Get Organized – DFW Divorce Finances – Weekly Tip
Get organized: it will save you time and money; while going through the divorce process. By organizing your life you will be better prepared to produce the necessary documents and answer questions that your legal team may have. Start by organizing something small like a kitchen drawer or your purse. Organization will also help to relieve some of the stress in your life.
Be aware that when you initially meet with your attorney you will be requested to produce copies of bank statements, tax returns, pay stubs, retirement documents, etc., etc., etc. All of these documents are necessary to determine the financial outcome of your divorce. I would recommend that you purchase a thumb drive that has a minimum of 8G of space, this way you can store all your documents in one location. Whether you are making hard copies or using a thumb drive you will want to set up files relating to the different forms of documents. Remember the more organized your documents are when you turn them over to your legal team the less time your team needs to spend on organizing them which in turn saves you money.
You may want to being your organization process with getting copies of documents relating to your employment. Not many people think to make copies of the forms they complete prior to employment or whenever the health insurance carrier is changed so you may need to contact the Human Resource Department to obtain copies of some of these documents. You will also want to begin saving copies (either hard copies or digital copies) of pay stubs.
Get Organized with file folders
If you and your spouse do not keep copies or your monthly bank and credit card statements or have gone paperless, you will want to being downloading copies of the past statements and saving them on an external hard drive or thumb drive. Most banks allow you to download the past 12 months of statements and since most times attorneys would like to see the past three years you may have to contact your bank to request access to those statements.
If you have community and separate property you will need to find the documents from the date of marriage or to the original purchase. You would also want to put copies of your separate property documents in a totally different files than those relating to community property. Finding documents relating to major purchases, like a home, may be a little more difficult to find but if you can narrow down the list of documents you are looking for life will be a lot easier.
To find out more about the type of documents you maybe ask to produce see our earlier articles Request for Production of Documents #1 and Production of Documents #2.
For a more in depth look at how to organize your life see our earlier article Jump Off the Divorce Hamster Wheel.
