What to Expect in Your First 90 Days After Filing for Divorce in California

You filed the papers. You did the thing you’d been turning over in your mind for months, maybe longer. And now you’re sitting with this strange feeling that nothing is happening.

No judge showed up. No resolution arrived. Your spouse may not have even responded yet. Life looks mostly the same from the outside, and yet everything has changed.

This is the part nobody warns you about. The first 90 days after filing for divorce in California are quieter than people expect, and more consequential than most people realize. Deadlines are running. Positions are forming. The process has started, even when it doesn’t feel that way.

California Won’t Let You Rush This

California has a mandatory six-month waiting period. Under Family Code §2339, a court cannot finalize a divorce until six months have passed from the date your spouse was served with the petition. Not from when you filed. From when they were served.

That applies even when both of you agree on everything: the house, the kids, the finances. The law treats six months as a floor, not a finish line. Most cases take longer, sometimes significantly.

That time is not idle, though. What happens in the first 90 days tends to define the shape of everything that follows.

The Moment You File, Two Things Happen

When you file a Petition for Dissolution of Marriage with the Santa Clara County Superior Court, the court date-stamps your filing and assigns a case number. That date matters more than most people realize at the time. It becomes a reference point for certain property and debt questions that come up later.

More immediately, Automatic Temporary Restraining Orders go into effect. Everyone calls them ATROs. They apply to you the moment you file, and to your spouse once they’re served. Neither of you can move money out of accounts, sell or transfer assets, take the children out of California without consent, or cancel the other’s health insurance. These aren’t suggestions. Violating an ATRO damages your credibility with the court in ways that are hard to walk back.

Service Matters More Than People Think

You cannot hand the papers to your spouse yourself. California requires a neutral third party to do it: a professional process server, a sheriff’s deputy, or another adult who has no stake in the case. Once it’s done, a Proof of Service gets filed with the court, and that document is what starts the six-month clock.

When a spouse is cooperative, service is usually quick and forgettable. When they’re not, it can become the first real source of delay in the case. California does allow service by publication if someone genuinely cannot be located, but that path requires court approval and takes time you probably don’t want to spend.

Every week service gets delayed is a week tacked onto the end of your case. It’s worth treating it as a priority from the start.

What Happens After Your Spouse Is Served

Your spouse has 30 days to file a Response. What they do with that window tells you a lot about how the case is likely to unfold.

If they respond, they’re in the case. Property, support, custody: anything unresolved will be negotiated or litigated. If they don’t respond, a default judgment may eventually be entered, but California courts still require full financial disclosure and judicial review before granting one. A non-response is not the same as agreement, and it is not a shortcut.

If they agree to everything up front, that’s genuinely the smoothest path. There’s still work to do: the settlement agreement must be carefully drafted, reviewed, signed, and submitted to the court. But cases where both people come in willing to be reasonable tend to move more cleanly through the system. The six-month clock still runs either way.

The Financial Disclosures Nobody Wants to Do

Within 60 days of filing, both spouses must exchange preliminary financial disclosures. A Schedule of Assets and Debts, an Income and Expense Declaration, and a Declaration of Disclosure confirming the exchange. It’s a requirement, not a suggestion.

I understand why people resist this part. Going through every account, every debt, every asset, while you’re already emotionally exhausted, feels like a lot. But these disclosures are the foundation on which the rest of the case gets built. How property gets divided, how support gets calculated, what a fair resolution actually looks like: it all traces back to this paperwork.

California courts take non-disclosure seriously. Under Family Code §2107, a judge has the authority to award an undisclosed asset entirely to the other spouse. That has happened. Attorneys’ fees and sanctions are also available remedies. There is no way to hide assets that ends well in a California divorce.

Start pulling your records together early. Bank statements, tax returns, retirement account summaries, pay stubs, mortgage documents, and debt records. Two to three years back is a reasonable starting point. The more organized you are going in, the less painful this part becomes.

Life Doesn’t Have to Be on Hold While the Case Moves

One thing people often don’t know early enough: you do not have to wait for a final judgment to have some structure and stability in your daily life. The court can issue temporary orders at any point during the case.

Temporary orders can address where the children live and on what schedule, interim child support or spousal support, who stays in the family home during the proceedings, and access to financial accounts. They’re not permanent, but they carry real legal weight while the case is pending.

If there’s active conflict over custody, real financial pressure, or any safety concern, a Request for Order hearing is often the right move early in the case. In situations involving a child’s immediate welfare, emergency protective orders can be obtained within 24 hours. You don’t have to wait and see how things shake out.

What You Should Be Doing During These First Three Months

The legal steps are only part of it. How you conduct yourself during this period matters just as much.

Document your finances now, even if it feels premature. Gather statements, account records, and anything related to property you believe is yours separately. If you brought assets into the marriage or received them as a gift or inheritance, start building that paper trail. Separate property claims depend on documentation, and documentation gets harder to reconstruct later.

Communicate in writing whenever possible, especially about the children. Texts and emails create a record. Conversations in the driveway do not. This is not about being adversarial. It’s about having clarity if things get disputed.

Do not make significant financial moves without talking to your attorney first. Moving money, closing accounts, making large purchases: all of it gets scrutinized, and ATROs make some of it outright prohibited. The same goes for social media. People say things online in the heat of the moment that show up in court filings. It happens more often than you’d think.

If you have children, do what you can to keep their routine intact. I know that’s not always easy when your own life feels like it’s been upended. But courts look at which parent is keeping things steady for the kids, and which parent is pulling them into the conflict. That observation shapes custody decisions.

Where Things Go After 90 Days

Once the early filings are done and disclosures exchanged, most cases move toward one of two outcomes: negotiated settlement or litigation. Which one depends largely on how much both people can agree on and how honest each is willing to be about the finances.

Most divorces in Santa Clara County do settle before trial. Mediation is a common way to work through property division, support, and custody outside a courtroom. Even in contentious cases, settlement talks tend to continue well into the litigation process. Going to trial is always an option, but it’s rarely the only one.

The groundwork you lay in these first three months shapes all of that. The records you gathered, the disclosures you completed honestly, the choices you made under stress: those things follow you through the rest of the case. They matter.

If You’re Not Sure Where to Begin

Most people who call my office don’t have a clear picture of what comes next. They’re not supposed to. Divorce is not something most people have experienced, and the process is more complex than it looks from the outside. That’s what I’m here for.

If you’ve recently filed or are weighing whether to, I’m glad to talk through where you are and what the path forward looks like for your specific situation. The Law Office of James Chau serves individuals and families throughout San Jose and Santa Clara County.

Phone: 408-899-8364

Address: 2114 Senter Road, Suite 5, San Jose, CA 95112

Contact Form: https://www.jameschaulaw.com/contact