Spousal Support Mediation

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Spousal support in California (also known as alimony) is an important part of a divorce involving serious financial decision making. When spousal support is required to be paid, it will almost always be the obligation of the higher earning spouse for a specific time period. Judges in California will weigh 14 unique factors while determining the spousal support award, but there is no set formula to calculate the amount. Clearly, the spousal support issue can often turn contentious, and neither the payer nor the recipient may feel satisfied with the court’s calculation of the alimony amount. For this reason, many divorcing couples prefer to seek the spousal support mediation services to achieve more effective and mutually agreeable outcomes.

How Our Spousal Support Mediators can Help You

At Lerner Conflict Resolution Center, we believe that instead of making spousal support a contentious issue, it should be seen as a fair and deserving award in specific cases where alimony is involved. In the pursuit of this ideal goal, our spousal support mediators in California will work hard to facilitate an open-minded negotiation between the divorcing spouses in an environment of mutual respect and cooperation. Our mediators will:

  • Help the payer spouse perceive alimony not as a burden, but as a fair share of their divorce obligations

  • Help the two parties to explore creative solutions for spousal support payments, such as:

    • Lump sum payment

    • Payment in installments that reduce with time

    • Paying certain monthly bills or debt obligations of the recipient

    • Making the amount or duration of alimony conditional to specific future events

  • Help the recipient spouse perceive alimony as a support to maintain lifestyle, and not as a means of pursuing financial retribution

  • Help the potential recipient see the hard facts when no spousal support needs to be paid

  • Help both parties consider the tax implications of spousal support (the payer can get tax deduction, while the recipient will have to pay taxes on it in California)

  • Help the payer feel more agreeable to the spousal support amount by making it non-modifiable and non-extendable in future

As long as the spousal support agreement reached through mediation is in compliance with the state law, the family courts in California will rarely question it. This makes mediation one of the simplest and most effective ways to arrive at a resolution for spousal support matters.

Our Divorce Mediators are Ready to Help You Find a Fair Resolution

Our mediators at Lerner Conflict Resolution Center will encourage you and your ex-spouse to overcome strong negativity, and focus on finding a practical solution to the alimony issue that fits the interests and real-world needs of both.

Mediation can Take the Tension out of Spousal Support Negotiations

At Lerner Conflict Resolution Center, our experienced spousal support mediators will facilitate the negotiation process and help remove elements that could be potential landmines for negativity and disputes. We will enable both sides to consider factors such as:
(a) their respective current incomes, (b) the economic and non-economic contributions they made to the marriage, (c) the lifestyle they maintain during marriage and the financial ability of each to maintain it post-divorce and (d) the sacrifice in terms of loss of professional opportunities that one spouse may have made during marriage.