When Should You Hire A Family Lawyer in Your Separation or Divorce in Ontario?

When Should You Hire A Family Lawyer in Your Separation or Divorce in Ontario?

How many times have you been thinking about whether you should hire a family lawyer in your separation or divorce?

That’s a really important question!

Hi, my name is Thomas O’Malley.  I’m an experienced family lawyer in Durham Region and the GTA.

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If you are seriously considering getting separated or divorced and you have children under the age of 18 and you own a home, you should really hire an experienced Ontario family lawyer to help you solve your family law problems.

You need solid advice in these areas of your separation or divorce: child custody and access, now called decision-making responsibility and parenting time, child support, spousal support, and the property issues.

In short, you need to hire an experienced family lawyer when you have children or you own property or you have both kids and you own property.

You definitely need to hire a family lawyer when your spouse has hired a family lawyer and you are dealing with issues with your children or you have property issues.

When you don’t hire a family lawyer in these situations, you can easily find yourself overwhelmed trying to understand what is fair and reasonable in any proposed settlement that your spouse sends to you.

As well, you’ll have a terrible time knowing how to actually settle your case when you want to send a settlement proposal or separation agreement to your former spouse.

It’s also important to remember that you and your spouse cannot use the same family lawyer.  That’s called a conflict of interest.  A family lawyer cannot advise both spouses in a separation or divorce since the two spouse have different interests.

When you hire a family lawyer, make sure the family lawyer advises you on the best approach to take in your separation or divorce.  In many cases, your best option is to negotiate a separation agreement and keep your case out of family court.  However, your spouse must be relatively civil and reasonable in order to negotiate a fair separation agreement.

Don’t ever let your spouse fool you about what you need to protect your family law rights in your separation or divorce.  Remember they are only looking out for themselves.  You must have the advice of an experienced family lawyer before you ever agree to your former spouse’s settlement proposal or draft separation agreement.

When your spouse is difficult and will not bend on key issues in your case, you might have to go to family court to solve your family law issues.

Fortunately, even in family court, most cases settle based on the recommendations of a family court judge.   Most cases do not go to trial.

In fact, sometimes you have to go to family court to get a settlement.  That means that your spouse realizes that you’re serious about protecting your family law rights since you started the family court process.  Often, your spouse then figures that they should settle since they know you are not going to roll over on the important issues in your case. 

Just make sure you have a reasonable position on the important issues in your family court case.  Your family lawyer can advise you on what are fair and reasonable positions to take on the various issues in your case based on the particular facts of your situation.

If you have any questions about your separation, divorce or family law case and you would like our help, feel free to contact on my Facebook law office page, that’s O’Malley Family Law, or call me at 905-434-8837 and I’ll point in you in the right direction. 

Click here to join my free Facebook GTA and Durham Region separation and divorce support group: GTA and Durham Region Separation and Divorce Support Group

Please make sure to share this important information and video with your friends, family members and co-workers so that it helps more people avoid serious problems in their separation or divorce before it’s too late.