Sometimes Even the Best Ideas Can Come With Some Negatives

Video Transcribed:  So that nesting agreement in Oklahoma sounds like a great idea, right? Well, be careful. Sometimes even the best ideas can come with some pitfalls. And that’s what we’re going to talk about today. My name is Brian L. Jackson. I’m a father’s rights attorney in Tulsa. And today, we’re going to talk about the pitfalls of nesting agreements. I’m going to start with some obvious things that are things you want to be aware of.

One potential problem right out of the chute with the nesting agreement is if you and the ex do not get along well, there is a great opportunity for conflict while you’re exchanging possession of the marital home with the kids.

And because it’s a private location and not somewhere nice and public, if something happens, you and she may be the only witnesses, which means it’s your word against hers. So if you have a situation where either there is a high degree of conflict, or particularly if there are allegations of any kind of domestic violence that have been thrown around, the nesting agreement is probably not for you and you should avoid that.

Another situation that would be a potential problem is if you, or she, or the both of you were dating, then it needs to be understood that the SO doesn’t come to the marital home, period. That is going to be a source of conflict, I can guarantee you that.

She’s not going to like that you’re out dating, even if you and she are done with each other. I’m going to tell you right now, she’s not going to like it because she’s going to feel replaced. And if you bring that person around the kids to play house, she’s really going to feel replaced.

Nobody likes being Brady Bunched. I don’t know if that’s a word in Urban Dictionary yet or not, but if it isn’t, it should be. Brady bunched, defined as you get to cut out of the picture so that you can go create a new conglomerate family with some other person. So nobody likes that. Don’t create the periods of trying to do that by bringing you SO there.

Some other things to be aware of. If she’s going to take possession of the property part of the time, I would suggest don’t leave your shit there if it’s sensitive.

I would probably say don’t leave anything valuable there either because even if she is generally well behaved and honest, you guys are getting divorced and that probably means trust is going out the window. So assume she’ll do something sneaky, slimy, or underhanded just for your own protection, even if you’re pretty sure she won’t.

I’m not saying that every female is sneaky, slimy, and underhanded. Please don’t hear that. What I am saying is when you know you’re going to divorce and you know the relationship is over, then you can assume trust is over.

And even if it’s a one in a thousand chance that that person will do something shitty, understand that you don’t want to give them the opportunity to really screw you by leaving something around that you shouldn’t.

So the best safety precaution in that scenario is don’t leave your shit at the house. If you have to leave something there, like a computer, say, it’s a desktop, then my suggestion is whatever you have if you have anything. Well, don’t store anything sensitive there.

If you need to deal with anything sensitive, then it should be saved somewhere offsite and where it’s secured, where she can’t get into it. Make sure you do things like purge your browser cache, don’t save files locally for God’s sake.

If you absolutely have to save a file locally, it should be encrypted. But I would propose to you that you don’t want to save that shit locally, period. Because even the best encryption, you can think of it in the same context as a safe.

The point of security measures like that is to make it harder to get its stuff. It never makes it impossible. You make it harder. And then you hope you make it hard enough that anybody who might be interested in it isn’t going to be interested enough that they will take the trouble to breach that security.

So the bottom line is if it’s something sensitive, don’t have it at the marital home. The last thing I would say is a potential problem with the nesting agreement, and again, this goes to issues between you and the ex, is if she is not messing with her stuff, if she leaves something there, don’t mess with her shit. Seriously.

The only exception I would say to that is if you ever find something illegal there, drugs, that kind of thing. If you find something illegal, I think you probably want to make sure you don’t yourself get in trouble for that. So then you either need to dispose of it or report it appropriately.

I would suggest if you ever find yourself in that situation, talk to your lawyer. And with that statement in mind, if you do have some questions about any potential traps with a nesting agreement, you should go to Dad.Law.