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You have split your schedule. You’ve untangled custody. You feel like you’re on top of the thousand tiny decisions that face you during your divorce process. And still, you stare down the bear: How do you split your stuff? This week on the show, strategies for approaching your personal property.
Show Notes
You have split your schedule. You’ve untangled custody. You feel like you’re on top of the thousand tiny decisions that face you during your divorce process. And still, you stare down the bear: how do you split your stuff?
It’s not easy. It’s emotional and exhausting. And it asks much of you in the form of patience and compromise. This week on the show, Seth shares strategies for approaching your personal property that may make your experience with your attorney, your mediator, and even your judge a little bit easier.
- (00:00) - Welcome to How to Split a Toaster
- (00:29) - Splitting Personal Property
- (04:37) - Splitting Strategies
- (11:30) - What is a "Full Gift"?
- (13:29) - The Wagon Wheel Coffee Table Problem
- (15:49) - Pet Property
- (18:51) - Attorney Influence in Personal Property
- (20:45) - The Value of the Fight over Stuff
- (23:21) - Managing Personal Property in Second Marriages and Beyond
- (28:16) - Wrapping Up
Creators and Guests
Host
Host
What is How to Split a Toaster: A Divorce Podcast About Saving Your Relationships?
Seth Nelson is a Tampa based family lawyer known for devising creative solutions to difficult problems. In How to Split a Toaster, Nelson and co-host Pete Wright take on the challenge of divorce with a central objective — saving your most important relationships with your family, your former spouse, and yourself.
Pete Wright:
Welcome to How to Split a Toaster, a divorce podcast about saving your relationships from TruStory FM. Today, we're taking on the momentous matter of material, how do you split your stuff?
Seth Nelson:
Welcome to the show, everybody. I'm Seth Nelson, as always with my good friend, Pete Wright. How are you doing, Pete?
Pete Wright:
I'm doing very well, Seth. I'm excited about our conversation today, only because yet again, I had a dear friend reach out to me saying they found the podcast, by way of some social thing that I shared, and they've been listening to it because they're in the middle of a divorce process themselves, and had some very kind things to say about you and told me the story that absolutely plays into what we're doing today. And I thought I might open with it and see what you have to say. What do you think?
Seth Nelson:
Absolutely. I'm sorry that your friend's going through a divorce, and they must've been drinking saying nice things about me. So I'm concerned about them. But fire away. What are they dealing with, my friend?
Pete Wright:
So they're outside of Boston, and this is all pretty raw. It was just about four weeks ago that she moved out. My friend's soon to be former spouse moved out into a house a couple of miles away, and they're not struggling over time, time with the kids, parenting. They're not struggling with money, bank accounts, that kind of stuff. They're struggling over stuff. And he said this thing that struck me, and it's been going over in my mind, he said, "I know that we are fetishizing the past, but we just can't agree on where to split even the smallest stuff around the house, trinkets, chotchkies, whatever. We can't figure it out. We will find a way to destroy any conversation we have when we talk about this stuff." And-
Seth Nelson:
Oh, I feel for him.
Pete Wright:
Right?
Seth Nelson:
And he's okay you bring this up on the show. I don't want friendships to be-
Pete Wright:
Nope. Absolutely. In fact, I'm sure I will get a bottle of wine out of this for telling his story in public. Yeah.
Seth Nelson:
So that can go to 400 North Tampa Street. From a lawyer's perspective, and I really want to talk about different ways to split this up, this is a great question that everybody deals with. And there's different ways that people deal with it. There's no right or wrong, they're just different. Get rid of the concept of fair, let's start with that. But most lawyers that I've talked to, and I know I'm in this category, this is one of the least favorite things to do because the amount of money you're going to pay me to talk about items that mostly have no real value.
Pete Wright:
Yeah.
Seth Nelson:
And now I'm going to tell you a little Florida law, and you know what I'm going to say, right, Pete?
Pete Wright:
Check your local jurisdictions.
Seth Nelson:
There you go. Check your local jurisdictions.
Pete Wright:
Everybody playing Bingo along with us.
Seth Nelson:
But in Florida family law, when we talk about personal property, it is garage sale value. Now, if you have an antique that has value or a watch collection that has value, or art that has real value that you can get appraised, those are one thing. But if we're talking about the couch, if we're talking about the plate, we're talking garage sale value. So the only people that hate dealing with this more than lawyers or judges, they're really dividing this up.
Pete Wright:
Well let me ask you on that point though, it's garage sale value, but the stuff that does have value, let's say art, or I don't know, comic books, whatever you've got, it's only real value if somebody is there who's willing to sell it, right?
Seth Nelson:
Well what happens in dividing of assets in Florida is equitable distribution, you're dividing up your assets. So let's say you have a piece of artwork that's worth $100.
Pete Wright:
Okay.
Seth Nelson:
And you have $100 in a bank account. And no problem if you say, "I want the artwork and my soon to be former spouse can have the bank account." You each get $100 worth of value.
Pete Wright:
Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Seth Nelson:
Okay? The problem is when you both want the artwork.
Pete Wright:
That's the proverbial toaster. You can't split that.
Seth Nelson:
Exactly. Exactly. So in my hypothetical, it's almost impossible because there's only one thing.
Pete Wright:
Yeah.
Seth Nelson:
Okay. But most people have more than one thing. Most of us have way too many things.
Pete Wright:
Yeah.
Seth Nelson:
So there's a number of different ways you can divide up your personal belongings. One way is that you each individually make a list of what you want. Do not discuss it or share it with the other person until the lists are complete.
Pete Wright:
Okay.
Seth Nelson:
And be honest with yourself on things that you really want. And you can put it down as in, "Here are my big priorities. Here are the things I would like to have, I don't really care." Or, "I'd like to have, but maybe we can split some of them. And here are things I just don't care about." Or you can just make a list, "This is what I want." And the reason why I encourage people to go through and make a list of just the things that they want, and not share it with the other person, is it will, hopefully, if you're being honest with yourself, that you are just going to take the things you want and not just put something on the list that you know the other person wants as a negotiating ploy.
Pete Wright:
Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Seth Nelson:
Okay? So if you know that you both love cooking and you both have this favorite pan and it's the same pan, the one you always go to, okay, I see where that might be on the list. But if you don't like cooking and you're putting all the pans on your list just to piss your spouse off.
Pete Wright:
Yeah.
Seth Nelson:
That's not really being helpful in trying to get this resolved.
Pete Wright:
Well that's what it sounds like, is the source of a lot of conflict, right? I mean it's this idea that there are other reasons that you are fetishizing the past, that you have an attachment to your stuff. And it's not the stuff.
Seth Nelson:
It's not the stuff. Stuff symbolizes things. It reminds me of this trip, or of X or Y. So you've got to let some of that go in your head as well. So when it comes to this stuff, if you make your own list. And what's interesting about that, Pete, is I would encourage you being friends with these people is to go in there and say, "I'm going to help you through this." You each make your own list and you give it to me. And then what you do, Pete, is you combine the lists and you have three highlighters. One just easy for me to remember, blue for boy, pink for girl, okay? Everything your buddy wanted, you highlight in blue. You actually have four highlighters. Everything that the wife wanted, you highlight in pink as long as they're not-
Pete Wright:
Individual.
Seth Nelson:
Individual, right? If there's something they both want, this is how I work it. I highlight it in yellow, because yellow I still know I have to deal with it.
Pete Wright:
Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Seth Nelson:
Now, I asked you for the fourth highlighter. There's four. One for her, one for him, one that's still at controversy. What's the fourth one for? It's a quiz.
Pete Wright:
So him, her. Controversy means they both want it?
Seth Nelson:
Yeah, that's the yellow.
Pete Wright:
And the fourth one is going to be stuff that is, I don't know, recyclable?
Seth Nelson:
Right.
Pete Wright:
We know we're going to sell it and get the monetary value out of it?
Seth Nelson:
Fourth one is neither one of them put it on their list. It's all their stuff that they don't want which you get to walk away with.
Pete Wright:
Yeah.
Seth Nelson:
You just tell them, "I get all this other stuff."
Pete Wright:
I get all that stuff. Yeah.
Seth Nelson:
Okay?
Pete Wright:
I get more stuff. Money in the bank, baby.
Seth Nelson:
You would be surprised how much stuff neither party wants.
Pete Wright:
So it's the stuff that they're fighting about is a portion of the stuff that it's not even all the stuff.
Seth Nelson:
It might not even be all the stuff. Okay. So that's one way to do it. Now, let's deal with the conflicted issues.
Pete Wright:
Yes.
Seth Nelson:
Right. It can be like you're dealing with your children, right? One, you flip a coin, who picks first?
Pete Wright:
Now, is this just in Florida jurisdiction? Or is this everywhere?
Seth Nelson:
No. This is just ways to get things settled, right? You flip a coin. If I'm flipping a coin with you, Pete, I'm going to say, "Heads, I win, tails, you lose."
Pete Wright:
Yeah.
Seth Nelson:
Right?
Pete Wright:
And I'm going to say, "Okay."
Seth Nelson:
Yeah right. But you flip a coin on who gets to pick first. They pick one item, then you pick one item. They pick one item and you pick one item. And you go through the stuff. And then at the end, if you want to say, "You want to trade anything?" You can, but those items are divided.
Pete Wright:
That's one way to do it. At what point do you just say, "You guys are children, neither of you get any stuff. We're going to sell it and split the money?" Is that ever a thing?
Seth Nelson:
Well only a judge is going to tell them that, right?
Pete Wright:
You wouldn't do that.
Seth Nelson:
I wouldn't do that.
Pete Wright:
You might tell them that a judge is going to do that if you don't learn to co-operate.
Seth Nelson:
And I've been in trial where a judge said, "Not only am I not going to tell you to sell it, I'm going to have you pick it up and donate it to charity," which is not allowed to happen under Florida family law.
Pete Wright:
Yeah.
Seth Nelson:
But the judge knows that that's what she's going to order and she also knows that we're not going to spend the money appealing it. And so it makes it a way to work out.
Pete Wright:
Yeah.
Seth Nelson:
I've had trials where the judge said, "Make your list of everything you want." And the judge went through and highlighted, like I said, blue and pink on the stuff that was not in controversy.
Pete Wright:
Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Seth Nelson:
Here's what the wife wanted, here's what the husband wanted. And then there was the stuff in controversy. She took those lists and she said, "I'm awarding everything the wife wanted that was not in controversy to the husband, everything the husband wanted to the wife. And here's what I'm doing with the rest."
Pete Wright:
Wow.
Seth Nelson:
She just flipped them. She was so annoyed that she was dealing with this stuff.
Pete Wright:
Well this gets that thing you started with earlier, that lawyers hate dealing with this. It sounds like everybody hates dealing with this.
Seth Nelson:
The judges hate dealing with it, the mediators find it very difficult, okay? Here are some things I would advise not to do.
Pete Wright:
Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Seth Nelson:
Talk with your lawyer. So I'm not giving you legal advice, this is practical advice. Do not have an item that you are going to share. "I love that artwork. You can hang it in your house for the first six months, I get it for the second six months."
Pete Wright:
Custody for your stuff. Seth, that sounds horrible.
Seth Nelson:
Yeah. And it's happened. And it's usually memorabilia type stuff.
Pete Wright:
Yeah.
Seth Nelson:
So pictures. Pictures of kids, okay? Make copies, scan them in. Literally, some of those things can be reproduced, right? If you have a photo, you can scan it these days. Great, okay? Any items that you gave to the other person as a gift during your marriage, ready, check your local jurisdiction in Florida, it's not a full gift. If you give your wife some earrings on the first anniversary of your wedding anniversary worth $1,000, making up a number here for easy math.
Pete Wright:
Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Seth Nelson:
And you get divorced, she wants the earrings, that's fine. And they're worth a thousand bucks, she owes you 500.
Pete Wright:
Yeah. Okay.
Seth Nelson:
Not only, but in the great state of Florida, you can't give your spouse a full gift, because when you get divorced, you can get half the value back.
Pete Wright:
Wow.
Seth Nelson:
Now, what I would say being the nice Jewish boy that I am, be a match. You gave her the earrings, let her keep the earrings. Don't ask for the 500 bucks.
Pete Wright:
Yeah. Right. A gift as a gift. Maybe not in Florida, but it's settled science.
Seth Nelson:
Yeah. I mean-
Pete Wright:
That hurts my heart a little bit.
Seth Nelson:
Right. Now, what about that picture that you guys bought on your honeymoon? You both loved it.
Pete Wright:
And you were married at the time.
Seth Nelson:
Right. That would be divided by a court, who gets what. Judges hate dealing with it, okay? So one, you can do what we call an AB list. Everybody makes their own list and you do the highlighter deal. Two, you can just start picking one, the other, you each take turns. And this is how, I'm going to say, ridiculous, but it's emotional. So I get it when you're in the emotional state. But this is where your brain and your grief is all getting in the way of what most people would be like, "Really? We're arguing about this?"
Pete Wright:
Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Seth Nelson:
Because you're just in it. I get it. And I'm not discounting that feeling for people. I understand it. I appreciate it. And when you're on the outside looking in, it's very easy for us to say, "Really? You're arguing over wine glasses?"
Pete Wright:
It's the wagon wheel coffee table. It's When Harry Met Sally.
Seth Nelson:
Yes. Great movie.
Pete Wright:
Yeah.
Seth Nelson:
Yeah. Yeah. And he's carrying it out, right?
Pete Wright:
Yeah. The wagon wheel coffee... But this is the thing that I think is so fascinating too, is that this approach to personal property to figuring out your stuff, it gets back to the question that started us off, that your ability to navigate this particular minefield could in many other ways damage an otherwise healthy divorce process. People who aren't fighting over the kids, who aren't fighting over the monetary assets, they are fighting over stupid stuff, wagon wheel coffee table.
Seth Nelson:
Right. And when they go to do the AB list, they're really smart. They're like, "Oh, we listened to Seth and Pete on the podcast. We listened to the Toaster."
Pete Wright:
Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Seth Nelson:
"Let's do AB." And I'm making this up of course, he says, "Okay, I'll take the lawnmower." One item very specific. She says, "I'll take all the Christmas decorations." She just lumped them into one category.
Pete Wright:
Yeah.
Seth Nelson:
Right? Are we going to go year by year and say, "I get the kids first year, you get their second year," right? And ultimately, most of this stuff, if you have children, it's going to hopefully get passed down to them. So you're really just holding it for how long until you give it to your kids.
Pete Wright:
That's right. It's going in the attic for about 15, 20 years.
Seth Nelson:
Right.
Pete Wright:
Yeah.
Seth Nelson:
So most of this stuff is just stuff. Now, I'm talking about your own personal stuff. And remember, we talked to Jamie Blumenthal about interior design.
Pete Wright:
Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Seth Nelson:
I also would say be practical. If you're going from a large house to a townhouse or to an apartment, do you really want to take all this other stuff and put it in storage?
Pete Wright:
Right.
Seth Nelson:
Now you have added expenses? What is really important to you?
Pete Wright:
Right.
Seth Nelson:
And why? You are never... Do not try to even do what I'm about to say, do not try to persuade the other person why you should get the item more than they should. You're not going to persuade the other side that you're right and they're wrong on that issue. You're just asking for conflict.
Pete Wright:
I don't want to set the stage too prematurely here, but we're about to have a conversation with somebody who specializes in pet custody. Are pets considered personal property?
Seth Nelson:
In Florida, yeah.
Pete Wright:
Of course they are.
Seth Nelson:
Of course, right? It just breaks your heart. And I am a huge dog lover.
Pete Wright:
Yeah.
Seth Nelson:
So this is hard. And we are going to be talking to someone who focuses on pets, which I'm really excited for that conversation. In Florida, it is what it is. Now, most people do figure that out. Usually somebody is more tied to the dogs, for example, right? Or the other one says, "I love this dog, but I can't handle it. I'm going to have two little kids now and a dog. No. Keep the dog."
Pete Wright:
Yeah. Or, "I'm moving into a smaller space," or whatever.
Seth Nelson:
Right. I don't have a backyard. When we say focus on the kids, focus on the dog too. But we're going to have a whole conversation about that, which like I said, I'm very excited to have that in the coming weeks here. The other thing to think about when you're talking about personal property, in Florida, check your local jurisdiction as I always say, but if I receive a gift for my birthday, from my parents, let's say, that's actually non-marital. That was a gift from a third party to me.
Pete Wright:
Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Seth Nelson:
So I would just get to keep that. Now, if my parents gave us an anniversary gift that's to both of us, that's marital property to get divided, okay? Like we said, if you give a gift to your spouse in Florida, it's marital property, it gets divided, it'd be a match on that, gifts or gifts like we said. But also, anything you inherit in Florida is yours because that's a gift from a third party to you, even though they've [inaudible 00:17:43], right? So if you have family heirlooms that came from one side of the family, for the piece of yourself in getting through this process, leave it with the person who the family heirloom is, okay?
Pete Wright:
All right.
Seth Nelson:
Now, the other thing about that list is the old thing that we do with kids, right? You have a brownie, one brownie, one kid splits, the other kid chooses.
Pete Wright:
Yeah. Right.
Seth Nelson:
You can tell someone, "You can make both lists A and B, the other person gets to select it."
Pete Wright:
Wow.
Seth Nelson:
You're now going to be fair.
Pete Wright:
And they should. If they have kids, they should know that's coming.
Seth Nelson:
That's right.
Pete Wright:
Yeah.
Seth Nelson:
Right. Now, [inaudible 00:18:28] would say, "Well that's not dealing with interest," because if you have an orange, I told her I would split it in the middle, and she said, "Wait, peel it," somebody wanted the peel for baking and the other wanted the orange to eat, right?
Pete Wright:
Right. Right.
Seth Nelson:
But if you're going to split and choose, that's a good way to make this an even list. Somebody makes the list on everything, A and B list, and the other person gets to pick.
Pete Wright:
What say... Say is not the right word, I'm sure, but influence do you have as an attorney over a couple that's struggling with this?
Seth Nelson:
Well I'll talk to my clients and give them all the different suggestions I just gave you.
Pete Wright:
Sure.
Seth Nelson:
And I'll also explain to them that... And people do lose sight of this when they're in the just clutches of the divorce. There's more at stake. There's more stuff to be divided than the items you're talking about. And what I mean by that is you only have so much money. So if we're going to hire lawyers or mediators, everyone to talk about this stuff, you might get a division of the stuff the way you ultimately wanted it. But now, you're going to have $3,000 less to divide because you spent it on the professionals to help you get through that process. So is it worth the three grand? I'll tell people all the time, they want the dishes, you're going to pay me my hourly rate to go argue about dishes, just go buy beautiful new ones. They're going to be the nicest dishes you've ever had because you didn't have to pay me.
Pete Wright:
Right. Right.
Seth Nelson:
Keep your money. Spend it on you, don't spend it on the lawyer to divide up your personal property. This is different than things of whatever you in your own personal life deem significant value. So I'm not talking art collections worth tens, twenties, $30,000. I'm not talking fancy watch collections or jewelry that might be a lot of money, right? That type of stuff you might want to get valued because one spouse is walking away with so much that you might want some on the other side, other people are like, "It was gifts, I'm going to let it go. I hear you." But I mean you're talking about trinkets.
Pete Wright:
Trinkets. Yeah. At some point, the couple has to come to terms with the fact that the value to them together in completing the divorce is higher than fighting over the stuff. But I imagine when you start the divorce process that the scales are tilted the other way. You want to-
Seth Nelson:
Absolutely. And not only that, people will get to that decision at different times.
Pete Wright:
Right.
Seth Nelson:
One spouse might be like, "I should get half this stuff or this or that. You know what? It's not worth it to me, the argument. You can have it all."
Pete Wright:
Right.
Seth Nelson:
Right?
Pete Wright:
"I'm just finished. I'm just done talking about it. Let's just move on."
Seth Nelson:
"I'm done. You can have it all." And it eats at them later because then when you look back, people have, "Buyer's remorse," because they think about, "Oh, this is what I gave up," but they forget that they didn't have to go through the process.
Pete Wright:
And also, they didn't really know the pain of that process, right? They had a sense when they said, "Oh, I'm done," that they wouldn't have to go through it, but they don't know what they missed and how bad it really could have gotten.
Seth Nelson:
Correct. Correct. And so there certainly is that, and there's all these power dynamics and emotional abuse that people go through when they're negotiating this stuff. Those relationship intricacies between spouses don't change. In fact, they're probably heightened during a divorce.
Pete Wright:
Yeah.
Seth Nelson:
If someone's manipulative, they're really going to be manipulated for the divide in this stuff, right? And they know, everybody knows what buttons to push on the other party, right? I mean you've been with them for how many years, you don't think you know what sets them off? Why are you going to set them off?
Pete Wright:
Yeah.
Seth Nelson:
And this does go back to something that I think we've talked about a long time ago, being nice. It's hard, but being nice to your soon to be former spouse. If you think that you're wanting them to do things for you, that you want something from them, it's a whole lot easier to get something from somebody if you're nice to them than if you're mean to them. This is not a new novel concept I just said, right?
Pete Wright:
Yeah. Right.
Seth Nelson:
"Hey, I know we both might want this. It would really mean a lot to me if you would allow me to take it so we don't have to fight about it."
Pete Wright:
Yeah.
Seth Nelson:
That's a whole lot better than, "I'm taking it, it's mine."
Pete Wright:
What is, or is there, a substantial difference in managing stuff between your first divorce and let's say your second or third?
Seth Nelson:
Diminishing returns, you keep coming and keep dividing and dividing.
Pete Wright:
Well I guess I wasn't leaning on that. I was just leaning on does it get easier?
Seth Nelson:
I think as people go through the process, but also anything you bring into the marriage in most jurisdictions is going to be yours. So on the second marriage when you bring stuff in, okay, we all know that it's yours. What typically happens in second and third marriages, depending on the age and where people are in their careers and amassing retirement accounts or savings accounts, or they have a business already, is that's where you deal with prenups. So let me just talk through that process because it's a great question you asked. It's very common in prenups where if you give the gift during the marriage, it's not marital property, it's a gift, right? So we solve that problem. We also solve the problem of anything that has a title to it. If we buy a car jointly, but we title it only in my name, it's mine, even though it might be under marital law and asset of the parties to be divided marital property.
Pete Wright:
Even, "Maybe it's in my name, but she drives the car the most."
Seth Nelson:
Right. Exactly. There's a lot of reasons. In Florida family law, if you buy a car during the marriage with marital money, no matter whose name it's titled in, it's marital property.
Pete Wright:
Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Seth Nelson:
You don't win or lose marital versus non-marital based on title alone. And there's a lot of reasons that people will title a car in only one person's name, because then only that one person could be liable for that accident, not the other party. So there's a lot of other legal stuff to go along with that. So in a prenup, you typically do that. Then no one... It's in a lot of prenups, but you really have to be careful about this and keep receipts, as ridiculous as this is going to sound, whoever purchased it from their account is the one who owns it because some things won't have title.
Pete Wright:
Wow.
Seth Nelson:
Right? If you go and buy a nice watch, you don't get a certificate of title to the watch.
Pete Wright:
Sure.
Seth Nelson:
Right? If you buy a piece of artwork on your honeymoon, but it came from your account, Pete, and not your wife's, you're going to get that.
Pete Wright:
Okay. And that counts for everything. Let's say we save and save, and suddenly I buy a $1,200 blender, right? A kitchen chef's quality blender.
Seth Nelson:
Right, that can do the laundry for you too. I mean 1,200 bucks for a blender, right?
Pete Wright:
I know. I'm fetishizing a blender right now. But I'm just saying, if I spend that kind of coin on a blender, but it comes out of my account, not our joint account, that's my blender.
Seth Nelson:
That's your blender. So go keep track of all that, because that's fun to do.
Pete Wright:
Yeah. Who does that? Who does that rationally? I don't keep track of stuff that-
Seth Nelson:
Right. And remember, as much as we're saying, "Really, how do you do this? Why would you do this?" And I'm not making light of this in any way. This is real emotional problems that people go through when they're getting a divorce. The focus should be one, do you really want this thing? And hat is driving that want? Okay? If we're going to argue about it, is it worth it? I've had somebody, this is classic, where somebody wanted all the stuff. "That's fine. Take it all. Everything. Everything in the house other than my clothes and my personal stuff, all yours. The furniture, the dishes, all yours. But I'm keeping the house. So you got to move it all out." Well then that tune changed, right? Because you've got practical problems with this stuff. So just really think about what do you want? Do you really need it? Are you going to end up donating it a year from now anyway? Is it going to be something passed down to the kids? Can you make a handshake deal that you're going to give it to the kids?
Pete Wright:
Sure.
Seth Nelson:
There's different things, because none of us are going to take all our possessions to the grave, so how long do you really want to have these things?
Pete Wright:
Yeah.
Seth Nelson:
And at what point do you have things that you're not going to have anymore? Is just not that important. The things you had that when you were 20 and 30, you probably don't have a lot of those things now.
Pete Wright:
Yeah. Yeah. Oh, if only.
Seth Nelson:
Right.
Pete Wright:
This is a little walk down memory lane, if only I had my Pink Floyd vinyl collection and that hookah.
Seth Nelson:
Right? Oh God. You had me with the Pink Floyd, you lost me On the hookah, brother.
Pete Wright:
Well I think this is helpful. If there's any one last thing that you want to make sure you reinforce, let's say, for my friend in Boston who's going through this process and struggling with it, what's that one thing you want them to go forward with? 8:00 AM Monday morning.
Seth Nelson:
Less is more. Be a minimalist. Less is more.
Pete Wright:
That's right.
Seth Nelson:
Get through it. So I hope this was helpful. It's such a touchy thing. If people are listening, I get it when they're like, "Really? You're just making light of this stuff?"
Pete Wright:
Yeah.
Seth Nelson:
And on the back end, when you're moving that wagon wheel coffee table.
Pete Wright:
Yeah. Let me tell you, there's no way we're going to devote time on this podcast to talk about something that's just a joke. It's serious. And we're doing two episodes on it because we're talking about animals next week. I can't wait to do that.
Seth Nelson:
Yeah. Looking forward to it.
Pete Wright:
Seth Nelson, thank you for your time and insights, my friend. May it please the court.
Seth Nelson:
May it please the court. Thanks, brother.
Pete Wright:
And thank you, everybody, for downloading and listening to this show. We appreciate your time and attention. We'll see you next week right here on How to Split a Toaster, a divorce podcast about saving your relationships.
Speaker 3:
Seth Nelson is an attorney with Nelson Koster family law and mediation, with offices in Tampa, Florida. While we may be discussing family law topics, How to Split a Toaster is not intended to nor is it providing legal advice. Every situation is different. If you have specific questions regarding your situation, please seek your own legal counsel with an attorney licensed to practice law in your jurisdiction. Pete Wright is not an attorney or employee of Nelson Koster. Seth Nelson is licensed to practice law in Florida.
This transcript was exported on Jan 18, 2021 - view latest version here.
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