Why Does Divorce Take So Long in California? 3 Common Reasons
Featuring
Tim Miranda, CFLS
What to expect
Why can a divorce in California take so long?
In this clip, a California family law attorney breaks down three factors that can contribute to delays in Family Court: court scheduling, continuances, and limited court resources.
Court calendars have limited available hours and must accommodate many different matters. Cases may also be continued when there is good cause or when proceedings simply cannot be completed as scheduled.
And according to the attorney, one of the biggest challenges is resources—the Family Court system must handle a substantial caseload, including matters such as domestic violence restraining orders, with limited judges, departments, staff, and other resources.
So when your divorce seems to be moving slowly, the delay may involve broader court-system constraints rather than simply one person holding up the case.
This content is for general educational purposes only and is not legal advice. Court procedures, timelines, and circumstances vary by case and jurisdiction.
Transcript
"The top three reasons why divorces in California take so long.
"Number three is the schedule. It's the court schedule, meaning it follows holidays, which are federal and state, and there's a lot of them. Also, the schedule, the court opens up to the public at 8:30 and it closes at 4:30. That means that you have theoretically 8 hours, but you really don't because there's two 15-minute breaks, one in the morning, one in the afternoon, and an hour and a half lunch period. That leaves a total of six net hours assuming that the calendar is not also impacted by ex parte hearings and other things. It's not the court's fault, meaning it's not the judge's fault, but it's the way that it works because there are union employees.
The number two reason would be continuances. Continuances are frequent and they are a necessary evil, in my opinion. I oppose them all the time. Rarely am I successful. The standard is good cause. That just means whatever the judge thinks is good cause to continue. Oftentimes, they have no choice because of the schedule, because of the other constraints, things just don't get done on time. You can't finish and you have to continue to another day.
The number one reason is the budget. The California Superior Court Family Court Division has a very limited budget, nowhere near the amount of money that is required for the current case load, the new filings. And remember, the filings include and the cases include domestic violence restraining orders. There's an awful lot there. They don't have enough departments. They don't have enough judges to staff the departments. They don't have enough staff to make things go faster and easier, like research attorneys."
