10 Minute Separation Split.

Part 3: Determining Future Needs

We can all agree that there's a lot of uncertainty surrounding the future when going through a separation.  

You're probably worried about where you're going to be living and how you're going to support yourself and any children you have without your former partner in the picture.

These worries are completely normal, and we understand how these thoughts can make you feel anxious about your future.

Well, in this video, part 3 of how to determine your share of the property pool, I'm going to take you through some of the key things you need to consider when looking at yours and your former spouse's future needs. 

You can feel assured that this is exactly the same process we use for all of our clients, so let's get started.

Stage 1 - Care Of Children

What are future needs in relation to children?

Care of the children including the capital costs of the children not covered by periodic child support payments. 

The court recognizes that the payment of child support does not compensate the primary carer for:

As a result, this needs to be considered when determining how much of the property pool you get.

Stage 2 - Earning Capacity & Financial Resources

What are future needs in relation to earning capacity & financial resources?

There may be a great difference in earning capacity between you and your former spouse. If you're the lower income earner, you may be entitled to an adjustment of property in your favor for that reason. 

The rationale behind this is that usually there may be a difference in earning capacity because of the relationship and the roles each party chose to play in that relationship. 

This is particularly common in long relationships. 

The court will also look at any financial resources you or your former spouse may have such as an entitlement to an inheritance or an interest in a family trust, anything that may result in either party receiving some amount of money.

Stage 3 - Health

What are future needs in relation to health?

The court will look at the age, state and health of each party.  

If you suffer from a health condition that impacts your ability to work or earn a living, this is a relevant factor.

You may have a health condition that requires extensive care and attention, and this will also be relevant. 

If you're nearing retirement age, and you're the primary income earner, the court will also look at this and consider that as relevant.

Stage 4 - Standard Of Living

What are future needs in relation to yours and your spouse's standard of living?

The court will look at what the standard of living was during the relationship. For example, whether the parties lived a substantial lifestyle and whether one party is still enjoying that lifestyle and the other is not.  

If one person is still enjoying a substantial lifestyle while the other is struggling to get bills paid, the court may adjust the share each person receives. This is so that there isn't a huge difference in financial quality of life.

Those are some of the main things you need to consider when determining what your future needs are and how this impacts what you might be entitled to in a property settlement.

If you have any trouble or have any questions regarding this video, or your separation, feel free to contact us on 1300 767 384 or you can email us at [email protected].

Otherwise, you can move on to the final video, Part 4: Calculating Your Share of the Property Pool.

10 Minute Separation Split.

Part 2: Assessing Financial & Non-Financial Contributions.

It's fair to say that what you put into a relationship is more than just financial contributions. 

You've got the cooking, the cleaning, the washing, fixing the light bulbs, and even mowing your lawn every second weekend.

These tasks help build, acquire, and maintain assets that now need to be split. So, they can be just as important as financial contributions.

Only question is, how do you put a monetary value on a task like mowing the lawn or doing the dishes?

Well, in this video, part two of how to determine your share of the property pool, I'm going to take you through all of the financial and non-financial contributions, as well as the homemaker contributions that can be seen as having a monetary value.

Even if it didn't directly take money out of your pocket. 

After that, we are going to figure out what your total contribution has been.

Before we begin, I recommend you download the "Part Two: Assess Financial and Non-financial Contributions" worksheet, so we can work through the steps together. You can download this from the link below:

Worksheet  2: Assess Financial & Non-Financial Contributions

Once you've got that, let's get into it.

Stage 1 - Financial Contributions

What are financial contributions?

Financial contributions are contributions made directly or indirectly by you or your former spouse to the acquisition, conservation, or improvement of any property that either of you may own or have previously owned during the relationship.

For example:

Or anything else that maintained or improved an asset or property you or your former spouse owned, like a house, car, or a business.

These financial contributions can also include any work or other financial contributions someone else makes on your behalf.

For example, if you received an inheritance or a personal injury payment.

NOTE:  It's important to note, you need to include the contributions made before cohabitation, so that is before you lived together, during cohabitation or marriage, whether or not you were married yet or de facto, and after your separation.

Stage 2 - Non-Financial Contributions

What are non-financial contributions?

They are similar to financial contributions in the sense that they're made directly or indirectly by you or your former spouse to the acquisition, conservation, or improvement of any of the property of the parties.

BUT, they are NOT made with money or payment.

For example:

In non-financial contributions we don't take into account the non-financial contributions pre-living together. We just look at the non-financial contributions made during and after the relationship. 

NOTE:  Do not at this stage include things like washing, cleaning, cooking, or general yard maintenance. People often get these confused. Those are homemaker contributions that we are going to deal with next. But for this stage, leave those things out. 

Stage 3 - Homemaker Contributions

What are homemaker contributions?​

These are contributions made by a party to the welfare of the family, including in your capacity as homemaker or parent.

For example:

Stage 4 - Assess The Contributions

In this final stage we are going to briefly assess the contributions.

In terms of the weight given to each of these types of contributions, they do depend on a variety of factors, such as:

So, you'll remember in a previous video we worked out the value of the property pool - that will be relevant to the weight of contributions;

In shorter relationships, financial contributions tend to be given more weight than in long relationships. In long relationships, not much weight is given to higher earnings, where there was a merging of efforts. For example, when dad went out and earned the money and mum stayed home and raised the kids.

These are given more weight than if they were received early on in the relationship.

We will go over this weighting in more depth in Part Four when we calculate a rough figure on what you may be entitled to. 

In the meantime, you can move on to Part Three, Determining Your Future Needs, because you have completed all four stages of Part Two.

As always, if you have any questions regarding this video or your separation, feel free to contact us on 1300 767 384 or you can email us at [email protected].

10 Minute Separation Split.

Part 4: Calculating Your Share.

Congratulations, you've made it to part four.

You've put in the hard yards, you've finished both worksheets and three videos so far and now it's time to calculate a figure.

To do that, we're going to go over the information you've noted down so far, so you'll need to have completed both worksheet one and worksheet two and have these open nearby. 

Worksheet  1 & 2:

Then we will work through an example together and calculate a rough percentage and figure of entitlement allowing you to do the same with your own information.

So, let's get into it.

Stage 1 - Reviewing assets, contributions & future needs

As mentioned before, I'm going to go through an example situation and based on their information, calculate a rough percentage and figure that the husband and wife may be entitled to. 

As I'm working through this example, you will need to make similar assessments of your own situation and information that you have noted down in the worksheets.

Let's get into our example.

Sarah and William began living together in September, 2000. After three years they were married in January, 2003. 15 years later, their marriage broke down and they decided to separate in October, 2018.

First, let's just briefly go over Sarah and William's assets. 

At the present day, Sarah and William have combined net assets of $537,500 which includes:    

You would have noted your own net assets down in table one of worksheet one.

In terms of financial resources, William is a beneficiary in the Smith family trust. This is a discretionary trust control by William's father. Historically, William has received distributions between 15 and $20,000 each year depending on how much his father decides to distribute to him.   

Sarah is also due to receive $40,000 in cash in her mother's final will. Her mother is still alive, but she has been given six months to live.

NOTE:  At the present day though, and importantly to note, Sarah's mother has lost testamentary capacity. This means that legally she cannot alter her will, so the will as it currently stands is what Sarah is likely to receive.

Because Sarah's mother is alive, although she's lost testamentary capacity, she is still alive and there's no guarantee that she will actually pass away in six months.

At this stage, that entitlement is considered a financial resource and not an asset. Once Sarah receives the $40,000 or is due to receive it, after her mother passes away, then it will be considered an asset. 

You will also have noted this information down about any financial resources you or your former spouse have in table two of worksheet one.

Now let's get to financial contributions.

Initial Financial Contributions

In terms of financial contributions that Sarah and William brought in when they first started living together, Sarah had $10,000 in savings, $8,000 in shares, a motor vehicle worth approximately $5,000 and around $45,000 in superannuation.

William on the other hand, brought in $80,000 in savings, a motor vehicle worth approximately $12,000 and superannuation of approximately $55,000. 

You will have noted down your own financial contributions before you began living together in worksheet two table 1A. If you haven't yet note these down now before continuing on any further.

You will have noted down your own financial contributions before you began living together in worksheet two table 1A. If you haven't yet note these down now before continuing on any further.

Financial Contributions While Living Together

During the relationship, Sarah received a gift from her parents as $30,000 in 2016. She was also made redundant at work and received a redundancy payment of $15,000 in 2004, both of which were contributed as payments to the mortgage.

William, on the other hand, received an inheritance during the relationship from his late mother's estate in 2006 this was to the value of a $100,000.

$50,000 of this inheritance was put towards the mortgage and the remaining $50,000 was spent on renovations to the property ($30,000) and a family holiday ($20,000). 

While living together Sarah was working as a full-time bank teller earning approximately 40,000 per annum. She ultimately stopped working in 2004 when their first child was born and has been a full-time homemaker since then.

William, however, has been a qualified engineer since before he met Sarah. From the time they began living together in 2000 up until 2015 William was employed by a business where he earned approximately $220,000 a year.

In 2015 William decided to start his own business and he now pays himself a salary of approximately $150,000 per year.

Financial Contributions After Separation

Since separating, William has continued to pay the mortgage repayments on the property. William's also paid for the paint to repaint the interior and the exterior of the property.

Now we'll move on to the non-financial contributions.

Non-Financial Contributions While Living Together

In terms of non-financial contributions, Sarah would assist William with the bookkeeping for his business once he started it. However, for the most part, the business was operated completely by William.

The assistance stopped when Sarah and William separated.

William also managed the family's finances up until separation.

Non-Financial Contributions After Separation

When separated William made a large non-financial contribution. This was in the form of his own personal labor in painting the interior and the exterior of the property, preparing it for sale and ultimately increasing the property's value.

Now we'll move onto homemaker contributions.

Homemaker Contributions While Living Together

In terms of homemaker contributions during the relationship, Sarah was responsible for the cooking, cleaning, and washing with William occasionally assisting with cooking on the weekends.

William would undertake the yard maintenance such as mowing the lawns and trimming the hedges but other home maintenance was largely up to Sarah.

Sarah and William had two children together during their relationship. Sally, who was born in August of 2004 and Thomas, who was born in October of 2008 making the children 14 and 10 years respectively at today's date.

During the relationship Sarah was the primary care of the children. She would get them to school, assist them with their homework, do the bed and bath routine.

William would assist on weekends when he was home from work but for the most part, Sarah was responsible for the day-to-day care of the children.

Homemaker Contributions After Separation

As Sarah and William no longer lived together the children now they've primarily with Sarah in the family home. They stay with William every second weekend. 

As Sarah was now the only one living in the matrimonial home all of the cooking, cleaning, washing, and home maintenance was performed solely by her.

Now we'll look at future needs. 

In terms of future needs neither Sarah or William have any known health issues, meaning they do not require extra financial support at this stage in their lives.

However, Sarah does not hold any qualifications past her high school certificate. She's been out of the workforce since 2004 until she recently obtained a retail position at David Jones earning approximately $50,000 per annum.

The children attend private schools and William has agreed to continue to pay for their school fees until the children finish school.

Sarah and William also have a private agreement in which William will pay Sarah $350 per week in child support.

You should also think about the future needs you and your former spouse have that we went through in part three.

Stage 2 - Calculating Your Share Of The Property Pool

Now considering all of this information, let's calculate your share of the property pool.

In my case I'll be calculating Sarah's share of the property pool.

In Sarah's situation she would be entitled to somewhere within the range of 55% to 65%.

This is based on a 8 main things: 

Because Sarah and William's relationship was approximately 18 years the court will tend to weight non-financial and financial contributions somewhat equal.

They say that there was a merging of efforts throughout the 18 years and that William went to work and earned the income he did and he could do that because Sarah was at home raising the children and running the household.

In situations where your relationship was shorter. For example, if it was only a three or four year relationship, the financial contributions of a person would be given much more weight than they would in Sarah and William's situation.

The next thing is that William has a far greater earning capacity compared to Sarah.

Sarah earns approximately $50,000 working at David Jones and that's probably all she can earn into the near future. William on the other hand, runs his own business he pays himself a wage of $150,000. However, historically as an employed engineer, he was earning up around that $220,000 mark.

William has the capacity to earn and does earn much more than Sarah. 

As we mentioned earlier, William picks them up every second Friday and has them until Monday morning. Other than that, Sarah is primarily responsible for getting the kids to school, getting their homework done, cleaning for them, cooking for them, doing all of those things that limit her ability to work long hours.

Sarah made financial contributions with the $30,000 from her parents and the $15,000 from her redundancy.

Again, those are two things that went directly into the property pool that added to the value of it.

William, on the other hand, had that significant financial contribution in the form of not only his increased income but the lump sum payment received from his inheritance, that $100,000.

While, $20,000 was spent on a holiday, $80,000 was applied to the mortgage and increasing the value of the home, so he does get something for that.

William's adjustment for that big inheritance though is lessened because it was received early on in their relationship. If, for example, he received that inheritance towards the end of the relationship or even after separation, it would be given much greater weight than it was being received much earlier on.

We also look at William's initial financial contributions. They were obviously larger than Sarah's, but again, in a long relationship, your initial financial contributions are given much less weight over time than they would have been if it was, say a three or four year relationship.

Even though Sarah's interest in her mother's estate is not huge, it is something that she is likely to receive.

As we said, it's at this stage still a financial resource as it's something that Sarah is likely to receive but has not yet received. Even though she has not received it yet, the court can't ignore that she's going to receive it at some point.

William's financial resource in being a beneficiary in the family trust is also something the court can't ignore. Yes, it is uncertain on if he will receive anything and how much William will receive, if he does, but historically he has received $15,000 - $20,000 each year. 

In this case, if Sarah negotiated with William and they agreed to, split the assets, 60% to Sarah and 40% to William because of all of the reasons above then the overall split might look something like this: 

You'll see the property might be sold. In that Sarah might receive $207,500 and William will receive the balance.

Now we've got to those cash adjustments because we take what each party already has in their possession.

Sarah is going to receive all the furniture in that property. She's going to receive the cash at bank and she's already got shares in her name and superannuation in her name.

William already has a car, he's got his company and he's got his super and then he's obviously got a little credit card debt there.

We take what each party already has, and then in order to top them up to that 60/40 split that they've agreed to, that is how the cash component is calculated.

If you're unsure and want some help with this I'm providing free calculations to help people determine their share of the property pool.

Simply click the button, Get a Free Personal Net Worth Calculation, fill in the form and I'll give you a call so we can discuss your situation confidentially.

Simply click the button:

Then fill in the form and I'll give you a call so we can discuss your situation confidentially.

Alternatively, if you've just got some questions about this video or your separation in general, feel free to contact us on 1300 767 384 or you can email us at [email protected].

But other than that, you're all finished!

You've completed all four parts of the video series and hopefully have calculated your share of the property pool.

All that's left is to:

This simply means checking that it's fair. Making sure, for example, practically that one part is not ending up with a bunch of superannuation and the other party is walking away with all of the cash. The split, while the percentage might be fair, you need to make sure that the actual practical split is also fair. 

You can do this through either consent orders or a binding financial agreement and we can assist with either of those.

10 Minute Separation Split.

Part 1: Identifying Assets & Debts.

We can all agree that going through a separation can be stressful.

You are probably feeling unsure of what your future may hold. Uncertain about what you will be left with. Maybe even concerned about what your quality of life will be going forward. 

In situations like these, what most of us want is to simply get a better idea of what we may be entitled to. 

Well, in this video, I'm going to take you through part one of a four part method, that works out what assets and property you may be entitled to.

Replacing those feelings of confusion and uncertainty with feelings of relief and clarity.

This how-to video is broken into four parts, as calculating your share of the assets is no simple task. 

We don't want you getting to the end of one big video feeling overwhelmed, thinking: 

What am I meant to do next?

So, for this video, we're just going to take you through part one - Identifying yours and your spouse's assets and debts.

NOTE: It's really important to note that when we look at the assets and the debts, to determine how to divide them, we're looking at them as at today's date. That is the day that either you settle by agreement, or the day that a court determines your matter.

It is not the date of separation.

So that means, even if you separate now and you don't resolve your matter for another two years, you take the assets as at the date of resolution, not separation. So all of your assets and debts continue to accumulate together.

By doing this from the get-go, you won't have to spend time doing it with a lawyer.

We give you this option to do it yourself, because we understand that getting a property settlement is not cheap, so we want to save you money where we can.

So let's get started, by jumping into the questions we ask all of our clients when working out their share of the net assets, otherwise known as the property pool.

Stage 1 - Quantifiable Assets & Debts

Before we go through how to identify your quantifiable assets and debts, I recommend you download the Part One Identifying Assets and Debts Worksheet, so we can work through the steps together. 

You can download this here:

Worksheet 1: Identifying Assets & Debts

Stage 2 - Unquantifiable Financial Resources

Now let's take a look at unquantifiable financial resources.

So what is a financial resource & what makes it unquantifiable? 

A financial resource is anything that can generate income or the reasonable expectation of receiving income. It's different to an asset in that it can't really be quantified.

Examples of a financial resource might be an interest in a family trust, or an interest in an estate. Something that, as I say, isn't exactly quantifiable. For example, if you are a beneficiary in a discretionary family trust, historically you may have received distributions every year. You don't know what amounts those distributions will be. You'll don't know whether you'll be getting any this year, so it's a financial resource as opposed to an asset.

On the other hand, if, for example, you were the trustee of that trust, and it was up to you to determine how to distribute the income, well, then it may be considered an asset. However, if you have no control over it, and you don't know what you're likely to receive, it's more likely to be a financial resource.

So go to table 2 in your worksheet and fill in the financial resources and ownership column. There is an example below on how to do this. After you've finished that we'll move on to stage three.

Stage 3 - Disclose All Of Your Financial Interests

You both have a duty to the court and to each other, to make full and continuing disclosure of your financial circumstances to the other spouse.

So what do you have to disclose?

Firstly, disclosure is just making it known to your former spouse. 

Disclosure = making something known to your former spouse. 

What you have to disclose can vary, depending on which court you're in, but documents that are generally required to be disclosed are things like:

Those are just to name a few.

But what if your former spouse won't disclose?

You can subpoena certain documents and information if you're in court.

A subpoena is a document that compels the production of certain documents or information.

Subpoena = a document that compels someone or a business to give you access to certain documents or information. 

The benefit of issuing a subpoena is that generally you don't subpoena your former spouse. Instead you sort of go above their head, and subpoena the person that will actually have access to the documents.

For example, if your former spouse won't provide their bank statements, you'll instead subpoena the bank and the bank will provide those statements, rather than relying on your spouse to.

If you refer to section three of the worksheet, we've got a full checklist of everything you might have to disclose, depending on which court you're in.

Stage 4 - Independent Valuations

What do you do if you and your spouse don't agree on the value of the property pool, or of a particular asset or debt?

Anything not agreed on must be valued.

To value real estate, a registered valuer should be jointly instructed by you and your former spouse. This means you should agree on a valuer and tell the valuer to do the valuation.

To value things like motor vehicles, a Red Book value will often suffice.

Often, superannuation member statements are not entirely accurate, so you might have to do a superannuation valuation. We have provided a link to the form that you'll need to do that below:

Superannuation Valuation Form

A business can also be valued. That, again, will take you agreeing on a valuer and jointly instructing that valuer to undertake the valuation.

Often identifying the property pool's the hardest part of property settlement, and valuations and disclosure can take some time. But this step is so, so important. You need to know what it is you're dividing, before you can think about how you're going to divide it.

The more you do at the start, the easier this process will be overall.

Remember, you can't really make any offers of settlement until you know what your offer represents. You can't say, "I want 55% of something," when you don't know what 55% actually equals.

And that's it for part one! Now, when you're ready, you can move on to part two.

If you have any trouble or any questions regarding this video or your separation, feel free to contact us on 1300 767 384 or you can email us at [email protected].

How To Determine Your Share Of The Property Pool.

Firstly, before any assets and property are divided, the Court will look at whether your assets and property should even be split legally.

The Court will usually say you can do so when both you and your former spouse/ partner are no longer living together. Along with this, no property will be commonly used by both of you anymore.

When this has been determined, you can move ahead with splitting your property. Which is where the next 4 step formula comes in handy.  

The only circumstances in which the Court will not do this is:

Even without the involvement of the Court you should take the following 4 step formula into consideration.

Step 1: Identify yours & your former spouse/partner's assets, liabilities, superannuation & financial resources.

This involves both you and your ex disclosing all of your assets. This includes assets owned personally, in a company, trust or other structure.

You both will also have to disclose any liabilities (debts), superannuation and any financial resources either of you have. 

Combined, this will make up the existing property pool. 

Step 2: Assess the financial and non-financial contributions of both you and your former spouse/partner.

When assessing the contributions you have both made to the relationship, look at both direct and indirect contributions. This can be financial contributions such as:

And non-financial contributions such as:

Non-financial contributions can be weighted just as heavily as financial contributions, especially in long relationships. 

In shorter relationships with no children, financial contributions are generally given more weight.

Step 3: Assess the future needs of you and your former spouse/partner.

There are a few things that should be assessed when determining what your and your former spouse/ partner's future needs are. These are:

These are some of the things the Court will look at and therefore should be what you consider when assessing your and your ex's future needs. 

Based on your situation there may also be more circumstances that apply to you. If you wish to get further clarification on what else may be considered for your specific situation we provide free phone consultations with a free 3 step action plan. This is to ensure you get the clarification you need. As we understand going through a divorce/ separation is already a confusing time, without the extra confusion of all the legal stuff.

Step 4: Assess if the proposed division is just and equitable.

Lastly, what you should assess is if the division is practical and for your circumstances. 

For example, if one person is receiving only superannuation but cannot access this while the other is receiving cash, the percentage may be fair but the overall division may not be fair. This is something the Court may deem to be unfair. (add what will happen if the Court sees the proposed division as unfair).

What if we agree of the division of our property and just want to formalise our agreement?

You and your former spouse may have discussed or negotiated through lawyers and reached an agreement on how to split your property. If this is the case, and you just want to formalise this agreement you can do this one of two ways:

1. Consent Orders

Consent Orders are formal Court Orders, but don't worry, you don't need to attend Court. 

To get a Consent Order you simply must send the agreement to the Court in the appropriate forms (need more info here). The Court will then assess the agreement and, provided they think it is fair, they will make the agreement an Order.

2. Binding Financial Agreement

A binding financial agreement on the other hand, is a private agreement that doesn't go through the Courts.

However, this is something both you and your former spouse/partner will need legal advice on. This is because it is an agreement, similar to a contract, that you will both agree on and sign.

Now you know how to determine your potential entitlement, find out about the ways in which you can split your assets, parenting and finalise your divorce. As well as the price tag of each option.

Read: The Price Tag Of A Divorce

How To Get A Divorce In Australia

We can all agree that filing for divorce is not the greatest day in our lives, but, unfortunately, you're here. 

You've made up your mind and finally decided it's time to get a divorce. Only trouble is, you don't know how to get one.

The last thing you want after all that agony is to go round and round in circles trying to figure out how to make this thing final. 

What most of us want is to have our divorce application completed and submitted to the Court or, at least, we want to know what we need to do before we can file for divorce.

NOTE: It's really important to note that divorce is different from a property settlement. A divorce is going to legally end your marriage but it's not going to determine how your property and assets are divided.

Well, today, I'm going to show you how to do just that.

I'm going to show you how to go from being stuck in an unhappy marriage where you're unsure of the divorce process to knowing exactly how to submit your divorce application to the Court. 

So you can finally close that chapter and begin to move on.

We're going to do that in two stages.

We keep it in two stages as we aim to make things as simple as possible. 

We are doing this because we understand the complex emotions in a relationship breakdown so we don't want to add to your stress.

The method we're going to show you is exactly what we use in our family law practice and we've used it to get the right results for hundreds of clients.

So let's get started.

Stage 1: Let's make sure you're eligible for a divorce.

To be eligible for a divorce you must meet the following 4 point criteria.

1. You are in a legally valid marriage.

That means that it needs to be recognized by Australian law as valid. If you were married in Australia it's fairly easy to satisfy that. If you were married overseas, sometimes that can get a little bit difficult. 

Your marriage would not be considered valid, if, for example:

When you lodge your application to the Court, you're going to have to file a certificate of marriage at the same time and that will help show the Court whether your marriage is valid or not.

If you were married overseas and that certificate's in another language you'll need to have that translated.

2. You or your spouse must be an Australia citizen or meet the following residency requirements.

The residency requirements are: 

3. You must consider your marriage to have irretrievably broken down.

That basically means there's no chance of getting back together. 

The Court will not grant you a divorce if there is a reasonable likelihood of you both living together again. 

4. You and your spouse must have been separated for at least 12 months.

This is going to help show the Court that there is no chance of getting back together. 

It's really important to note that you can still be separated but living under one roof so if that is your case you'll need to file an affidavit with your application for divorce. An affidavit is a statement that you'll sign and lodge with the Court. In the affidavit you have to explain that even though you are living together you consider the relationship to be over.

If you're still not sure about whether you're eligible to get a divorce, you can take the quiz below. It will help you determine whether you're eligible or not.

Stage 2: How to submit your application for divorce to the Court.

Okay, stage two we're going to show you how to submit an application to Court. This is a five step process and I'm going to take you through all five steps now.

1. Complete your Application for Divorce online.

The following link below will take you to the Federal Court website which gives you some further information around applying for a divorce. More importantly this link will have a button near the bottom of the article which will take you to the divorce application portal. 

An application is the form that you'll need to actually send to the Court to apply for your divorce. 

There's two ways to do that:

A joint application is always going to be easier. If your former spouse is prepared to sign one with you, make sure you try that first.

2. File the Application.

File simply means submit it to the Court. 

When you submit it to the Court, there's a filing fee, as the lawyers like to call it, which is basically just a submission fee. That's pretty hefty, it's $900. You might be entitled to a reduction if you have a Commonwealth Healthcare Concession Card. 

Find out if you are entitled to a reduced fee here. 

Remember, if you're filing a joint application, you might be able to ask your former spouse whether they'll pay half of that fee but if you're filing a sole application, you'll have to pay the full fee on your own.

3. Serve your former spouse (only if doing a sole application).

If you're filing a joint application you can jump ahead and ignore this step. 

If you're filing a solo application, you must then serve your former spouse. Serve basically means you need to give them a copy of the application so that they're aware that you're filing an application for divorce.

You can do this in two ways:

4. File any service documents to the Court (only if doing a sole application).

If you did have to serve your spouse, you will need to submit (file) those service documents to the Court. Those service documents are the Acknowledgment Of Service that your former spouse signed and the Affidavit Of Service that the person who served the documents signed. 

For more information on how to eFile further documents to support my application for divorce go here.

5. Attend the divorce hearing (only if doing a sole application or there are children under the age of 18).

Finally, you'll need to attend the divorce hearing. You'll only need to attend the divorce hearing if you filed a solo application and there are children under the age of 18.

Once you attend that hearing, the order will come into effect one month and one day after it is made. That is, one month and one day after the hearing date so you can't legally remarry until such time as that order has come into effect.

We always recommend to try a joint application first. This is because of the three extra steps that are involved when doing a sole application. 

A joint application is:

Obviously, if your former spouse isn't prepared to sign one, you'll have to do the solo application.

And that's it!

No one likes things that are completely out of their control.

Especially things that they are paying for.

Particularly when the negotiations are going through a lawyer.

But unfortunately, this is how things can feel when going through a divorce.

You can feel like you have little to no say in what’s being done. Little to no certainty that you are going to come out the other side in one piece.

We understand that divorce and anxiety are close friends.

We don’t think that you should have to endure any more anxiety than necessary during the legal process.

So we have developed a simple auditing process that reduces anxiety called CONTROL.

Just like the name suggests, this simple auditing process helps you regain control and certainty in the legal aspects of your divorce; keeping your anxiety levels low.

CONTROL was developed on the same basis as the famous SMART criteria.

SMART is an acronym criteria used for setting goals. The objective of this criteria is to:

clarify your ideas, focus your efforts, use your time and resources productively, and increase your chances of achieving what you want in life. (Mind Tools)

Each letter in SMART is an “auditing step” to ensure your goals are clear and achievable.

The SMART audit forces us to develop goals that are:

Just like SMART, CONTROL is also an acronym.

Except, CONTROL is a seven step auditing process, not five. And it is specific to auditing legal advice. So that you get FASTER results.

Here are the ‘auditing points’ of the CONTROL process:

Each letter in the CONTROL acronym is used to check that every element of work performed for you is:

It ensures that you stay in control every step of the way. 

It ensures that you get some certainty in a very uncertain situation.

No one likes things that are completely out of their control.

Especially things that they are paying for.

Particularly when the negotiations are going through a lawyer.

But unfortunately, this is how things can feel when going through a divorce.

You can feel like you have little to no say in what’s being done. Little to no certainty that you are going to come out the other side in one piece.

We understand that divorce and anxiety are close friends.

We don’t think that you should have to endure any more anxiety than necessary during the legal process.

So we have developed a simple auditing process that reduces anxiety called CONTROL.

Just like the name suggests, this simple auditing process helps you regain control and certainty in the legal aspects of your divorce; keeping your anxiety levels low.

CONTROL was developed on the same basis as the famous SMART criteria.

SMART is an acronym criteria used for setting goals. The objective of this criteria is to:

clarify your ideas, focus your efforts, use your time and resources productively, and increase your chances of achieving what you want in life. (Mind Tools)

Each letter in SMART is an “auditing step” to ensure your goals are clear and achievable.

The SMART audit forces us to develop goals that are:

Just like SMART, CONTROL is also an acronym.

Except, CONTROL is a seven step auditing process, not five. And it is specific to auditing legal advice. So that you get FASTER results.

Here are the ‘auditing points’ of the CONTROL process:

Each letter in the CONTROL acronym is used to check that every element of work performed for you is:

It ensures that you stay in control every step of the way. 

It ensures that you get some certainty in a very uncertain situation.