Vancouver collaborative high net worth divorce lawyers at MacLean Law help lower the temperature in Vancouver high net worth divorce and separation cases. Audra Bayer heads our Vancouver collaborative high net worth divorce lawyers. Call our Vancouver collaborative high net worth divorce lawyers at 1-877-602-9900 to get the process started.
Vancouver Collaborative High Net Worth Divorce Lawyers
As a professional, business owner, entrepreneur, executive, politician, sports figure, or otherwise high profile individual in Vancouver, and even more importantly as a parent of your children you have an incentive to settle your divorce and separation promptly, discretely and fairly. Hiring Audra Bayer of our award winning Vancouver collaborative high net worth divorce lawyers would be a wise move for any high net worth individual going through separation.
Vancouver collaborative high net worth divorce is a private form of dispute resolution where you and your spouse each have your own skilled lawyers to provide you with advice. The Vancouver collaborative high net worth divorce lawyers at MacLean Law have specialized training to focus solely on helping with spouses reaching an out-of-court agreement. This means that no time, energy, or money is spent by Vancouver collaborative high net worth divorce in potentially damaging and embarrassing trial tactics such as filing of explosive affidavits, fishing expeditions for documents, discoveries and lengthy trial appearances. Our Vancouver collaborative high net worth divorce lawyers are focused on helping you reach an agreement and move on with your lives, pure and simple.
Moving Forward With Vancouver Collaborative High Net Worth Divorce Lawyers
Vancouver collaborative high net worth divorce lawyers focus on:
- Reducing the emotional impact for spouses and children from the breakup
- Getting input from financial professionals to ensure a mutually beneficial sharing of tax costs and strategies to save both sides tax and expenses
- Keeping things private so businesses, practices, and ventures are not damaged and your relationships with bankers, investors, partners remain strong and unimpaired
- Helping you successfully move forward with your post separation life free of bitterness and recrimination that block you and your child from future success
- helping you focus on your career, business and children
Vancouver collaborative high net worth divorce lawyers handle the most complex high net worth cases involving high incomes and significant family property holdings including businesses, professional practices, real estate development ventures, multi-million dollar stocks, patents, real estate holdings, art collections and other personal property.
Vancouver Collaborative High Net Worth Divorce Explain Collaborative Law:
A recent case of DA v LA, 2013 NBQB 258 (CanLII) involving compelling financial disclosure after a collaborative divorce process was unsuccessful in resolving matters provides a nice explanation of what Vancouver collaborative high net worth divorce lawyers do to help their separated clients:
[10] Because Mr. and Mrs. A. were well-known in the local business community and wished to keep private and discreet their marital challenges and their discussions around a marriage contract, they decided to retain counsel outside the Moncton area. They were also encouraged to pursue negotiations of a marriage contract through the Collaborative Law process.
[27] In Landau, Wolfson and Landau, Family Mediation Arbitration and Collaborative Practice Handbook, 5th ed. (LexisNexis Canada Inc., 2009) the authors describe the Collaborative Family Law process at page 18:
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What is Collaborative Family Law?
Collaborative Family Law (‘CFL‘) is an exciting development in Family Law that has spread to Ontario via the United States and the Western province. Both clients select collaboratively trained lawyers who blend the communication skills of mediators with the problem-solving skills of lawyers.
CFL represents a paradigm shift from the traditional role of a lawyer. Fundamentally, a collaborative lawyer uses his or her skills to model and teach clients how to be more effective negotiators. Collaborative lawyers act as legal advisors and process facilitators, rather than decision-makers.
The key to CFL is that everyone agrees that they will not litigate and if one client decides to litigate, contrary to this agreement, both lawyers must withdraw.
[28] In cases where the collaborative process is engaged, the procedure requires that the parties and their counsel sign a participation agreement or contract. In this case the Collaborative Law contract signed by the parties and by solicitors Noble and O’Brien contained provisions in respect of the goals of the process, as well as the duties of the parties and their counsel. Specifically paragraphs 2 and 8 read as follows:
2 We Will Not Go To Court
2.1 We commit ourselves to settling this case without going to court.
2.2 We agree to give complete, honest and open disclosure of all information, whether requested or not. Any request for information will be made informally. L.A. & D.A. will provide this information immediately.
2.3 We agree to engage in informal discussions and conferences to settle all issues.
8 We will Negotiate in Good Faith
8.1 We acknowledge that each lawyer represents only one client in this Process.
8.2 We understand that this Process will involve vigorous good faith negotiation, even with full and honest disclosure of information.
8.3 Each of us will be expected to take a moderate approach in all differences. Where what is important to L.A. & D.A. is different, each of us will use our best efforts to create proposals that are acceptable to L.A.& D.A. If necessary, we will compromise to reach a settlement of all problems.
8.4 None of us will use threats of litigation as a way to force settlement, although each of us may discuss the likely outcome of going to court.
Vancouver Collaborative High Net Worth Divorce Lawyers Financial Disclosure
When Vancouver collaborative high net worth divorce lawyers cannot reach a settlement new lawyers represent the parties and the matter can proceed to court. Even then, an out of court settlement can be reached. The key for Vancouver collaborative high net worth divorce lawyers is to ensure full financial disclosure is made because without it no fair settlement can be reached ion financial matters. In the recent case of DA v. LA disclosure documents produced by Vancouver collaborative high net worth divorce lawyers were ordered to be poroduced by the collaborative lawyers despite claims of privilege.
[46] Specifically, under Rules 72 (Divorce Petition with or without a joinder for relief under the Marital Property Act), Rule 73 (Family Division Proceedings including claims under the Family Services Act) and Rule 74 (Marital Property Act applications), the parties are obligated to produce a Financial Statement (Form 72J) or a Statement of Property and Debts (Form 74A), a Statement of Contribution to Property (Form 74B) where required, and income information pursuant to the Federal Child Support Guidelines. The extent of disclosure under the Guidelines is of itself very broad depending upon a party’s sources of income and/or the nature of any business or corporate holdings.
[47] Parties are also obligated to produce, upon request, all documents in support of the values stated in their financial documents. Failure to do so may result in costs being awarded against an unwilling party. The obligation to produce all relevant financial documents in the course of marital disputes in particular has been recognized by our Court of Appeal in O’Brien v O’Brien 2007 NBCA 22 (CanLII), [2007] N.B.J. No. 114….
We know separating and divorcing is confusing and emotions run high. We can help you explore a new way to move forward collaboratively. Call Audra today at 1-877-602-9900.
What If Vancouver Collaborative High Net Worth Divorce Lawyers Can’t Get A Deal Done?
If you have tried collaborative family law and it didn’t work then do not hesitate to call Lorne N. MacLean, QC at 1-877-602-9900 to help settle your case through the traditional court methods.
Mr. MacLean’s reputation as a hard hitting litigator works wonders in helping difficult cases settle.
