Knowing what you have, and what you have to work with, is the first step. You may not have every answer before mediation, because some information comes from your spouse. But we need a full accounting, so the agreement is fair and thorough and so you can see the options clearly.
In Canada the law requires disclosure of financial information, to promote transparency and fairness. With it, both of you understand the financial situation and can make informed decisions about child support, spousal support and property division.
You really want to include everything, even a little bank account with a balance of thirty cents, because it makes clear what you separated and what you did not. An account or item not mentioned in your agreement stays on the table for division in future, including all the growth between now and then.
The best reason to include every detail, though, is that it lets you both make decisions and use your time well. Where the information is sketchy, people cannot assess proposals, cannot weigh what a compromise is worth, and cannot commit to an outcome, because too many questions are still open.
Part of using your time well in mediation is having all the information you need to review options, assess proposals, and agree how to deal with it all going forward.
The link is in the email I sent you. It walks you through what you own and owe, and it generates a document list built from your answers rather than a generic one.
Your private shared folder. Upload as you gather, rather than saving it all for the night before. If the form is missing information, we spend mediation time filling it in.
A pension marriage-breakdown statement, a business valuation or a house appraisal takes weeks, not days. Everything else waits on them, so these go first.
Our financial disclosure checklist sets out every document, grouped by what you own, with how to establish a value for each. Most people need five or six of the ten groups.
It works on screen and prints if you would rather tick things off on paper.
A bank statement tells you what an account holds. For a house, a pension, a business or a vehicle, you usually need some outside verification, and some of it takes weeks.
If the two of you agree on a value, we use it. Valuations are only for the things you do not agree on, or are unsure about. That one point saves more money than anything else in this process.
Nor do you always need one. You do not need a pension valued if you are dividing it, only if you want to keep it and buy your spouse out. You do not need the house appraised if you are selling it.
A free thirty-minute consultation costs nothing and commits you to nothing. Or take the two-minute quiz and get a roadmap written around your answers.
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