What to Bring for Your Conference
To help better assess your case, please accurately fill out the client information sheet and bring it with you to your conference, along with any of the below mentioned documents if you deem them appropriate, although they may not be necessary.
- Bring with you your tax returns (personal and business/corporate) for the past two years, wage statements, W-2s, 1099s or Form Ks.
- Be familiar with your monthly expenses (including housing, utilities, food, children’s expenses, transportation, health care, personal expenses and monthly credit card/revolving debt) and itemize them for your attorney.
- Itemize your property, estimate its market value and what, if anything, is owing against it. Such a list includes real estate, cars, IRAs, pensions, bank accounts, stock accounts, etc. This will better assist us in evaluating your case. Separately itemize your personal liabilities, i.e., credit cards, etc.
- Maintenance is a factor of your lifestyle and standard of living. Summarize your lifestyle briefly. Such summary should detail your home (price range), the types of cars driven, clubs joined, vacations taken, private school for children and where you shop, etc.
- In the area of parenting, outline the historic pattern. Courts look to the future based on the past. Please take a look at the issues raised by the various sections of a form Parenting Plan.
- If there are physical limitations of either you or your spouse or, for that matter, mental problems, outline them and discuss them, including medical issues, hospitalizations and prescription medication taken.
- If there is domestic violence, alcoholism or drug use, discuss it with your attorney, as there may be limitations on parenting due to such issues.
REMEMBER: TO MAKE YOU FEEL AT EASE, YOUR CONFERENCE WITH YOUR LAWYER BY LAW IS PRIVILEGED. THE PRIVILEGE BELONGS TO YOU. NOTHING YOU SAY CAN BE RELATED WITHOUT YOUR PERMISSION.
