Empty nest divorces happen to parents after their children move out of the house. The parents may have decided to stay together for the children’s benefit, so they wanted a divorce earlier and just decided to postpone it until after becoming empty nesters. In other cases, the parents may not have realized they had major problems with their own relationship until some of the distractions of parenting were removed.
From a child custody perspective, this type of divorce can be easier. It is still going to have an effect on the children emotionally, but parents do not have to worry about things like creating a physical child custody schedule and making exchanges. They do not have to spend time figuring out who has legal custody rights to make medical decisions or financial decisions on the children’s behalf. Their children are adults who have moved out of the home, so the parents can just focus on themselves.
Conflicts still occur
That said, do not assume that an empty nest divorce will be easy or free from conflict. It certainly can still happen.
Often, property division becomes a major issue. Parents who have raised their children have been together for decades. They may jointly own almost everything in their lives, from the family home to their vehicles to their retirement accounts.
Because they have such complicated assets, dividing them may be far harder than it would have been when they were just a young married couple with much less to their name. Also, parents at this age are often approaching retirement, so they have to consider how to retain the assets they need to retire on their predicted schedule. To address all of these complications and more, it helps to work with an experienced divorce attorney.