Florida divorce guide: process, requirements, and laws

You are staring at a decision about the house, the retirement account, and how many nights a week you see your kids, and nobody has given you a straight answer about any of it. Florida has its own words for all of this, and the law changed in ways that make older advice wrong. What you want to know is simple: what will this cost, and how long will it take.

This guide answers both from Florida's own statutes and court forms. Read it start to finish or jump to the part you are stuck on. Every section hands off to a fuller chapter.

How does divorce work in Florida?

Four rules set the shape of it:

• Six months in Florida, and that is the only residency rule. Section 61.021 requires that one of you has resided in Florida for six months before the petition is filed. There is no county waiting period.

• No fault, and mostly no argument. Under section 61.052, the ground is that the marriage is irretrievably broken. The only other option, mental incapacity adjudicated for three years, almost never comes up.

• Equitable distribution starting from equal. Section 61.075 tells the court to set aside each spouse's nonmarital property, then divide the marital property beginning with the premise that the split should be equal, unless the listed factors justify something else.

• Twenty days, not six months. Section 61.19 bars a final judgment until 20 days after the petition is filed, and even that can be shortened if the delay would cause injustice. Florida has one of the shortest waiting periods in the country.

Everything below is the detail.

Step 1: Can you file for divorce in Florida?

How long do you have to live in Florida to file for divorce?

Six months, and only one of you needs it. What surprises people is the proof: you have to actually establish residency at the hearing, with a Florida driver license, voter registration card, or state ID issued at least six months before you filed, or with a corroborating witness who can testify or sign an affidavit.

That last requirement catches people who moved recently, kept an out-of-state license, and assumed nobody would ask.

→ Complete guide: Florida divorce residency requirements and who can file

How long does a divorce take in Florida?

Twenty days is the floor. In practice a simplified dissolution can finish in about a month, an uncontested case with children takes three to six months, and a contested case with a business or a custody dispute runs a year or more.

The parts that actually move your calendar are the 45 day disclosure deadline, the parenting course, mediation, and how long your circuit takes to give you a hearing.

→ Complete guide: Florida divorce timeline and what happens at each stage

Step 2: How do you file for divorce in Florida?

What forms do you need to file for divorce in Florida?

Florida publishes Supreme Court approved forms for every version of this, and picking the right petition is the first real decision. There are separate forms for a case with minor children, one with property but no children, one with neither, and a joint petition for simplified dissolution.

Filing happens in the circuit court in your county, electronically in most cases, with a statutory filing fee and an indigent status application if you cannot pay it.

→ Complete guide: How to file for divorce in Florida, step by step

How do you serve divorce papers in Florida?

Personal service through the sheriff or a certified process server, which starts your spouse's 20 day clock to answer. If you genuinely cannot find them, constructive service by publication is available, and it comes with a serious limit: a court that only has constructive service can grant the divorce but cannot order alimony or child support.

That single sentence decides how much effort is worth spending to find someone.

→ Complete guide: Serving divorce papers in Florida and the answer deadline

Step 3: How is money divided in a Florida divorce?

How is property divided in a Florida divorce?

The court separates nonmarital from marital, then divides the marital half starting from equal. What makes Florida cases hard is that the line between the two categories is not where people expect. Mortgage principal paid from marital income on a house one spouse owned before the marriage creates a marital interest, and so does the appreciation that came from either spouse's effort.

Dissipation matters too, and it reaches back: money one spouse intentionally wasted within two years before filing is on the table.

→ Complete guide: Florida equitable distribution and how marital property is divided

What financial documents do you have to give your spouse in Florida?

A lot of them, on a deadline, whether or not anyone asks. Florida's mandatory disclosure rule requires each party to serve a sworn financial affidavit plus three years of tax returns, six months of pay stubs, 24 months of loan applications and financial statements, and 12 months of statements for every account, all within 45 days of service of the petition.

The affidavit cannot be waived, even by agreement.

→ Complete guide: Florida mandatory financial disclosure and the 45 day deadline

Can you get alimony in Florida?

Yes, and the rules changed in 2023. Permanent alimony is gone. What remains is temporary, bridge-the-gap, rehabilitative, and durational, each with its own cap: two years for bridge-the-gap, five for rehabilitative, and a percentage of the marriage length for durational.

There is also a hard ceiling on amount. Durational alimony is the lesser of the recipient's reasonable need or 35 percent of the difference between the parties' net incomes.

→ Complete guide: Florida alimony types, caps, and duration after the 2023 reform

Step 4: How do time-sharing and child support work in Florida?

Does Florida presume 50/50 custody?

Yes, since 2023. Section 61.13 now says there is a rebuttable presumption that equal time-sharing is in the child's best interests, and a parent who wants something else has to prove it by a preponderance of the evidence.

Florida also does not use the word custody. It uses a parenting plan, shared parental responsibility, and a time-sharing schedule, and each of those is decided separately.

→ Complete guide: Florida parenting plans, time-sharing, and the equal time presumption

How is child support calculated in Florida?

On an income shares model: both parents' net incomes go into the guideline, which produces a combined obligation split between them. A judge can move off the guideline by up to 5 percent without explaining, and further only with written findings.

Overnights matter here in a way they do not in every state. Once a parent has at least 20 percent of the year's overnights, the court has to use the gross-up calculation, which changes the number substantially.

→ Complete guide: Florida child support guidelines and the overnight adjustment

Step 5: Which kind of Florida divorce are you in?

What is a simplified dissolution of marriage in Florida?

The fastest divorce Florida offers, and the narrowest. Both spouses file a joint petition, agree the marriage cannot be saved, have no minor or dependent children together, have already divided everything, and neither one is asking for alimony. You both give up the right to trial and appeal, and you both show up at the hearing.

If any of that is untrue, you file a regular petition instead.

→ Complete guide: Simplified and uncontested divorce in Florida

What happens in a contested divorce in Florida?

Temporary relief hearings, discovery beyond the mandatory disclosure, experts, and a bench trial. Florida has no jury in a dissolution case, so a judge decides everything, and that judge has to make written findings on the property division and the time-sharing schedule.

Those written findings are worth understanding early, because they are what an appeal is built on.

→ Complete guide: Contested divorce in Florida, from temporary relief to trial

Is mediation required for divorce in Florida?

Most circuits require it before a final hearing on contested issues, and section 61.183 lets the court refer parental responsibility, residence, access, and support disputes to mediation. An agreement reached there becomes a consent order the court can enforce like any other order.

→ Complete guide: Florida divorce mediation and settlement agreements

What changes in a high-asset Florida divorce?

Once there is a business, equity compensation, or a nonmarital estate that got mixed with marital money, the case becomes an argument about classification and valuation. Florida writes a fair market value standard for closely held businesses into the statute, and it writes a coverture formula for real property that was paid down with marital funds.

Both of those turn on documents rather than on testimony.

→ Complete guide: High-asset divorce in Florida: business value and tracing

Where should you start with a Florida divorce?

If you are still deciding:

1. Confirm you meet the six month residency rule and can prove it

2. Read the timeline so the 45 day disclosure deadline does not arrive as a surprise

3. Understand how the property rules classify what you own before you agree to any split

If your case is already filed:

• Start assembling your mandatory disclosure now, because 45 days is shorter than it sounds

• If you have children, read the time-sharing rules and the support guideline together, since overnights change the money

• Know what alimony you can actually ask for under the current statute before you trade it away

Florida moves faster than most states and gives judges a structured framework rather than open discretion. The people who do well are the ones who take the disclosure seriously and show up to mediation knowing what everything is worth.