What Is The Role Of The Financial Specialist in Collaborative Divorce?

Divorce is about many things. It is about lost love and trust. It is about shattered dreams and hopes. It is about children and keeping them safe. Divorce is also about money. That’s right. Money. And, in most divorces as in most marriages that end in divorce, money is a major issue that needs to be approached, processed and settled in order for a re-constituting family to move on healthfully.

In Collaborative Divorce, there is a vital and special role for a neutral professional with specialized financial expertise and training – someone that has come to be known as the Financial Specialist. Simply put, the financial specialist assist the team by conducting a comprehensive assessment of the divorcing couple’s financial affairs including assets that are owned (such as homes, bank accounts, stock, retirement plans, businesses), debts that are owed (such as mortgages, loans, credit cards) and cash flows derived from work and from other sources.

The financial specialist also learns of how the family has managed risk – for example life insurance policies that are in place. The financial specialist comprehensively gains all of the information that would have, in the litigation model, been gathered by two battling attorneys through an expensive and tedious process know as “discovery” - a process during which attorneys would often disagree about what the assets and liabilities actually were.

With a clear and comprehensive picture of a divorcing family’s finances in mind and with a picture of what each parents’ realistic needs are, the financial specialist can help...read more