Providing Divorce Mediation Services Throughout California
Providing Divorce Mediation Services Throughout California
If you are a high net worth individual in California or have complex or complicated assets, divorce can be especially tricky. Divorce costs can escalate very quickly when parties have considerable asset sizes or complicated cash flow.
However, your divorce doesn’t need to be riddled with excessive attorney fee bills and endless legal battles. Instead, stay in control of your divorce and work with your spouse in a confidential and efficient divorce space using California’s high-asset divorce mediation.
Our high net worth divorce mediators understands the nuances and care needed to handle complex assets like employee stock benefits and plans (RSUs, ESPP), private equity (SARS, stock options), family and corporate business valuation, international investments and intellectual property.
Divorce Mediation is a private, efficient and economic divorce process for high net worth individuals that protects their privacy and avoids expensive litigation. It has a myriad of empirically proven benefits.
Divorce litigation impacts business owners and brings unwanted scrutiny into financial records, tax documents, and cash flow.
A litigated divorce costs tens of thousands and takes years. A mediated divorce takes 3–4 months for a fraction of the cost.
Traditional divorce agreements are difficult to maintain over time. Mediation empowers couples which leads to more compliant agreements.
Court documents are public records. Family law mediation keeps negotiations private and protects your reputation, business interests and family from public scrutiny.
The adversarial court systems are hostile by nature – plaguing parties missing high-quality agreements and ancillary benefits like tax reduction.
Litigation is inherently combative and stressful, putting more conflict in the cases. This leads to overwhelming emotional stress throughout the process
Californians who want privacy, sophistication, and timely solutions for their challenging financial divorces benefit from high-quality divorce mediation.
If you’re a celebrity and public figure, you need the utmost confidentiality to protect your public image and brand. Mediation provides privacy of your sensitive financial and personal matters and keeps them out of the public court record, which litigation does not.
Taking care of your business is the first priority. For entrepreneurs and business owners, we develop unique solutions to value and divide their business interests or equity for the divorce, while keeping the business operating, which litigation might jeopardize.
High-earning professionals in California need tax-smart, fast solutions for complicated income scenarios, including equity payments like RSUs and on target performance bonuses. Mediation provides the solutions for these circumstances without the lengthy and expensive process in court.
Silicon valley affluent and billionaire couples can use mediation to take care about their privacy, costs, and keeping their families intact. Our personalized divorce mediation is designed to provide dignified solutions while protecting their complex estate and children.
For those with inheritances, international assets, or in a gray divorce, our expertise ensures your high-value, complex portfolio is divided with the nuance court cannot provide. Family courts often ignore spousal death benefits, estate planning and payment of higher learnings for children and health insurance for adult children.
Our systematic yet flexible mediation process is expressly designed to get through complex high-net-worth divorces efficiently while ensuring you keep your personal information private and reach a favorable settlement that protects your financial future.
You start off with an initial meeting to discuss your goals and situation. We guide you through a transparent negotiation of all financial information.
Our mediators help you focus on collaborative negotiation of asset division, support negotiations, and parenting plans.
We convert the fully negotiated and mutually agreed-upon terms into a legally valid Marital Settlement Agreement to prevent any confusion in the future.
We provide the completed forms for you to file with the court. This is the final step in the divorce mediation process and officially makes you divorced.
We have helped hundreds of affluent couples from the Bay Area, Orange County, and Los Angeles California navigate complex divorces and privately reach a mutually beneficial solution without details reaching the public.
We offer the subtlety, confidentiality, and creativity that litigation lacks. You can create customized solutions that go far beyond what a judge has to give you – particularly relevant when divvying up unique assets and tax considerations.
We navigate California’s community property laws to accurately classify and divide high-value, mixed assets. Our mediators utilize accurate valuations and help prepare creative and tax-efficient distributions for separate and community property, real estate holdings, national and foreign assets, retirement accounts (401(k), IRAs, pensions), debt allocation, etc.
We determine support based on your income and cash flow. You can enter into negotiations about spousal support and child custody that takes into account complex compensation packages and upholds family standards, while also putting the children’s best interests at the forefront.
We can help you understand the validity and enforceability of any agreements that exist. Our mediators will facilitate discussions about the contracts’ implications on the current division of assets, so there is a fair and equitable interpretation.
At Families First Mediation, we are a dedicated team of four professionals with over 60 years of combined experience in family law. Our collaborative group includes skilled attorney mediators, a case manager, and a divorce paralegal. We also work directly with financial experts and forensic accountants. We’re committed to providing compassionate and effective divorce mediation services throughout California.
Principal & Founder Attorney-Mediator
Dina Haddad is the founder and principal of Families First Mediation, one of California’s top-rated mediation services.
As an attorney-mediator based in California, Dina has helped countless couples resolve issues related to divorce, legal separation, child custody, spousal support, and prenuptial and postnuptial agreements—amicably and effectively.
She earned her post-doctorate law degree in mediation from the renowned Straus Institute for Dispute Resolution.
Dina has practiced family law at some of the most respected firms in both Southern and Northern California. She brings a strong legal background together with a thoughtful, educational approach to mediation—ensuring both parties feel informed, heard, and empowered to reach lasting agreements.
She has served as Judge Pro Tempore for Personal Property Arbitration in Santa Clara County and is a family law mediator with the Agency for Dispute Resolution (ADR), a premier provider of private dispute resolution services.
A divorce with large and complicated assets such as businesses, investments, pension plans, and stock options. Mediation is the most effective approach to handle these complicated cases privately and quickly.
A 401 (k) can only be divided using a Qualified Domestic Relations Order (QDRO); a legal order that divides the account between the parties without tax penalties as long as the account is divided according to your settlement.
Typically, valid inheritances and gifts made to one spouse are separate property. If one spouse deposits a valid inheritance into a joint checking account, the inheritance can become divisible property.
You do not lose half your net work automatically in a California divorce. Although California law provides that community property is divided equally between the spouses, spouses can agree to a different division and the court will approve that agreement.
Yes, cash, savings, and checking accounts are a marital asset if it was received during the marriage; and it would be divided like any other property.
In litigated high-net-worth divorce cases, the legal fees for both spouses can be upwards of $75,000 per person, depending on if the parties disagree about the assets, expert fees, discovery costs, and other factors. Learn more about the cost of divorce.
If the retirement funds were contributed during the marriage, the non-employee spouse is entitled to one-half of those funds. If the non-employee spouse wants those community 401(k) funds equalized, the non-employee spouse has the right to their portion. e. .
Typically, accounts that consist of valid separate property, such as an individual spouse’s inherited money left solely in his or her name, will not be affected by a divorce.
