Navigating Divorce with Confidence: Expert Tips from Family Law Attorney Sandra Brooks

By Leah Jones on February 2, 2023

Divorce can be a challenging and emotional time, as it often involves significant changes to your family dynamic, financial situation, and overall lifestyle. If you are the financially dependent spouse, it is important to be informed about your rights and options during the divorce process.

In this episode, Family Law Attorney Sandra Brooks offers insight and advice based on her extensive experience handling divorce cases. She discusses common fears surrounding divorce and offers guidance on topics such as alimony, adultery, financial planning, and adjusting to life as a single individual. Whether you are just starting the divorce process or are seeking support and guidance during this difficult time, this episode is a valuable resource for anyone navigating the complexities of divorce.

Sandra covers the following topics:

• How to gather important information and documents before retaining a lawyer
• Understand your rights and options as a financially dependent spouse
• Explore different approaches to addressing adultery in the divorce process
• Consider factors that may impact alimony negotiations
• Additional tips and guidance on navigating divorce proceedings

Connect With Sandra:

• LinkedIn: Sandra Brooks

Connect With Leah:

leah.jones@hightoweradvisors.com

https://bethesda.hightoweradvisors.com/index.html

LinkedIn: Leah Jones

301-202-3590

Schedule a Call with Leah:

https://go.oncehub.com/LeahJones

About Sandra:

Sandra (Sandy) Brooks’ practice focuses on all aspects of family law. She dedicates her time to assisting clients in domestic law matters including divorce, child custody/visitation, family mediation, spousal/child support, property division, and division of retirement benefits. Ms. Brooks’ other areas of deep knowledge and experience include tax consequences of divorce, mediation, prenuptial and post-nuptial agreements, negotiating and drafting of separation agreements, domestic litigation, and post-judgment proceedings. Ms. Brooks is a member of the American Academy of Matrimonial Lawyers which places her in the top 5% of family law attorneys in the United States

Publishing Tags: Her Divorce Source, Hightower Bethesda, Leah Jones, Divorce, Alimony, Adultery, Family Law, Divorce Lawyer

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[00:00:00] Has divorce become a reality? And you are asking yourself, now what? If you have questions about your new life, you’re in the right place. Her Divorce Source with Leah Jones is the go-to podcast for women before, during, and after a divorce. Join me, Leah Jones, a certified Divorce financial analyst at Hightower Bethesda.

As I help you envision and create a new life that’s full of possibilities, empowerment, and freedom, I’ll tackle your questions about lifestyle and money, giving you practical guidance you can use right away. Now, let’s get started.

Sandy Brooks is a lawyer familiar with all aspects of family law in her practice. She guides clients through divorce and mediation depending on what makes sense in their situation. She’s here with your host, Leah Jones, to go over some of the unique considerations faced by the financially dependent spouse that she’s seen as she helps clients [00:01:00] navigate this time in their lives.

Hey Sandy, thanks so much for joining us today. Of course. Thank you for having me. So, I’d love to just start off so that our listeners can learn a little bit more about you and get context for our conversation with just learning a little bit more about you and your practice and how you work with your clients.

Sure. So, I work with Offit Kerman. I have been solely doing family law for about 12 or 13 years. I’ve been practicing for about 15 years. Prior to family law, I did tax law, so I didn’t get much satisfaction doing all tax work, so I jumped ship to family law where I’ve really enjoyed being able to help families get through difficult times.

And then the tax background has just given me some insight, maybe an edge [00:02:00] against some of my fellow colleagues about dealing with the financial aspects of the divorce cases. Great. And I know today we wanted to, I mean, there’s so many different things we can talk about, but today we really wanted to talk about the financially dependent spouse and some kinds of things that you have learned through working with this type of client.

So, where I’d love to kind of start with is, and this is something we had talked about, is why does it take so long for the financially dependent spouse to kind of, you know, feel comfortable with starting this process. So, I think that the financially dependent spouse may take a little bit longer to seek counsel or to have that initial consultation because one, the consultations do cost money and so they’re afraid,

how am I going to pay for [00:03:00] that consult without my spouse seeing that I’ve hired or even consulted with an attorney? And the other piece is that they’re afraid they’re not going to have money. Some of them just don’t have an understanding of what really happened. Some really think that because my spouse is the income earner, I’m going to be left with little.

And so, it takes a little bit to get in the door, what’s been happening or what sometimes happens is if they have friends that have gone through it, then they might be more inclined to come in and meet and get a plan going. But I would encourage anybody, whether you’re the dependent spouse or not, if you need some help or if you’re contemplating the separation divorce process, go meet with an attorney because there’s a lot that could be done

prior to you even retaining counsel. There’s a lot of behind the scenes stuff that the dependent spouse could be doing. So, let’s dive into that a little bit because I [00:04:00] think that could be really helpful for our listeners. What should someone that’s financially dependent and thinking about it, maybe they haven’t made a decision, you know, maybe they have, but they’re not ready to execute on it yet, but what should this person be doing?

So, if you are not the spouse who handles the bills, sometimes the dependent spouse actually pays all of the bills, sometimes they do not. If you do not handle the family finances, I would recommend you start gathering information. So, one huge piece of information would be your taxes. So, most spouses file jointly, there’s a tax benefit to filing jointly, especially if there’s high income earners and all kinds of things.

So, if you grab a copy of your tax return, you could get the electronic copy or call the accountant and just ask for a copy of it. That’s going to list a lot of assets and [00:05:00] income, so you’ll need that information. It doesn’t always list everything, though. If you see statements come in, you might want to take pictures of the statements, so if you’re unaware of the Vanguard account, but you see statements coming in from Vanguard, take a picture of it and just store it somewhere.

The idea is to gather information regarding income, so that’s the tax returns and or pay stubs and or K-1 assets, which would be the retirement accounts, investment accounts, any stock accounts. And then another would be the expenses. So, that’s a concern that the dependent spouse has, how am I going to pay my expenses?

How am I going to pay the children’s expenses? So, you need to start pulling what your actual expenses have been. And I always recommend you start with, well, how do you pay them? Most people, now it’s credit cards, [00:06:00] we’re not doing a lot of cash. So, pull your credit card statements for the past year to three years and start gathering all this information because if you wait to do it once something has been filed, or if you have to do it quickly, it becomes a lot of work.

So, you just want to start gathering the financial information sooner rather than later. Okay. So, I think, you know, great pieces of advice there. And for all of our listeners, I mean, tax returns are a really great starting point, as you mentioned. I think most people think of it as a nuisance, oh, just sign and whatever happens with it happens, but it leaves a trail of your entire financial picture.

So that’s a really great place to start. And then it lays out a roadmap for what is potentially else out there that you might or might not be aware of. So, let’s say that a financially dependent spouse listening to this podcast [00:07:00] realizes they need to start gathering that data. Then what do you do with it?

Like, let’s say somebody comes in and they have these things. Where does the process kind of go from? So, it really depends on where the person is in the process. Do they want to gather information, get a better understanding prior to actually separating and filing? Or are they ready?

I mean, is the situation so bad? And that would typically be in the case of domestic violence or some type of family abuse. Is it so bad that they have to get out?  If that’s the case, you know, we have to figure out a plan immediately, a financial plan immediately. Is there some asset, some form of funds that we can get right now that you can survive off of until we get into court?

The courts are not moving super quickly, but there is some emergency relief that you may be entitled to and some of that could be financial, especially in abuse.  [00:08:00] If you are still gathering the information and you have the time to kind of set it up just a little bit more, we gather the information.

I analyze it. The office organizes it, I analyze it, and then I call for another meeting and say, hey, this is what it’s looking like. And we really start educating our client, this is what it looks like you have. This is what it looks like you have access to. It looks like you’ll need this much to serve, you know, to make ends meet moving forward.

And then we start talking about the plan because what do you want to do? What is your goal? If you tell me the goal, I’ll do my best to get you there. So, one of the big, big decisions early on is, who’s staying in the marital home? That’s usually a big piece because that’s a large expense for the most part.

Sometimes it’s people’s largest expense or private school or something like that. But are you staying or are you not? So, once we figure that out, then when are we going to [00:09:00] reach out to the other side? Are we going to try and get, everybody talking sooner rather than later? Or do you need to get some more pieces in place?

Do you need to meet with your financial advisor? Do you need to meet with your accountant? So those are the types of things that we need to set up, but it’s really dependent upon this dependent spouse’s.

And I like that upfront, you kind of help them with the, okay, well how am I immediately going to live, right? Because that’s obviously concerning, again, depending on how contentious the situation is. But secondarily, if they can be okay, are they going to be okay? Because, and I’ve seen this all the time and I know you have too.

We work in an area where it’s pretty affluent and so a lot of times, there’s tons of money. Even if it’s split, there’s enough for someone to live comfortably, but there’s still a lot of fear and anxiety that [00:10:00] it’s not enough or just understanding what that means in the context of future lifestyle.

You’re absolutely right. So, and I, you know, the where we work, you’re correct. The majority of the clients that we work with have a great deal of resources, what could be scary and a problem is we have this amount of income which can handle our lifestyle, our married lifestyle, pay for our kids private school, and pay for all of the expenses that we want, our country club, our vacations, and so on.

But now we’re going to have two households and that’s what’s scary for people. So we now have to take the same amount of income and we have to divide it between two houses. And then there are different factors. Is somebody’s health a factor? Is somebody unable to work? Or is somebody restricted from working only so many hours a week?

Is the private school still [00:11:00] affordable? Do we want to move into a different district and put more of the funds into the house asset instead of the school asset? So, these can be very scary decisions or even things to think about for a lot of people. But those are the types of things we try and flesh out.

So, what I like to do is build a team, you know, you’re not alone. We’ll gather the information and we get a good team in place to help advise. Yeah. The team approach, I think in particular, if you are afluent, makes a lot of sense because you do need counsel from different experts in different areas that are very familiar with what they’re looking at.

And obviously I think a lot of times that can be more cost effective too, depending on the structures, of course. But, let’s talk about the A word because, depending where our listeners’ heads are at, that could be different, you know, for different folks. But, what I want to talk about is [00:12:00] alimony, because for the financially dependent spouse, that’s a huge concern and it’s also a huge question mark.

So, talk to our listeners a little bit about that. So, alimony is the word that the dependent spouse kind of hangs their hat on. We need alimony. We need alimony. The spouse that is not dependent. The money earning spouse hates that word. No alimony. No alimony and alimony in Maryland, which is primarily where I practice, alimony in Maryland is not formulaic.

So, we don’t just plug in numbers and then boom, the judge says, this is your alimony, it’s based on 1213 factors set out in case law. And factors include things like each party’s income, each party’s age, their health, their mental status, their ability to earn income, the cause of the [00:13:00] breakup of the marriage.

And so, there’s a lot of factors that go into it. So as we’re negotiating, you’re always thinking about, well, what would happen if I go to court? If you have to keep that in the back of your mind, negotiating, you can negotiate any deal that works for everybody.

So, the other piece to alimony is the length of time. So, if you were to go to court, you know, the court doesn’t put an end to the alimony. The court just says you’re ordered to pay X amount of alimony. Sometimes more enticing, well, I would say most of the time more enticing for the spouse that’s paying the alimony is to want to reach an agreement whereby there is an end date.

And you can do that via negotiations and an agreement. So that’s called term alimony. So, there could be indefinite alimony. I mean, and the court could order, you know, indefinite alimony, [00:14:00] which means you pay it indefinitely until it’s later modified. So those are factors, and that’s another factor. Do you need alimony forever?

Is this, I mean, are you a spouse who cannot work? Does the doctor say you’ll never earn income? Do you need some type of alimony clause whereby if you cohabitate, if you move in with somebody, then alimony ceases and or that it reduces. If you have really, you know, if you have counsel that’s experienced in this and or works with their advisors, their financial advisors, or CPAs, you can slice alimony a thousand different ways.

I mean, you can reduce it over time. You can increase it over time. Now that our tax law has changed, I mean, as you know, it’s no longer deductible by the person paying the alimony. It’s treated similarly to a child. So, these are a lot of factors [00:15:00] that go into, into alimony. Yeah, I know that people come to you and it’s like they want you to just give them an answer to this question.

Right. Well, I need $5,000 a month to live. Can I get that? You know, and it’s tough because it is such a gray area, and it can go a lot of different directions and at least from my experience, your best case is really to try to work it out, you know, with your team. Because, you know, otherwise I don’t think anyone ever feels like they quote unquote win.

Right. And, it’s not really winning. It’s at the end of the day, both people are not going to feel totally satisfied with what happens, right? Well, if both parties are equally unhappy, I think that the attorneys’ mediators, I think that a good job has been done. Yeah, but you’re right. It’s really, really tough because that’s a [00:16:00] huge question.

How much am I getting in alimony and the other side when they come in, how much am I paying? I don’t know. Let’s sit down and figure this out. But there are ways to maximize the pie for everyone. So, you know, I just feel that alimony, if everybody’s working together and it’s an amicable case, you know, not one of these cutthroat ones where we’re after each other all the time, then we can come to a resolution that I think is fair.

It’s just getting the expectations reasonable, I would say is something that may take some time because like I said, if you’re spending an average of, for easy numbers, $50,000 and you don’t have, you can’t have two lifestyles and continue to spend 50,000 just in your column a month, then it’s hard to hear, hey, that needs to be reduced to $20,000 a month.

So, those were pretty large numbers, but just to [00:17:00] make it easy for purposes. Well, they’re, you know, also realistic examples.  They are. I mean, in our area there’s certainly realistic numbers, right? But that’s really hard to say. Listen, you know, it looks like there’s only $25,000 left over, so that’s, you know, you really can’t get blood from a stone, right?

So, how are we going to maximize the income? Exactly. Okay, so I want to talk about another a word. So, you know, again, keep our listeners, I think I know it. I think this one is adultery. So, you know, many people’s marriage comes to an end over, you know, this topic. And I know that. Something that is a huge concern and people kind of want to know how that’s go play out and how that might affect the divorcing process.

So, talk to us a little bit about that. [00:18:00] So, you’re right, that’s a hot topic. Adultery is a big, big deal and depending on whether you are the party that has committed it, or you are the party that it was committed against, it’s a big deal too. When, and like I said, in alimony, one of the factors is the cause of the breakup of the marriage.

What I tend to tell people that come in who are worried, I committed adultery, so I’m getting nothing. My spouse said, I’m not getting alimony because I’m the one who committed adultery. And I did. I tend to tell them, I don’t think that’s true. I have yet to see the court say, because you committed adultery, you get no alimony.

Maybe somebody else has seen that. I have yet to see it. I think that whether your beliefs agree with it or not, I think it’s pretty common in the courthouse. I think there are a lot of adultery cases, [00:19:00] so I just don’t think it’s as big of a factor. Where I do think it comes into play to be perfectly frank, is in negotiating.

I think that there are some feelings of guilt by the person that committed the adultery and that they may be willing to give more. Basically. I’m so sorry. I, you know, I caused all of this. And then I also see on the other side, the person that the adultery was committed against, have a hard time sometimes maybe agreeing to anything because nothing is enough.

I mean, this person committed adultery. They ruined our whole. So, using other experts and or pieces of the team to help move that along. I work regularly with financial advisors, CPAs, people like you, but I also work regularly with good therapists because I think it’s really important, you know, when that’s [00:20:00] involved.

And then depending on the age of the children and do the children know? And how do you tell the children this information? As a couple, I mean, I’m just a lawyer so I can negotiate a deal, I can put the evidence before the court, but I truly believe that when it comes to something like that, both parties should go to the expert in that area, which I believe would be, you know, a good therapist, a good psychologist to help them.

But as far as money goes, I just, I think it comes more into play in negotiating than I do in the court at. Except there’s always an exception, unless it’s affecting the children. So, if somebody is committing adultery in front of the children, I do think that weighs heavier with the courts and you know, I’ve had that one, so I should be like a given.

No, no, don’t do that. But you’d be surprised. Egregious adultery might have eg. Yeah.  [00:21:00] subconscious egregious adultery. We don’t, don’t do that. Yeah. Yeah. And I would agree with what you had mentioned, which was the guilt factor and kind of the emotions that are around it, and just being aware of how that might either be holding you back or you might be giving too much or not willing to receive or whatever that emotion is, because in my experience, and I’m sure you would agree with this statement, that goes away.

So, you know, if you’re carrying on a battle and it initially started over adultery and you know, maybe the first six months to a year, someone’s feeling guilty and willing to negotiate and be more generous. After that, it goes away. And, all of a sudden that emotion, whether it helps you or hurt you, is gone.

And so, you know, you might be looking back and thinking to yourself, oh man, you know, maybe, maybe I let my emotions not help me make [00:22:00] a good decisions there. I completely, I mean, and it’s something that again I think that you have a window, whatever the window is, I don’t know. But that feeling of guilt does go away.

And then you see it turn to I would say in most cases, some type of anger and or blaming, well, you’re the reason I committed adultery. Why in the world did I agree to move out of the house? It’s my house I should be in. So, these are all factors. I mean, those are great points, and I think that those go towards negotiating and strategizing with your attorney on how to take advantage and or not of that.

Yeah, and I think also the team, the team approach, right? Because it is very hard, it’s exceptionally hard. We all know not to make financial decisions when you’re emotionally charged about something. And that’s where a good therapist or counselor or whatever else you need to help you process the emotion and then really rely on your counsel.

That is more analytical. You know, they’re just [00:23:00] looking at the data and telling you what decisions are, so I would totally agree that coupling those things really, really makes a huge impact during that time because it’s a lot, you’re dealing with a lot and they’re big decisions most of the time they’re irreversible.

If they are reversible, you go through a lot of trouble to do so. So, yeah, I think all really good, important topics here. Sandy, anything in just kind of closing that you want to say or speak to financially. Spouses that might be listening, if anybody is listening and is contemplating separation, divorce, but you’re nervous because you don’t have the resources or your spouse makes all of the money,

I just think I would urge you to reach out to an attorney and just set up that initial consult just a one-hour consultation so you can understand the process. I mean, we just kind of skimmed here, but there’s a lot that you can do. There’s a lot that you can set. [00:24:00] And you know, a good attorney will give you some resources that you may be able to reach out to and work with your spouse on, on putting some of this together before you even have to retain counsel.

So, I would say, they can also help you with a plan, like how to get to the next step. You know, what you want, or you may not. And then you can at least start mapping out what are my options, what are my concerns, and then how can I start getting some. So, I would just urge somebody to reach out and, you know, if you need recommendations, you can email me, you can email Leah.

I mean, we all know the same good folks around town. So, I mean, by all means, just reach out to somebody. Yeah, and I would also just add that life is too short, so you know, most likely your financial situation or being the dependent spouse is not as significant of a factor holding you back as you might [00:25:00]

mentally be thinking it is. And that’s where the, at least reaching out and understanding what your options are and understanding that it is viable and that you can, you know, go on to live your life and be happy, if you want to, if you choose to go that route, I think is invaluable. So, Sandy, how do people reach out to you?

Well on that comment, you’re right. I always tell people the money always works itself out. It’s so much easier for people like us to say it’ll be fine, but I have yet to have a case where it wasn’t fine. The money always works out.  I am right across the street from you, Leah. I am in Bethesda, but I practice all over the state of Maryland and I can be reached via email@sbrookskerman.com or anybody can call my direct line at two four zero five zero seven one seven one.

and I mean, you can reach out to me for, hey [00:26:00] Sandy, I’d like the name of a good therapist. I’d like the name of a good couple’s counselor. I’d like the name of, you know anything. I’m happy to help. Great. Well, thank you so much for that offer, and I do hope that anyone that’s listening that might be in this boat does reach out to you because all those resources are invaluable.

So, thanks for that offer and you guys can always reach out to me at Leah, leah.jones@hightoweradvisors.com, and my direct line is 3 0 1 2 0 2 3 5 9 0. Thanks so much for listening. And you can follow this podcast for all the latest episodes. Also, please share with others, especially those who might benefit from the information.

Thanks for being with us.

Thank you for listening to Her Divorce Source with Leah Jones from Hightower Bethesda. Don’t forget to follow the podcast to be notified whenever a new episode is released.

[00:27:00] Hightower, LLC as an SEC registered Investment Advisor. Securities offered through Hightower Securities, LLC, member FINRA, SIPC. This podcast was created for informational purposes only in the opinions expressed here in or solely those of the authors, and do not represent those of Hightower advisors, LLC or any of its affiliates.