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COMMUNITY RESOURCE GUIDE
By David Valone
Controlling Costs Through Collaborative Divorce
By resolving conflict through cooperation, collaborative divorce avoids expenses associated with court.
In previous issues of Cityview, I have written about how financially devastating divorce
can be and the consequent need
to minimize its costs by prudent planning and separating contentious personal issues from the necessary legal dissolution. Three years ago, for example, the estimate for an average divorce was $15,000 if no children were involved—and $53,000 for divorces involving child custody. Today, the
estimatesareapproximatelythesame— although Divorce360, a support service providing help and advice to those contemplating divorce, uses Census figures and other research to estimate that a high-end divorce for couples with significant assets can reach $188,000— and, in some cases, even more.
I have written about and continue to advise minimizing emotional conflict; getting an accurate financial picture with detailed income, expenses, assets, and lia-
bilities;usingmediation;andcomingtoa custodial agreement together rather than having to litigate it. I also believe that those contemplating divorce should hire the best rather than the least-expensive lawyer. Divorce, however, is expensive, and a fairly recent-to-Tennessee innova- tion—with the aim of reducing divorce’s cost—is collaborative divorce.
The main goal of collaborative divorce is to avoid court and thereby minimize the expense and disruption that court
198 CITYVIEWMAG.COM JULY AUGUST 2015