General Discussion
In reply to the discussion: Stay-at-Home Mom Facing Divorce? Don't Expect Alimony - Forbes article [View all]bhikkhu
(10,714 posts)but aside from kids, when two people are divorced they should both be independent. Money issues complicate things so much - my sister has been trying to get a divorce finalized for years now. Disagreement over child custody frustrated the first attempt to do it simply, without lawyers. Now it been a year of valuing and dividing assets, including pensions and so forth, and private investigators to track down hidden and undeclared assets - a big bitter mess.
I was lucky in my divorce, as there wasn't much to divide. Two properties worth less than the debts they carried, no real money in the bank and an assortment of other debt we divided according to who's name was on it. And two $1000 cars, I got one, she got one. Pretty easy as well in that neither of us had any intentions of taking the kids away from the other, and its worked out reasonably well. Without worry about being saddled with her debts, or having my income used against me, I've been able to improve my employment situation and better provide for the kids.