Filed for divorce, now what happens in NY Supreme court?

In general existing, valid Orders of Faily Court will be incorporated into the Judgment of Divorce, though either party may challenge them and seek to have them amended. This is a general answer to one of your many questions. I advise you to retain one of the attorneys you've spoken with . He or she will be in full possession of all the facts of your case, and will be able to review your existing Orders with you. I understand it's tempting to try to economize and handle matters yourself, but many years of matrimonial practice have convinced me this is almost always a poor economy.

You need to file a Request for Judicial Intervention to get a Judge assigned to the case.

A 'retainer' is typically only the amount the lawyer requires to enter a case. It is by no means the final price as the typical lawyer bills hourly against that amount. When hours exceed money, you get a bill and have to continue to pay. From these facts, although she may appear to be representing herself, it sounds as if your wife has a lawyer in the background. She is asking for many things which would not be apparent to the lay person and would require added court intervention to determine -- like college tuition. These items of relief are very costly and may not even be available to her at this point. For example, college tuition is never ordered when the child is still very young. The only way this can appear in a judgment is if you consent to its placement in the judgment. Then you are bound by what you consent to. Having prior court orders is certainly helpful to move the divorce along because the divorce judge does to have to review issues already settled by prior order. At your Preliminary Conference, you'll be spared a child support award typically awarded by Queens Supreme Court's new "PC Part" where Support Magistrate Friederwitzer (now "Referee") sits and calculates all the up front orders of support against men. However, there will be issues that will pop up as the case goes along which will add time and money. This is why it is not possible to determine how long your divorce will take. You do not know what surprises the wife will throw at you. Realize that courts are staffed with high-brow academicians who rarely step outside into the real world. They enforce policies contrived by other academicians to solve social problems that may not exist. For example, these academicians believed that women suffer disproportionally when there is a divorce. They believed that women ended up on welfare because husbands would abandon them. This is why we have "maintenance" and "child support" today. The reality is that women and men stand on equal economic footing as jobs and education are equally available to all however old and groundless policies remain in place. In many divorces I have seen, especially in Queens, women come in with masters degrees alleging they work at the Aqueduct casino for pennies and men are slammed by Friederwitzer to pay amounts of money in support that they don't earn. Again, your situation will spare you this slamming because you were already slammed by a prior Support Magistrate in family court. What is slamming? In the world of child support, a Support Magistrate is allowed by statute to 'impute' (pull numbers out of the air as) incomes for men who fail to disclose their incomes. So seventeen percent for one kid can become seventy percent for one kid. Timing a child support matter is crucial if the mother is to pull off a slam. A November-to-March filing is always more lucrative because the working man has not yet filed his taxes (April 15), so the risk of imputation is greater in a November-to-March filing given the absence of a current and recent tax return and up-to-date annual income information. For men who are self employed, a November-to-March filing is preferable for the same reasons: an accountant will typically not have taxes prepared in time for a November-to-March child support filing. The statute compels early production of the FDA (Financial Disclosure Affidavit) or else imputation becomes available to the Support Magistrate. It is probably this reason you need an attorney to represent you. That attorney will prevent you from falling into the wrong category and protecting you from being overcharged. It is this overcharge that is the main objective of any divorce opponent. Overcharging quickly brings motions for contempt and jailing. Scorned and angry litigants love to see their ex sitting behind bars. Please be guided accordingly.

The prior court orders will be incorporated in the judgment of divorce unless there has been a change of circumstances since the orders were made. Assuming that there is no prenuptial agreement, marital assets are not restricted to assets that are held jointly. With very few exceptions (gifts, personal injury awards and inheritances) all assets acquired after the marriage up until the time of the divorce filing are considered marital property regardless of title. A contested divorce is not going to be had for $2k to $3k. Instead, the lawyer is going to bill you per hour and when the initial retainer is depleted, additional amounts of money will be required.

It is a little known fact that in a subsequent Divorce proceeding the Supreme Court technically is entitled to what we call DeNovo review of any previously issued orders of support and custody/visitation. (which means review at first instance) However, in practice where there are previously issued orders from Family Court, unless there is some need for a change the Supreme Court Judges tend to simply incorporate the previously issued orders into the Divorce Judgment. That being said, in your case, if there is now a request for spousal support your previously issued order of support may need to be revisited. If in fact "temporary" and/or "permanent" spousal support is awarded your child support numbers and pro-ratas will undoubtedly change. Consider: In a case where one party earns 75k per year is ordered to pay 5k per year in spousal maintenance the payor spouse's income for child support and tax reporting purposes is now 70k, which changes your AGI for child support purposes and most likely your pro-rata share. Insofar as a retainer is concerned, generally it is a deposit made against which an attorney bills work hourly and for which according to regulation the attorney MUST provide you with minimum 60 day billing statements in Divorce cases. In my experience, depending upon your area, initial retainers for contested Divorces can range from as low as 2-3K up to and beyond 25k, depending upon the very specific aspects and complexities of your case and who you hire. As was previously mentioned, the initial retainer deposit, may very well not be the final/total fee. As the retainer agreement they will present to you should say, "if the case takes more time/costs more the attorney will request a supplemental retainer. " But the issues in your case are sufficiently complex that I believe the assistance of experienced, savy Divorce counsel is warranted.