The benefits of mediation in family law property matters are that it gives you greater control over the outcome of your family law property matters rather than leaving it in the hands of a Judge at the Federal Circuit and Family Court of Australia.

Another benefit is that resolving your matter at mediation can reduce the legal costs of your matter as you can avoid lengthy litigation of which the costs can be exponential. Bainbridge Legal will discuss with you issues such as costs throughout your matter to assist you in making the most financially beneficial decision for you.

Furthermore, mediation is generally a quicker process than progressing your matter through litigation in the Federal Circuit and Family Court of Australia. It can take years to progress your matter to final hearing at the Federal Circuit and Family Court of Australia. Whereas a mediation can be participated in much more quickly than that.

Mediators are impartial participants in the mediation. The role they have is to assist parties to communicate and resolve their issues. They are not to advocate for one party or the other. There are a number of mediators throughout Australia that are able to conduct family law property mediations. Mediators in family law property matters are specifically trained for the role and have had hours of practice at conducting mediations. These mediators can be private mediators or mediators that work for organisations. Choosing a mediator can be confronting. Often parties jointly select a mediator to conduct their mediation. Bainbridge Legal is able to assist you in choosing a mediator.

Mediations can be run in a number of different formats, depending on the requirements of the participants. The general idea is to provide parties with the best environment to resolve the matters in dispute. The parties will be able to request how the mediation process should proceed, and there are several options. For example, the mediation might be run in person as a face-to-face mediation. This is often the most effective and efficient way to mediate, but it may not be suitable where the parties have heightened emotions that they may have difficulty controlling (as is sometimes the case in recent family law separations). Alternatively, mediation can take place via "shuttle", which involves each party staying in a separate room and the mediator shuttles back and forth between the parties. Mediation can also be run remotely via electronic means such as Zoom or Microsoft Teams. This can be a preferred option if a party holds safety concerns.

Mediations are confidential so that what is discussed at the mediation is not to be discussed outside of the mediation. This ensures that parties can speak freely at the mediation without fear of repercussions.

Generally, parties will have a meeting with the mediator prior to the mediation to discuss the matter in brief with the mediator. These meetings are referred to as an “intake”. Usually each party, with their legal representative, will participate in these intakes without the other party and their legal representative being present. This gives each party the chance to talk freely and discuss the issues and matters they consider to be relevant to mediation. These intakes are usually around 30 minutes in duration.

Mediations to resolve your family law property matters can be participated in at any time. For example, they can be participated in before your divorce, after your divorce (noting there is a 12 month limitation period for property matters following divorce), during court proceedings or before court proceedings. Often where a matter proceeds to litigation in the Federal Circuit and Family Court of Australia the court will order the parties to attend a mediation. This provides the parties with an opportunity to resolve their family law property matter without need for further intervention of the court.

At Bainbridge Legal, we recognise that many of the issues at family law property mediations do not only reflect legal or factual issues but emotional issues and matters relating to your relationship itself. We are experienced at representing clients at family law property mediations and dealing with all of the issues that arise.

There is a significant amount of preparation to be completed prior to a family law property mediation to give it the greatest chance of success. These preparations include ensuring disclosure has been completed. Disclosure involves the parties exchanging their financial material such as bank statements, tax returns, assessments and more. This helps parties to ensure that they are satisfied that the property division arrangement they may come to at the mediation is an appropriate one. Bainbridge Legal is able to help you in exchanging your disclosure material and analysing that material.

In some matters valuations need to be obtained before the mediation to ensure that the parties are satisfied as to the value of relevant property. For example, in the circumstances where you have a house that one party wishes to take over and pay the other out it is prudent to obtain a family law valuation to ensure you can be satisfied as to the price placed on the property. This is as the value asserted on the property can significantly impact your family law property settlement outcome.

In the event these tasks, such as disclosure and valuations, are not complete prior to the mediation you can risk the mediation not resulting in resolution of the matter. Here at Bainbridge Legal we can help you to ensure these tasks are properly completed to give you the greatest chance of success at your family law property mediation.

In the event that you come to an agreement about your division of property at your mediation, this is not the end to the matter. It is important that you then ensure that any agreement is formalised into Consent Orders filed at the Federal Circuit and Family Court of Australia or a Binding Financial Agreement, so that any agreement is legally enforceable. Furthermore, Family Law Consent Orders and Binding Financial Agreements are important for a number of matters including stamp duty exemptions and superannuation splits. Bainbridge Legal assists parties to settle their matters on a formal basis by way of consent orders or Binding Financial Agreements and we are able to help you to do the same. You can read more about financial agreements and consent orders here: Binding Financial Agreements Family Law Consent Orders

Mediations can be a great tool to assist you to resolve your family law property matters. Here at Bainbridge Legal we can assist you in all aspects of your mediation as well as in the next steps of formalising your family law property matter. Contact us at 1300 148 110 to discuss resolving your family law property matter today.