California Divorce Kit - What a Good One Should Include

If you and your spouse agree that you want to get divorced as easily and cheaply as possible, a California divorce kit could be just what you need to achieve your goal.

As long as the two of you are willing to cooperate, you can work together to do your own divorce without lawyers and save a ton of money on legal fees. But you will need a comprehensive and up-to-date California divorce kit.

Key Elements of a Good California Divorce Kit

So what should you look for in a divorce kit? To work well for you, the kit should include the following elements:

Divorce overview. The kit should provide an overview of how a California divorce works, and what it means to do it yourself. Doing your own divorce doesn't mean you can't get professional help if you need it, but a good kit should tell you when it's a good idea to get help, what kind of help to get, and how to get it.

A complete kit should provide information on the following topics:

- Dissolution, nullity and legal separation

- Regular vs. Summary dissolution

- Grounds for dissolution

- Residency requirements

- Serving California divorce papers

- Automatic restraining orders

- Mandatory disclosure

- Tax consequences of divorce

- Dividing property and debts

- Child custody and visitation

- Child and spousal support

- Settlement agreements

Clear instructions. You want clear, easy-to-understand explanations of the procedures you will go through in a dissolution of marriage; and instructions written in plain English that you can easily follow. The procedures and instructions should be thorough and detailed enough that you can do your divorce on your own by following them.

Topics covered in a comprehensive California divorce kit should include:

- How to fill out the official divorce forms

- The Summons and the Petition

- The Response

- Proof of Service

- Declarations of Disclosure

- The Property Declaration

- The Income and Expense Declaration

- The Request to Enter Default

- How to fill out the Judgment

- Wage and earnings assignment

- How to get your Judgment

- The Notice of Entry of Judgment

- The Summary Dissolution

- Termination of Domestic partnership

Current Divorce Forms. The California Legislature is one of the most active in the U.S. when it comes to enacting laws that make changes to the official divorce forms and procedures. It's important that you get a California divorce kit that is updated regularly to keep up with these changes.

Your kit should provide you with the latest versions of all the California Family Law forms you might need for your divorce. You don't need to use all the forms--just the ones that apply to your case--but the kit should provide them all and explain which ones to use for specific situations.

There are too many California divorce forms to list all of them in this article, but here is a list showing the form number and the name of the form, of some of the basic forms that should be included in a good divorce kit (FL stands for Family Law):

FL-110 Summons

FL-100 Petition

FL-103 Petition--Domestic Partnership

FL-105 Declaration Under UCCJEA

FL-120 Response

FL-123 Response-Domestic Partnership

FL-115 Proof of Service of Summons

FL-140 Declaration of Disclosure

FL-142 Schedule of Assets and Debts

FL-160 Property Declaration

FL-150 Income and Expense Declarations

FL-155 Financial Statement (Simplified)

FL-165 Request to Enter Default

FL-180 Judgment

FL-350 Stipulation to Establish Child Support

Software. To be really complete your kit should also include two software programs: one that you can use to create your own legally correct Settlement Agreement, and another that you can use to run child or spousal support calculations. The support calculation software that comes with your California divorce kit should be certified by the California Judicial Council, to ensure that the results are accurate.