Before your initial consultation with a divorce lawyer, you may be thinking about what you should do or what you should say. You should also think about what you should bring with you. Having the right documents on you when you attend this first meeting can make it easier for a Shelby County, Tennessee divorce lawyer to evaluate your needs and begin working to get you the most favorable divorce agreement possible.
What Does My Divorce Lawyer Need During Our Initial Consultation?
Your divorce lawyer wants to get a complete picture of your marriage and financial situation during this initial consultation. You are going to need to bring a lot of paperwork along with you, including:
- Tax returns
- Pay stubs
- Statements from checking, savings, retirement, and investment accounts
- Your marriage license
- Deeds or titles to property owned by you and your spouse
- Documents relating to marital debts like mortgages, leases, and car loans
- Divorce documents that have already been filed
- Other legal documents that pertain to your marriage, like a restraining order against your spouse
When you hand over all of this documentation to one of our experienced divorce attorneys, we can get right to work on figuring out how to fight for the best possible outcome.
Should I Ask Questions in My Initial Consultation?
Of course you can ask questions! We even recommend that clients write down any questions that they have in a notebook beforehand. You can even add more queries to the notebook as your meeting goes on and you think of other things to ask about.
What If I Have My Own Business?
Even if you consider your business to be a separate property, your spouse might not. If you do have a business, bring along any relevant financial documents and anything that can show when your company was incorporated. If this was a separate property that should not be distributed along with other marital property, then we can help you protect it.
Can I Give My Divorce Lawyer Evidence Against a Spouse?
When you get divorced in Tennessee, you can file a fault-based or no-fault-based divorce. For no-fault, you just have to say that there are differences between you and your spouse that you will simply never be able to work through. For a fault-based divorce, you have to show that your spouse did something to trigger your divorce filing. This can be something like infidelity or abuse.
If you have evidence of this fault, you should bring it to your divorce lawyer in this initial consultation. Your lawyer can figure out the best route forward and how this evidence should affect negotiations over spousal support, child custody, and more.
Schedule Your Consultation Today
So if you are ready to move forward with your divorce, contact Rice Law. Our firm can set up an initial consultation and an attorney can help you get this process started.
