Auburn Divorce Lawyers

If you and your spouse have already reached an agreement, then our Auburn divorce lawyer can get you an easy uncontested divorce. If you are not in agreement, then a contested divorce will need to be filed and our family law lawyers can fight for you at trial. However, a contested divorce is much more expensive and takes much longer to complete.

In an uncontested divorce, it is mostly paperwork. We just prepare the paperwork and both of you sign it and return it to us to file. That is a flat attorney’s fee plus a filing fee that the Court requires. There is usually no court and it is very simple. 

In a contested divorce, there is no agreement. A divorce is filed and your experienced contested divorce attorney fights for you at hearings and negotiations along the way. At the end, there will be a trial (if an agreement cannot be reached). At this trial, the attorneys for both parties will present all evidence to the judge and the Court will decide all marital issues once and for all.

If you and your spouse cannot come to an agreement, then you will have to file a contested divorce. To do a contested divorce, one spouse serves the other with a Complaint. The person who was served then retains an Auburn or Tuskegee divorce lawyer to help them file a response to the Complaint.

At this point, the attorneys begin the discovery process. Discovery is where both attorneys attempt to gather evidence from the other in order to use it at trial to win their case. They might ask for the other side to produce bank records, tax returns, or to answer questions so they can have their answers on the record. Then, at trial if they answer differently than what they answered in the interrogatories it can be used to discredit their testimony.

There are lots of tactics between the filing of the divorce and trial that are used by both sides to try to put the spouse in the best position to win at the final hearing. Preparing a good strategy from the beginning with your family law attorney is very important so that you can ultimately have a chance at winning your trial.

The divorce trial is the main proceeding both sides are preparing for and the better your case looks leading to the trial date, the more likely the other side will settle with terms in your favor in order to avoid the trial if their case looks weaker. Gathering this evidence through discovery is the main tool lawyers use to prepare your divorce case for trial.

Contested divorces are complicated and more involved than a straightforward uncontested divorce which is why the attorney fees will be higher. Because contested divorces tend to have a lot of back and forth, the attorney fees can become quite costly. When you call our office, our Auburn divorce lawyers will let you know their retainer when you do the consultation.