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There are, on average, 80,000 divorces per year in Canada and about 20 times that number in the United States (about 36% of marriages in Canada and close to 45% in the United States). If you are going through a separation or divorce, you have lots of company.

Most provinces, and states, now have laws in place to ensure that property acquired during the marriage is shared equally when the marriage breaks down. This may seem like a simple and straightforward process. However, in many cases, it is complicated and difficult and causes great problems, holding up the divorce for years.

For about 45 percent of the working population, one of the most valuable assets acquired during the marriage is the pension, which will be received after retirement. The working population in Canada (with only a few exceptions) will also receive a pension from Canada Pension Plan. The value of a pension acquired during the marriage may be very high or very low depending on a number of factors. Experience indicates that pensions, and their valuation for marriage breakdown purposes, are not understood by very many people. Experience also shows that many divorces are settled using wrong values for one or both partner's pensions. In some cases this costs one of the parties many thousands of dollars.

You may be trying to avoid the costs of a lawyer or valuator in dealing with the value of your pension or your spouse's pension. If so, you are probably being “penny wise and pound foolish”. At the same time you should not just dump everything on your lawyer’s desk expecting him to do his best job for you if you have not investigated your pension fully. If you are to be treated fairly, you must understand something about pension valuations. Many factors affect the value of a person’s pension on marriage breakdown, and we will attempt to explain some of these. It will be necessary for me to use technical terms in some cases. Please do not allow this to confuse you.

Our New Book!

A "must read" for family law lawyers and people going through the divorce process.

“Pension Valuations are Our Only Business, Providing the Best Service is Our Primary Concern”

A glossary of the most common terms is provided by following the link. Or check the meanings of terms or phrases in a good legal dictionary. These can be found in most libraries.

There have been many cases where the divorcing couple thought they would save legal fees and valuation costs by “keeping it simple”. They agreed to not spend the money on valuations. Invariably this ends up with the total costs of the divorce being higher and the process being slower. It also normally means that one of the spouses does not get his fair share of the assets. Some people end up with less than 10% of what they were entitled to because they did not have their spouse’s pension valued properly.

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