How To Tell When You Should Swipe Left On A Divorce Lawyer
You knew that your marriage was ending, but you and your spouse had agreed to call a divorce lawyer on Divorce Monday, right after New Year’s, and meet with the lawyer together. Now, here you are on Black Friday, having just been served with a divorce petition. If you do not respond to the petition and your judge grants your spouse all the requests she made in the petition, you will be in a desperate financial situation, and you will get to spend much less time with your children than you would like. Clearly, your spouse is not playing fair in this divorce case. The stakes are so high that you cannot afford the risk of representing yourself; you need to hire a lawyer. Unfortunately, there are plenty of unscrupulous divorce lawyers willing to take advantage of people who are in a vulnerable position, like you are. These are some red flags to look for as you try to choose a Boca Raton divorce lawyer.
4 Divorce Lawyers to Dump
You can usually tell, by the end of a first consultation, whether a divorce lawyer will be helpful in your case. These are some divorce lawyers you should definitely not hire:
- Evasive Eddie – He does not give you straightforward answers to any of your questions, despite his picture appearing on billboards for the law firm. He will probably have one of his fresh-out-of-law-school underlings handle your case.
- Belligerent Bobby – He promises to put up a fight at your trial and keeps talking about arguments that will leave your ex-spouse’s lawyer speechless. He seems to treat your case like an ability to win a debate competition. Does he even know that most divorce cases settle during mediation?
- Hubristic Hal – He promises to get you everything you want in your divorce case and more, but his plans for how to do it are not very realistic. He seems to think that his strategies cannot possibly fail, and he doesn’t have a plan B if his first strategy doesn’t work; he is sure he will not need one.
- Outraged Oscar – If Belligerent Bobby only has one strategy for accomplishing your divorce, Outraged Oscar has none. All he keeps talking about is how horrible it is that your wife surprised you with divorce papers and wants to take all your money and most of your parenting time, after you had informally agreed to work together on your divorce and divide your property and parenting time more evenly. It is reassuring to hear that you are in the right, but outrage alone will not get you your fair share of marital property and parenting time.
Contact Schwartz | White About Avoiding Shady Divorce Lawyers
A South Florida family law attorney can answer your questions about divorce honestly and candidly and can help you finalize your divorce without making overblown promises or causing needless drama. Contact Schwartz | White in Boca Raton, Florida about your case.
