sentences. That’s what the timeline is for, because in court, if you have to be in front of a judge, you cannot tell them everything that happened in 15 years. You have to narrow it down. That’s why the timeline is so important, because the attorney doesn’t know you. The attorney doesn’t know your life. They don’t know what’s going on behind closed doors. So if you had to tell the story of your marriage in a few sentences, that’s what the timeline is for. And then you can fill it with with meat and put more stuff in there. Another thing is, when you have to prepare bank accounts, you know best what’s going on those bank accounts. If you give the attorney a box full of statements how they’re going to figure out what’s going on in the account, like I, for example, made a spreadsheet and put on there what I think is important to see. So I mean, the attorney looks at the accounts, they can, kind of like, figure out what I’m saying or understand what I’m trying to say, and then they can decide whether they can be used in court or not. Another thing is, if they don’t prepare for hearing temporary orders, most of the time, as far as I understand, the attorneys can come to an agreement, but sometimes you can’t, and then you have to go in front of a judge. So if you’re sitting there and the attorney is asking you questions, if you don’t know what they’re going to ask you or where they’re going with that question, it’s very hard. Are you prepared that the attorney talk to you? If we have to go in front of a judge, if I have to ask you questions, those are the kind of questions I want to ask you. I will ask you. And you need to know what to say. You’re not lying on a stand. You just need to make sure that you know where you’re going and then, and then understand the what Justin said, understand the emotional effect divorce has on you because you get paralyzed. I mean, this is like the rug is pulled under your feet so you’re not in your best state. That’s why it’s so much more important to be prepared. So when you go into court, you don’t feel like they don’t really understand me or you. You’re throwing 50 things at the attorney while he’s trying they’re trying to argue your case. All that stuff has to be prepared. It is hard, and the staff is always there to help you, but you need to be prepared yourself. And it’s not easy, and get ask a friend to help you explain what you want to explain in court to a friend, see whether that makes sense. But you kind of kind of have to practice and have your ducks in a row, because, again, the attorney does not know your life. Yeah,

Justin Sisemore  17:11

and to follow up on that, that’s a great point, I think so. I think there’s this conception out there, which is actually a misconception, that this preparation takes a lot of time from the lawyer and client. I try to do most of our hearing prep either day of or day before. And that is very that feels very scary, but I keep reiterating to the client these themes, which is, you talk in themes, okay? So if, for example, somebody is, you know, squandering assets, or they are they have alcohol or drug issues. We want to focus on the themes and then specifically talk about the facts and let the judge conclude. Okay, so the evidentiary pieces that we’re pulling in there all marry up with the timeline. It’s very important that we go in chronological order. So like Andrea just said, if you’re trying to make a point, I can’t tell you how many times clients come in with 1000s of things they want to say, and then I say, Okay, well, give me your if you had 30 seconds to give me your three reasons why this person shouldn’t have custody, what would those three reasons be? And they can’t answer it, and that’s where, that’s where the lawyer should get all of the facts, pull together the information with their team, and really get this theme down. And that theme evolves, changes. It also expands, depending on what type of hearing you’re having, whether you’re in mediation, whether you’re in final trial. So you know, just because we’re talking about compelling, let’s say, for example, we’re compelling an asset distribution or compelling an account that wasn’t turned over in discovery. If we are in, if we are in that kind of hearing, we’re not talking about whether somebody changed the light bill, right? And so I think when you start from the end game of relief, you’re seeking the attorney explains, you know, all right, let’s get it shortened down into our three our three bullet points. If you walk in there in 30 seconds, I want that judge to know exactly where we’re going with this, and then you can expound on it. If the court gives you more time, you certainly have other evidentiary options there. But that preparation for those three big ticket items, when you’ve done something 1000 or more times, it should not take that long. And I do not like clients feeling like they have this rote or written Q and A. They know exactly what the answer is. It doesn’t come off as genuine. We don’t need to memorize exactly everything we’re going to say, but you certainly need to, like Andrea said, know where you’re going and and your friends oftentimes will just be your buddy, and they’ll tell you, yeah, that’s terrible. And all this, I have 1000 opinions that I get every day from family members, friends, priests and all that, who are not paying the bill. And by the way, they they really don’t know some of the things that the court are looking for or really don’t want to hear. And so I think that you. That narrowing those issues with organization and some touch point meetings, and again, the less touch points, the better, as long as you’re thorough, is the way to really, is really cut down on the cost, certainly in the litigation phase. And

20:15

don’t call the attorney for everything, like Justin said earlier. I think that’s that’s a mistake a lot of people make collect your questions and send one email with three questions that you have, and don’t pick up the phone every time and ask questions, because, again, there are certain phases. Let the attorney explain what those phases of divorce are, and sometimes there are periods where nothing is happening, and so you don’t need to do anything. So just just understand. And then don’t talk to your attorney, talk to the paralegal. That’s cheaper, too. If there’s just a basic question, the paralegal can’t give you legal advice, but they can at least point in the right direction or ask the attorney. So just be smart in on wasting your funds, on calling every day about everything that happens that saves a lot of money.

Mary Maloney  20:53

So it’s a good, good follow up to this one too, for both of you, is, I know that the size more law firm is very cognizant about these expenses for clients and the financial strain that it poses. So what specifically does the law firm do to help clients contain their costs, keep their costs down? Because I know that’s really important to you guys.

Justin Sisemore  21:14

Well, I hear a lot from clients that say, you know, things like, you know, there’s no amount of money that my child’s not worth and all that. And the reality is, if you are really doing your job as an attorney, you have to be thinking of costs for the client to be ethical, to get referrals to, you know, create what we call the raving fans, right? So you’ve got to be cognizant of that. And you know, I hear clients say, Well, I want you to do this, and I tried it in my nicest manner and most empathetic manner, explain to the client what I know works 1000s and 1000s of times. And it can feel very much like, well, I’m being thrown to the wolves. They’ve got four people calling me. I don’t know who’s doing what, if you don’t have a good onboarding process with the client. And so, you know, it’s a work in progress. Always, with every business, you get new people, people leave, people have babies, they quit their job. And I think it’s just important as a business owner, in that regard, to really organize and streamline the process and constantly work on it. I can’t tell you how many meetings we have about the same thing. We say the same thing over and over and over again. And you know, that’s that’s to our staff, right? And it’s not that they’re dumb or they don’t get it, they it’s just you get wrapped up in the moment, and you get out of your lane for a minute, and you have to do some redirect, as any any business owner does, and the staff piece is massively important. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve been told, Well, Justin, I want you, and then I bring in somebody I think is really a good fit for specifically that court, in that moment, for what they need. And then they like, Justin, I want to talk to you, and that’s music to my ears, because that means, you know, we have a good team of people. And then, you know, if I, if I’m being pulled off a task that really doesn’t require, you know, the the billable hour, that fortunately, over the years, I’ve been able to command, I don’t need to charge the client that, you know, I used to when I’ve, I’ve, you know, I’ve consumed litigation in our other businesses before, and I remember those, you know, bills where you’re like, oh my gosh, you just enclosed a letter that I’ve already read, and it was $400 I could have just received an email for that. And and so I really think of this from the client’s perspective. I really try to think of the cost if, if I was paying it, what would be what would I be frustrated by? I give those lectures to my staff, I talk about in the in the bill, use that as a point of explanation. Really make the client understand not just what you build for, but why you did it and where you’re going with it. I really think the evolution of our firm in 24 is is the where and the why and the how. I think we skipped that in today’s society, because it’s just scroll through as quick as you can and just give me that final answer. And those details really do impact a case. And I’ve had some clients that actually showed me things about myself that I thought I really had it all dialed in, and the client actually goes, well, look at it this way. It’s like Andrea said, those summaries. I love when clients have summaries, because they’re really thinking through what it is they’re they’re after and their agenda. And when you ask good questions as a client, and I mean, I understand you’re not going to know all the questions to ask, but when you really dive into your case and you you stay organized and focused, you’re going to ask better questions, and you’re going to get a better result from your lawyer, and candidly, you build a better relationship with the whole team. And so it just, it starts with the the onboarding. It starts with the paralegal, lawyer meeting after we do the consult. And you know, Andrea can tell you the stress that happens when someone switches in, right if you haven’t met with them, or you don’t understand that there’s. Other people on the team. In fact, we’re having a meeting about that today, in about two hours, on that very issue, if you are going to even something as simple as a pre trial or a continuance, if a client shows up and they haven’t met the person that’s over there, which happens all the time in family law because of the nature of how fast it happens. In the beginning, it is very stressful already. You compound that with having to answer questions that you’ve already answered to someone that you don’t know and haven’t seen and haven’t met, it can be very stressful. But I will say that good law firms can plug and play with good attorneys and good support staff at any time, any day of the week, and you really have to believe that, and that needs to be a key indicator that you look for when choosing a firm. If they don’t have a staff, good luck. Okay? And

25:50

I think what we, what we have done to staff, and then also using technology, is the other piece, right? Everything that’s that’s what we really try to do to use technology, because going back to Mary’s question about saving costs, we’re trying to use technology as much as we can. We have improved our processes over and over again, and this is, this is a work in progress, and we’ll continue to but the onboarding process, I think we have been pretty good in onboarding the client and getting the information. Justin said earlier, we need to have in the onboarding process, so it’s a it’s again, front loaded. We asked them all the questions we need already upfront. They have to give us documentation upfront, and doing that in an electronic way avoids 50 emails from from the attorney to the client or from the paralegal to the client. We have all the information. And then what Justin was just talking about, I think, is vitally important. The information is in a system so anybody can pick up at any time and has all the information on there. So it’s not one attorney telling the other one in passing what this client what this client is all about. It’s all in a system. Somebody gets sick, somebody else can jump and has all the information in the system. And I think that’s makes the client, besides not having met the person at the lawyer in person, but calms them down, because the information is all in the system, and the client has access to the same system, so they can see what kind of documentation is in there. I think that’s we have come a long way, and it really helps. That really helps to be that organized. And it’s a lot of information for the client up front, because they don’t really understand yet, but it helps to get it all together. Yeah,

Justin Sisemore  27:15

I think it’s important, Mary, too. Like we you know how much time we spend on blogs and podcasts and getting information out to clients. I think it’s really critical for the client to to try to explore on the lawyer’s own website or their attorney’s website, look at the information that the lawyers put out there and see if they’re really trying to help you through this, right? I mean, this stuff takes time, and it’s not easy to, you know, break away from something that you know is you’re getting a or commanding a good rate per hour to educate the reality is, I’m very aware that everyone’s not going to listen to the full podcast, you know, they’re not going to go on and blog and all that stuff. We’re just trying to get that information in the client’s hands, because I really want the client to succeed, right? You have to use that information for your success, and if you have questions after you’ve done your homework, you’re going to get a better result.

Mary Maloney  28:10

Yeah. I mean, really, it’s about educating yourself. And there are, there are so many tools on the website that can really help you do that. We have, I don’t know how many blogs you can read it all day long. So on a final thought here, you know, one thing that people consider in terms of keeping their costs down is not hiring an attorney and doing it on their own, you know. So usually that’s not a good idea. But can you explain when it is and is not a good idea to not use an attorney to get a divorce?

Justin Sisemore  28:41

So with the evolution of the documentation that’s available online right now, it very much gives a client a false sense of comfort that they know what they’re doing, because you can read, okay? And I’m not saying that the complexity of the orders is just so far above, you know, intelligent people’s heads that they can’t read and understand what they’re doing. But just a simple example, I have a very educated client that yesterday, she goes into a meeting with a counselor, and the counselor tells her, hey, you need to switch custody. You know, this kid’s 17. You’re really, you know, you’re just kind of creating a very tough situation for this child, and he really wants to go live with his dad, and we’ve got that has supervised possession right now. Okay, so I get that, that that that may be a way to try something. But if, if you are representing yourself, and you just went and did it yourself. You might not think of things like, what happens if I change the primary designation of the residents? What happens and how does that flow with the Educational Rights and the medical rights? How does that affect child support? What is the possession schedule? Does it tip it over 50% what’s going to happen in the event that I relocate to Mansfield or. Arlington or Dallas or Fort Worth. And if I do this on a temporary basis, and somebody just tells me, well, let’s just try it. Okay, I think there’s a lot more things that you need to think about than just trying something when you’re shifting primary conservatorship of your child over, specifically when you’ve spent 10s of 1000s of dollars to get what we’ve already gotten you. And if a client just said, Well, you know what, I don’t want to pay another five or 10 grand, and they’re getting $2,000 a month in child support, that may not be the best idea, or vice versa. If you’re talking about property, I have a client that right now, she decided that she’s going to do it herself. And I’m not saying, if you don’t have any property, you don’t have any kid issues, you can’t do it yourself. You certainly can. But those the limited circumstances, the the case that I’m dealing with right now, the client actually awarded, quote, the cabin. And the cabin, the only problem with the cabin is it sits on two pieces of land, and one piece of land is a really, really big piece, and the other piece of land is a really, really small piece. And so if you were trying to just say, Well, I got the he got the cabin, that’s what he got. You have to understand the property code. You have to understand, you know, whether it’s a fixture, you have to understand what you’ve actually awarded, legal descriptions and all that. When you get real generic like that, and you don’t award specific retirement accounts, and you just award any and all retirement and you don’t do the quadros. You don’t even know what that is. You don’t have a special warranty deed of trust, secure assumption, power of attorney, to transfer a motor vehicle, ancillary documents, Austin forms, all the things that we do behind the scenes that really, you know, nobody even thinks about that much. There’s a reason why I’m still learning 15 years later, and I think we’re kind of the at the forefront and the head of our game, or the top of our game. And that’s not to be arrogant. It’s just to say it takes a lot of research, a lot of homework, and, more importantly, a lot of getting clobbered over the head and learning over the years, so that until you get to the point where you can feel very comfortable with a lot of different areas of law that come up. You know, family law is very dynamic. It’s got everything from contracts to oil and gas to custody to assault, family violence, personal injury claims, and if you don’t know how to issue spot, because you don’t even know what the issues are, and you’re trying to do it yourself, I just will tell people, please don’t do that. I mean, I’m not saying go hire some Yahoo, but even a even, even just the lowest level attorney that really is unorganized and doesn’t have much, at least you got a second set of eyes. And in our business, Andrea has heard the four eyes method. We have four eyes on everything we do now, right? If you don’t have a set of eyes that is a, that are a, open and B, understanding of what the the ramifications of these terms and provisions are, you will not be able to fix it, because the court loses what we call plenary power. And when they do that, and you go say, hey, lawyer, I didn’t know this, or I didn’t understand this, and this wasn’t disclosed to me, tough cookies.

33:08

And I think, like Mary and I both have been on so many blog calls, and we know enough to be dangerous, we think, but even the two of us who’ve been involved so much would not know all the stuff. And I think one thing, one word that’s always mentioned is enforceability, meaning, I might have an order, a divorce decree that says certain things in there, but can I go back to court and actually enforce if the other party is not doing what they’re told? For example, they’re supposed to sell the house, and then they don’t sell the house if I don’t have verbiage in there that that makes the court take action afterwards. How do I know as and that’s why they go to law school for many years, and that’s why younger attorney still learns all those years. So I think you’re saving the you’re saving in the wrong amount. You might save $5,000 on the attorney helping you, but you might lose 100,000 $200,000 because you did it yourself. And Justin has many examples of people not getting retirement accounts or not getting retirement just because they did not know what rights they have and what options they have. So to do it yourself. Thing nowadays with chatgpt and all that stuff, that’s not the way to go. Yeah,

Justin Sisemore  34:07

Mary, believe me, if I could chat GPT in my career and sit on a beach and do it, I’d do it. The other thing you need to think about here is I hear a lot of people call, well, we want to use the same lawyer, or we want to go to this mediator. First of all, it’s my belief that in almost 99% of cases there will be some form of conflict of interest with a mediator representing even if they say we’re going to just kind of shadow our ghost and we’re just going to draft up what the clients want. We’ve talked before about the idea of exchanging retirement for equity in a home, for example. Well, there’s tax consequences, there’s capital gains, there’s early withdrawal penalties. And if I say, Well, yeah, he he’s gonna give you $100,000 of retirement for the 100,000 in equity. And I’m the mediator, and I’m just kind of throwing that out there. I’m giving an opinion. Million, even without giving it. And that is a conflict of interest. Okay, that’s one piece. The second piece is, you know, when it comes to mediators, there are awesome mediators in every county. I know that because I’ve used them almost all over Texas. And you really got to know those mediators. I have seen horror stories of people that go to these mediators that I don’t even know if they have a law degree, but they will write up these mediation agreements that are 30 and 40 pages long with total nonsense. Client gets a bill for $20,000 from this mediator and comes to me and says, Hey, I went to this meet professional mediation service, and they gave me this document, can you please turn this into a decree? And I said, Well, what we can do is we can read this together, and if you can make any sense of what it is, because I can’t, and I, you know, I maybe not the most well read person in the world, but I’ve read a lot, and so what I’m getting at is the concept and notion of keeping it, keeping the animosity down, it doesn’t two good lawyers are going to steer people in the right direction. You don’t necessarily have to be in the same room. And I think clients get this false sense of comfort in the mediation route or in the let me share this, this lawyer, just have this lawyer drafted up route, even when there are some JDS or lawyers on the on the side of something. And so I think the traditional process, you know, I’m not saying that collaborative law and mediation doesn’t ever work. There’s certainly success stories from it. I just, I think that by nature, we collaborate anyway, or we should, and you need to have the ability for the court to decide an issue, if you reach an impasse, or if there’s some clarity issues. And then on a final point, what I would suggest is that oftentimes I will see parties that are representing themselves specifically, when we’re dealing with a modification, they’ll put all kinds of stuff in an order, right? Even if it’s not with a mediator, they just put all kinds of things in an order. And what Andrea just said, enforceability, either, who, what, when, where, why, of the order, the enforceability piece of that is critical, because when you start adding all of these A La Carte items that you think you want, sometimes what you will find is that invites future litigation. Specifically, if you have the narcissist, control freak, or all the other terms that I hear 38 times a day, those people, if they want to continue to control you or have an impact on your emotional state, the more you put in, sometimes the more it can backfire. And if you don’t have somebody limiting that that actually cares about you not coming back as a repeat client, if you don’t have a good set of eyes on that, you can really bite yourself and hurt yourself in the future and cause more cost, more litigation in the future.

Mary Maloney  37:55

So again, I think that’s a great reason why people should invest that 200 bucks to get a consult, consultation with an attorney before they decide which way they’re going to go. Yeah, definitely. And

Justin Sisemore  38:07

Mary on that point too. Like the consult fee, like I had this lady the other day. I spent 45 minutes with her, and I was trying to go through with her and explain specifically what she needed to do, and she needed to go hire a probate attorney. There were some guardianship issues. She called me and said, Hey, listen, my husband has dementia. I want to get divorced from him. I am the power of attorney. I want to sign over the assets to me. And you know, she threw in the I’m Christian, and I need to be able to have intimacy and all that, and but I need you to get this divorce done yesterday. And you know, we just said, Hold on, let’s slow down here a little bit. We gotta unpack a few things from that console, right? And she called back and was like, Hey, I don’t feel like you gave me the answer. And what she really should have said was, you didn’t give me the answer I want, and so I want my console feedback. Well, I gave her a console feedback, and I can tell you right now she didn’t deserve it, but I did it anyway, out of out of customer service, $200 consult fee and not spending $10,000 on an attorney to do something wrong is absolutely value add a client coming to a consult with their preparation. When you, when you spend $200 or $50 or $500 on a consult fee, you’re going to make time, you’re going to make effort, and you should be prepared. And we talk to them about that, we front load that with the client inside of that before they make those decisions. And I think that’s just mission critical.

Mary Maloney  39:34

Well, I think that’s a great place to wrap up. All right, so if you live in Texas and would like to contact the Sisemore Law Firm. You can reach the firm at 817-336-4444, or visit www.lawyerdfw.com and we also invite you to follow a podcast and forward it to any friends or family members who might find it helpful. Thanks so much for listening in and have a great day.

39:58

Thank you for listening to in your. Best Interest with Texas divorce attorney and entrepreneur Justin Sisemore, the content presented here is provided for information only and should not be construed as legal, tax or financial advice. Click the Follow button to be notified when new episodes become available. You.