We have a wonderful business evaluator on our collaborative law team, Geoff
Wall. I use him in mediations too. I've learned so much about evaluating
businesses from him!
We usually give the couple an opportunity to agree on a value before
referring them to someone who can help them. Occasionally, they just agree
but most of the time they see the need for help.
Geoff gathers information from business records and from talking to both
people. Not only does he talk with the one who is active in the business but
he talks with the one who is not and usually meets with them both. He hears
their concerns and answers their questions. I think the information
gathering is generally done individually and then they meet with him as a
couple and he goes over what he found.
He then explains how business evaluations work - the various types of
evaluations based on the type of business, size of business etc. So, for
example, for some businesses, an income approach might make sense while for
others, the value of the inventory might make more sense. Some businesses
are valued by comparing them to similar businesses traded on the stock
exchange, etc. He will then talk about the marital business and how each of
those approaches might be used to evaluate this particular business. Often
he will even talk numbers - "using this approach, the value would be x, the
other approach would produce a value of y". Then the couple talks about the
information Geoff presented to them and agree on the value of the business.
We've done this in 5 way meetings and I've sent clients off to meet with
Geoff between mediation sessions. He empowers the clients to agree on a
value every time. In one case, when they left the office, the difference was
between a 0 value (the person keeping the business) and $200,000 (obviously
the other). They came back after two hours and a few hundred dollars in
complete agreement on $93,000 and the person keeping the business came to
the next meeting with an innovative plan for paying out the equity.
I appreciate the way he educates them to make a well-informed decision but
leaves the number up to them. It seems much more collaborative than giving
them a number and expecting them to live with it.
J. Kim Wright J.D.
Managing Attorney
Healers of Conflicts
Law & Conflict Resolution Center
P. O. Box 306
(20 Battery Park Avenue, Suite 708)
Asheville, NC 28802
828-253-3355
Fax: 828-255-3315
http://healersofconflicts.com ;
