Divorce After New Years, Divorce Attorney Referral Service

It is a well known fact that Divorce goes up after New Years. This Attorney Referral Service has been watching divorce patterns in Florida and Georgia since 1997 and we get an increase of Divorce callers within the week or two following New Years. Here is what Attorneys and organizations are saying:

One Divorce lawyer always makes sure he is at his desk and ready to take calls after the holidays.

“I’ve had people who were lined up the day after Christmas,” said Roane

January is the busiest month of the year for divorce lawyers. And it’s hardly ever a case of: “I didn’t like your present, I want a divorce,” Roane said.

Reasons for the rush are varied, said Diann Landers, a divorce lawyer who said she met with six new clients in the first two days of the year — despite taking half a day off.

Some are parents who want to avoid the anxiety a separation will cause their family over the holidays, said Landers, who has been practicing law for 35 years. Others want to make a change at the outset of the new year.

“I hesitate to think they’re saying, ‘It’s Jan. 1 and this is my New Year’s resolution,’” Landers said. “I think it’s more likely that people hesitate to do anything during the holidays.”
 

Another Divorce lawyer Randy said most parents don’t want to drop the divorce bombshell on their kids between Thanksgiving and New Year’s Day.

“I think it’s also a case of making one more run at it over the holidays,” said Velzen, who chairs the Grand Rapids Bar Association’s Family Law Section. “But when you add the holiday stress to an unhealthy relationship, it can make it worse.”

Roane said some couples don’t want to be alone on Christmas, even if it means spending the holidays in a bad situation.

According to local court records, actual divorce filings don’t peak until March and April. That’s because it takes time to assemble a case once the decision is made.

According to Kent County Circuit Court records, there were 296 divorce filings last March, followed by 268 filings in April. In Ottawa County, filings also peaked in March with 108.

Less popular were November and December, with 213 and 166 filings in Kent County. Filings also were lowest during November and December in Ottawa County, with 67 and 48.

Landers said the spring peak also may have to do with the cost of filing and moving out of the house.

“A lot of people start to do things at the beginning of the year but wait until they get their income tax refund before they actually get started,”

Landers said. “It takes money to start a case.”

A lawyer may request a retainer that’s anywhere from $1,000 to $5,000 to get a case started, Landers said. “With kids, you’re probably looking at $500 in court costs and processing alone,” she said.

    Stressed couples wait until Christmas is over
    Festive season often amplifies troubles
    "Christmas is sometimes the final straw"

Relationships Australia regional manager Grant Pearson said his organisation spoke to a lot of families who were stressed in anticipation of the festive season.

"Because society has this idea that everyone will be happy and friendly … families have that expectation, but that's not the reality," he said.

Mr Pearson said this time of year also had the ability to amplify unresolved issues already brewing. "Christmas time in itself won't break up relationships," he said.

"Families are carrying a lot of stresses or issues into the Christmas period and then that couples with society's idea of everyone being in a happy family."

But, if the silly season falls short of expectation, Mr Pearson advises families to stop reacting and take responsibility rather than focusing on attributing blame.

UnitingCare Wesley Adelaide advocacy and communication manager Mark Henley said Christmas and the New Year period were the busiest times for families presenting with stress.

"People get together where there is strain and try to make out, often to the kids, that everything is OK," he said. "But a fews drinks and people's capacity to show restraint diminishes and things can get ugly."

Mr Henley said children were often the vulnerable players within the family unit as parents attempted to hide their conflict.

He said children generally had a good barometer for family stress and often blamed themselves.

 

 

King an Albany lawyer  says couples with children are also reluctant to divorce prior to the holidays for fear of spoiling what should be a happy time for kids. “Who wants to leave their children with a miserable memory of the holidays?” Once the New Year has passed, the lull in holidays and events makes it easier to get a divorce on track.

Despite the pressures a poor economy can place on a marriage, Roane and Velzen say hard economic times actually reduce the number of couples seeking divorce.

“It’s counterintuitive. I would expect that as the economy turns around, more people will be filing,” Velzen said.

“It’s not just the attorney’s fees,” Velzen said. “They can’t afford to set up two households and the extra expense that comes with it.”

In rare cases, a couple may choose to live separately in the same house, Velzen said. “Some people are coming up with solutions that are not at all healthy,” he said.

Roane said some clients decide to postpone divorce because their assets or the value of their business has dropped in value.
In some cases, their home is worth less than the mortgage debt or the pension fund has dropped in value and there is little to fight over.

Sometimes, clients review their divorce options annually to gauge whether their unhappy marriage is worth the cost of exiting, Roane said.

“Sometimes they do, sometimes they don’t. I’ve had people who have been talking about it for 10 years.”

Posted on December 27, 2011 by Eric
The New Year's Resolution Divorce

For the last few years, I have posted on the phenomenon of the New Year's Resolution Divorce.  For whatever reason, this post has struck a chord and has been both well received and cited by other bloggers.  As such, given that the new year is near, I thought I would share that piece again.

    Over the years, I have noted that the number of new clients spikes a few times of the year, but most significantly right after the new year. Out of curiosity, I typed "New Years Resolution Divorce" into Google and got 540,000 results in .29 seconds. While not all of the search results were on point, many were extremely interesting. It turns out that my intuition about this topic was right and that there are several reasons for it.

    One article on Salon.com put divorce up there with weight loss on New Years resolution lists. Also cited in this article was that affairs are often discovered around the holidays. Another article linked above attributed it to "new year, new life". Another article claimed that the holidays create a lot of pressures at the end of the year that combine to put stress on people in unhappy or weak relationships. Family, financial woes, etc. associated with the holidays add to the stress. Turning over a new leaf to start over and improve ones life was another reason given. This seems to be a logical explanation for a clearly difficult and perhaps heart wrenching decision.

It is after New Years and you are thinking Divorce. Call The divorce dept of Attorney Referral Service for a Divorce lawyer.