San Francisco High Asset Divorce Lawyer

Call Now If You Have Highly Valuable Community Property

Every part of a divorce can feel stressful, especially property division. If you have significant finances or high-value assets, property division is likely to be even more complicated and contentious. You might find yourself head-to-head with your spouse while you try to fairly figure out who should get what and why.

At Gill Law Group, PC, we take pride in making high asset divorces less stressful for our clients by getting to know their goals, clearly explaining their options, and representing them during meetings, hearings, and courtroom procedures. If you’d like to see what our legal counsel can do for you during this challenging time, please reach out to our firm right away.

You can call (415) 324-6969 or use an online contact form to begin.

High Asset Divorce Community Property Division

California uses community property rules for property ownership during a marriage. Under this rule, any property that is obtained, gained, or improved during marriage is (generally) considered property of both spouses. In technical legal terms, both spouses have a 50% interest in the property or asset, so the ownership division is 50-50.

California also uses a 50-50 division standard for splitting community property during a divorce, including a high asset divorce. During your divorce, the court will expect to see a property division agreement that equally splits the property based on value, not necessarily amount. Our goal as your chosen high asset divorce attorneys will be to protect the valuable property you want to keep the most, so you can feel like our property division process ended fairly for everyone.

Different types of property considered in a high net worth divorce are:

• Family-owned businesses
• Investment and retirement accounts
• Real estate property (especially homes beyond the first)
• Luxury vehicles or multiple family vehicles
• Antiques, artwork, and jewelry

What Does Splitting by Asset Value Mean?

A California family law court won’t expect you to equally split community property piece for piece. Instead, the total value of your collective community property will need to be calculated and then divided in half to determine the value of the property that you and your spouse are each owed.

Consider this high asset divorce situation: You and your spouse jointly own a small business, a vacation home, and a collection of diamond jewelry, so it is all considered community property. The business is valuated to be worth $1,000,000, the vacation home is assessed to be worth $800,000, and the jewelry is appraised to be worth $200,000. A solution to reach a 50-50 division in your high asset divorce would be to award you the family business and your spouse the vacation home and the jewelry; in this situation, you would each get property worth a total of $1,000,000.