Get Your Law-Related Questions Answered

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Q: How long do you have to live in Wisconsin to get a divorce?

A: Wisconsin law provides that a divorce may be filed in a county where one of the spouses has lived for at least 30 days immediately prior to filing the action, provided that spouse has been a state resident for at least six months prior to filing.

Q: How much does it cost to get divorced?

A: That depends on several factors. If the husband and wife are in agreement on the critical factors to be addressed and resolved before the court, costs are much less than if they are in total disagreement. A collaborative divorce process avoids trial litigation, meaning it costs less than a heavily litigated divorce.



Q: Must my spouse or I tell the court why we want to divorce?
A: A couple must agree that the marriage is broken and cannot be fixed. Wisconsin is a no-fault divorce state, meaning neither party must prove a reason for the divorce to be granted. You'll need to agree that the marriage cannot be reconciled or that you have lived separately and that reconciliation is not possible.

Flat fee or Hourly?

Filing for divorce creates stress and uncertainty in the lives of our client’s and we often times get asked whether we will take on a divorce on a “flat fee.” A flat fee divorce is a divorce in which you pay your lawyer a large lump sum of money one time. It is certainly understandable that our clients would inquire about this billing model as it provides some financial certainty as to the cost of the case, however it has significant drawbacks when it comes to unpredictable family law litigation.

First, many flat fee contracts have a strict “scope” meaning that the flat fee may only cover you if everything is agreed on. In some cases, you can be left paying an initial flat fee for the lawyer to work on your divorce. However, the fine print of that fee agreement may, and often does, contain additional escalator clauses that require additional fees to be paid in the event that the case does not settle. This can leave you high and dry when you need your lawyer the most.

Second, while most fee arrangements contain a “moral hazard,” flat fee models have some more concerning features or traits when it comes to the moral hazard question. An attorney may implicitly or explicitly feel that doing more work on a case just makes your case less profitable and less valuable to them. In these cases, you may not be getting the attention that you want and deserve. Of course, a flat fee divorce lawyer may tell you that hourly rates result in unnecessary billing or an over worked file. However, we rarely find that to be the case in our firm as we provide detailed monthly billing statements and allow our clients to tell us how much financial resources, they want to dedicate to the case.

To that end, a flat fee lawyer may be left with a windfall if you are charged $10,000.00 to complete a divorce and the case is resolved in the first 120 days. If your case is resolved in the first 120 days through an hourly rate, then you may feel like you actually got what you paid for. This leads us to yet another drawback which is that a lawyer can get off your case if there is a breakdown in the relationship and may keep the entire flat fee. In these cases, you paid a lawyer to assist you with your divorce, but are left with no help, no final judgment, and an empty bank account.

Flat fees may be preferable to folks who want to straight forward legal work done like drafting wills, purchasing real estate, etc. etc. However, the only thing straight forward and predictable about a family law matter is that it will be unpredictable.

Make sure to weigh your options before you move forward with a lawyer and consider what fee model fits you best before you sign any dotted line.