Legal seperation

[maine_man]

What is the naHme of your state (only U.S. law)? Maine
Hello,
My wife and I are sperated and we had a lawyer make up speration/settlement papers wich dispersed all our assets and states all child support and allimony issues clearly as well as any 401-k and retirement accounts and states its to be incorperated into the divorce if we reach that point. The question I have is now that its been signed and notorized do we need to file it with the Maine courts?
We had a lawyer generate the paper work and we handled the signing and notory because we are agreeable with it all. We just didnt know if it would be legal as is or if it needs to be filed with the courts?
thank you.

 

[LdiJ]

What is the naHme of your state (only U.S. law)? Maine
Hello,
My wife and I are sperated and we had a lawyer make up speration/settlement papers wich dispersed all our assets and states all child support and allimony issues clearly as well as any 401-k and retirement accounts and states its to be incorperated into the divorce if we reach that point. The question I have is now that its been signed and notorized do we need to file it with the Maine courts?
We had a lawyer generate the paper work and we handled the signing and notory because we are agreeable with it all. We just didnt know if it would be legal as is or if it needs to be filed with the courts?
thank you.

Yes, it needs to be filed with the courts to be legal.

 

[maine_man]

how do we file the legal seperation?

How would we file it in our district court house? And proceedure would we just need to bring in the originals and pay a filing fee and thats it?

 

[LdiJ]

How would we file it in our district court house? And proceedure would we just need to bring in the originals and pay a filing fee and thats it?

How much did your attorney charge you to draw it up?...usually the attorney who draws it up would file it with the courts.

 

[maine_man]

legal seperation filing

He gave us that option to do the whole filing or he offered to draw up just the papers and we handle the notary and filing seeing we were in agreement with everything. He charged us $350 we consulted with him for aprox 2 hrs and then his time to generate the paper work.
Thanks

 

[maine_man]

seperation agreement

I called the district court house and they stated that i we would have to fill out basicaly divorse papers and then have them served on the other in order to obtain a legal seperation. A new question is if we dont have them filed and in the future we do end our marriage if we have a notarized seperation & settlement agreement even tho it was not filed will it still stand up in court for us to just to attach it to our divorce filing papaer work or would you advise us to file it with the courts?
Thank you.

 

[LdiJ]

I called the district court house and they stated that i we would have to fill out basicaly divorse papers and then have them served on the other in order to obtain a legal seperation. A new question is if we dont have them filed and in the future we do end our marriage if we have a notarized seperation & settlement agreement even tho it was not filed will it still stand up in court for us to just to attach it to our divorce filing papaer work or would you advise us to file it with the courts?
Thank you.

As long as both of you continued to agree it would be possible. However, if one of you became disatisfied with the agreement then it would end up being a worthless piece of paper. I would advise you to file it with the courts. However, for simplicity's sake, I would pay the attorney to handle it.

 

[maine_man]

simplicty

simplicty being a understatement holly cow the court is saying we would have to fill out divorce papers and due the same route as a divorce with one of us having to serve the other and submitting finance statements ect.. everything that is already in the drawn up seperation and then have to see a mediator dont undertsand why so difficult to file some papers.
I was under the impression if it was drawn up and worded correctly that it would be a legal binding contract once signed and notorized.
Thanks again~