A strange thing happened in my social life during the past two awkward years of pandemic times: Three couples in my circle got divorced.
All have kids my kids’ ages. All our kids went to the same elementary school. All three announcements took me by surprise because I had known the couples for years and they all seemed happy. (Maybe that just shows how good I am at reading social situations.)
Anyway, that’s not even the weirdest part.
The weirdest part is this: They all get along super well now that they are divorced. They show up at the same parties; they express great affection and even love for each other. Usually they even say they get along better after the divorce as friends than they did as married couples. This is wild! It seems anomalous but is definitely great and preferable for everyone since they have kids and share many friends.
What does this have to do with money and business, you ask? I’ll tell you.
At the start of COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, San Antonio-based family law attorney Lauren Smyth of Carrington Smyth PLLC and her husband, Jeremy Smyth, launched a “law-tech” firm called Uncontested.com to address this very situation: couples who do not intend to fight over kids or money and simply want a fast and affordable way to file for divorce. None of the three divorcing couples in my life used Uncontested.com but all agreed it pretty much fit their situation.
Here’s how it works: One side of a divorcing couple goes to Uncontested.com and answers a series of in-depth personal and financial questions, enough to provide all the data to prepare divorce documents. With Carrington Smyth PLLC as the law firm of record and Lauren Smyth as the attorney, technically the client is the person who filled out the online questionnaire. The other person in the couple also needs to sign the agreement.
Disruptively inexpensive
Ordinarily, the going rate for a totally simple all-parties-agree-on-everything divorce is from $2,500 to $3,500. Uncontested.com offers a bare-bones, just-the-documents service for $500, plus an additional $500 for the legal work of filing the divorce, for an all-in cost of $1,000. This is a disruptively inexpensive option for people who don’t want to fight about anything.
“We want to reward clients who can come to an agreement with a cheaper, hitherto unavailable option by giving them the limited legal services they need to complete their legal matters,” Jeremy says.
About 12 percent of users choose the “documents only” option, while the vast majority opt for the full documents, filing and final hearing service.
Kate McConnico is a Houston-based attorney certified in family law. Her specialty is representing one side in contested, complex divorces. She says her cases often cost from $20,000 to $60,000 to resolve. Even contested cases without extraordinary assets cost from $7,000 to $14,000. I mention this just to note that, ordinarily, the legal fees for getting a divorce are really expensive.
As McConnico says of her clients, “The No. 1 thing they want out of their life is their lawyer. I tell my clients all the time ‘You need to get rid of me, and I’ll tell you how to do it.’”
I was curious whether McConnico thought Uncontested.com at $1,000 made sense. She went through the online questionnaire and agreed absolutely.
“This fits a niche for people who don’t have enough money for in-person litigation but don’t qualify for pro bono,” McConnico said. “For technology-savvy people this will fill a need.”
She estimated 30 percent of divorces are filed uncontested in Texas, suggesting a very large market.
Expansion plans
Carrington Smyth PLLC is based in San Antonio. To date, 74 percent of its clients have come from the local area although Uncontested.com works in all Texas counties. A few counties in Texas require physical appearances, which means clients would need to use the $500 “documents only” service.
Jeremy told me Uncontested.com has ambitions to expand to both the U.K. (where he is from and where Lauren is already licensed) and additional states as soon as next year. Family law — and requirements for an online divorce document template — varies by state and country. But a coalition of 35 states will synchronize their statutes in 2023, making a “law-tech” solution potentially easier to expand, using one template.
I went through the website template and found it took less than 10 minutes to initiate the process. I did not press the button to hire Uncontested.com for the $500 “docs only” or $1,000 “full service,” as I would hate to accidentally get divorced in the course of doing research. That would be a shock!
Divorce can be one of the most financially traumatic life events. Engaging in an uncontested divorce, with a very low-cost solution like Uncontested.com, may be the savviest financial choice to make in an otherwise difficult situation.
One final thought: One of my newly divorced friends had another idea for the next big financial technology to help with divorce: the “divorce registry.” It’s like a wedding registry but friends can buy preselected gifts for the divorcee who needs new household items.
This incredible business idea is for free, folks. Just remember where you heard it first.
This article originally appeared in The San Antonio Express-News. Michael Taylor is a columnist for the San Antonio Express-News.