Product Description

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #29051 in Books
• Published on: 2009-03-03
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 256 pages

Customer Reviews

You can do it all with this invaluable title
Nolo Press was founded in 1971 specifically for the purpose of publishing the first edition of this title. The Nolo principle is that not all legal transactions require retention of a lawyer, and in the state of California, for an uncontested divorce between two parties, tens of thousands of dollars in legal fees can be saved with the purchase of this $30 title (which is regularly 30% off from Amazon).

This book is a step-by-step guide to the divorce process and each of the forms necessary for filing for divorce in California. The text explains the hows and whys of the filing process and warns of potential pitfalls that can cause filings to be rejected or invalidated in the future.

My husband and I separated after a two year marriage and worked amicably through the process with the aid of this book. We knew that we would save a bundle of money by avoiding hiring lawyers to do discovery on our behalf, and we wanted to split up our property and move on as painlessly as possible. We each purchased a copy of this book and used it to file all the forms in our county courthouse. There is a helpline for telephone consultations at a reasonable rate, and we spent a few hundred dollars to get advice on the Separation Agreement we had drafted together (detailing financial and personal property separation as well as our agreement on our joint mortgage). We got big bang for our buck by having a helpline lawyer personally go over our Separation Agreement and we were confident with filing all the paperwork ourselves.

This book is intended for unconstested, fairly amicable divorces. If one party is out to "get" the other, the services of a lawyer may be required. Nolo recommends mediation before litigation if at all possible, to save money and effort. The authors remind the reader that lawyers do not have the consumer's best interest at heart--their first priority is to protect themselves from malpractice lawsuits, and so they will be as thorough (and costly) as possible to meet that need.

If you are considering leaving your spouse and do not anticipate an amicable divorce, I would recommend purchasing Nolo's Essential Guide to Divorce instead of this book. That has all of the overview information of this title, with additional specifics on mediation and litigation that will help your case if it is going to be in those arenas instead of the do-it-yourself category.

No Fan of Lawyers
A lawyer will tell you that "anyone who is his own lawywer has a fool for a client." But of course it's also said that "a fool and his money are soon parted." which is why your lawyer is so interested in you. You are a fool either way. You might as well be the fool with this book in your hand and more money in your wallet.

Most of what a divorce lawyer does is no-value-added middleman stuff that would be eliminated in an enterprise that was motivated to be efficient. They also have very little expert insight to offer that you can't learn yourself from this book. Lawyers can even make things worse by creating conflicts where none existed before. They create the family-law equivalent of a Cold War arms buildup, where they are the weapons suppliers. They want to instill an "us vs. them" mentality into the case. In my case I felt like the "us" was the ex amd me, and the "them" was the lawyers. I ended up firing mine and represented myself. I got a better result, faster and costing less, than I would have had I not cut my losses.

My advice: buy this book, represent yourself ('pro per'), and hire a lawyer on what they call an 'unbundled' basis to serve strictly in an advisory capacity. If the book helps you do even one thing without a lawyer's help, it has paid for itself a hundred times over.

I have read several books on the subject, but you really need only one. This is the one I recommend. The CD is useful too. I highly recommend the Cal Support software. Also, be sure to check out the stuff the court publishes for free online.

Absolutely required for doing your own divorce without an attorney!
How to Do Your Own Divorce in California: Everything You Need for an Uncontested Divorce of a Marriage or a Domestic Partnership How to Do Your Own Divorce in California by Ed Sherman is a required resource. It is also an incredible bargain for the information and reference to other resources it contains. For such an inherently difficult process like divorce, the chapters and steps are well organized, making the process alot easier. However, it does lack an index, which the author justifies excluding based on the time-sensitive nature of the information, and the difficulty of including it. But you can still find what you need. Be prepared to spend a lot of time studying the chapters and learning the process. I can see that some people might not have the patience for the process and run to an attorney. But if you have the patience, and don't have the money, this is the way to go! It is still difficult even with the book, but lots better than going through an attorney. The demo software (for CalSupport and DealMaker) and worksheets that come with the are also very helpful. CalSupport and DealMaker are easily downloaded for only $35 each, and are bargains for what they can do! I am still going through the process and using the book and software.