For most people entering into a family law dispute, they have two priorities: protect their best interests; and do so as cost-effectively as possible. Who wants to spend more money than necessary, after all?
If this is one of your top concerns with your family law case, then you should be thinking about how you can conclude it using mediation, rather than litigation. In almost all circumstances, mediation will be less expensive than litigation, also known as taking your case to court before a family law judge to make a ruling. How is it that mediation can be so consistently less expensive than litigation, though? The answer lies in how mediation works itself.
Reasons why family law mediation is less expensive than litigation:
- Quicker resolution: Mediation is typically most beneficial when there is only a small number of disputes to solve between the two parties. With less disputes to sort, there is a lesser need for the time of a professional working on the case, such as a family lawyer. Naturally, requiring less of a professional’s services will drop the overall cost of a case.
- Easier corrections: In mediation, you can include a clause or “legal mechanism” that instructs all parties to reconvene for any future disputes. With this mechanism in place, you can re-meet with the same mediator who already knows the case. In turn, this will lessen how much of that professional’s time is required, which lowers total costs.
- Fewer professionals: Speaking of requiring the help of experts and professionals for your family law case, mediation requires you and the other party to work together to some extent. By collaborating on problems, you can solve them on your own, with neutral input from the mediator. You will need to hire less experts, which, again, keeps costs down.
- Lowered anger: With the nature of mediation being cooperation, the feelings of anger and betrayal that can spark up often in litigation are quashed. Many couples who divorce through mediation do not fight at all during the process, which helps them stay in an amicable relationship for the benefit of their children later on. Less fights also means mediation can develop without delays, reducing the time it takes to conclude a case. Once more, less time means lowered costs.
If you want to know if mediation is right for your divorce in West Lake Village, give Richard Ross Associates a call at 805.410.3407 to arrange a consultation with one of our mediators or family lawyers.