Divorce Mediation After a Long Marriage in California

After a long marriage, divorce mediation in California means you and your spouse work with a neutral mediator to reach your own agreement on property, retirement, spousal support and any parenting issues. The same legal rules still apply: community property is divided equally unless you agree otherwise, California law requires full financial disclosure from both spouses, and a court reviews the result.

Most people facing the end of a marriage that has lasted ten, twenty or thirty years are carrying a lot at once. There is a shared home, retirement savings built over decades, maybe a business, and often one spouse who stepped back from work to raise children or run the household. You and your spouse may still talk civilly, and you may be wondering whether that is enough to sort all of this out without a court deciding it for you, or whether a marriage this long is simply too complicated for mediation.

This article walks through what mediation is under California law, why a long marriage raises particular issues, what both spouses must disclose, how spousal support and confidentiality work, how the timeline runs, and when mediation may not fit. Simple Divorce Mediation works with couples in San Diego County and, through online mediation, with couples anywhere in California.

What Divorce Mediation Is — and What It Is Not

California law defines mediation in Evidence Code section 1115(a) as "a process in which a neutral person or persons facilitate communication between the disputants to assist them in reaching a mutually acceptable agreement." Section 1115(b) defines a mediator as "a neutral person who conducts a mediation."

That word "neutral" carries the whole idea. The mediator does not represent either spouse, does not advocate for either spouse, and does not act as either spouse's lawyer. The mediator also does not decide anything. You and your spouse make the decisions, and the mediator helps the two of you talk them through.

Either spouse may have a lawyer of their own. Neither of you is required to, and neither of you is barred from it. Some couples mediate with each spouse consulting separate counsel along the way; others do not.

Private divorce mediation is also different from the court's own custody mediation. When a petition or other filing shows that custody, visitation or both are contested, Family Code section 3170(a) says the court "shall set the contested issues for mediation." In that setting, mediation is not optional. In San Diego County, that court process is child custody recommending counseling with the court's Family Court Services, which calls the person a Family Court Counselor.

The court's counselor plays a different role from a private mediator. Under Family Code section 3183(a), except as provided in section 3188, that mediator may, consistent with local court rules, submit a recommendation to the court about custody or visitation, if the recommendation is first given in writing to the parties and their attorneys before the hearing. A mediator who can do this is called a child custody recommending counselor. Family Court Services explains that if no agreement is reached, the counselor makes a recommendation and the court hearing goes forward. The judge decides.

The confidentiality rules differ too. Evidence Code section 1117(b) says the Evidence Code's mediation confidentiality chapter does not apply to the court's custody mediation under Family Code section 3160 and the sections that follow. Those court proceedings are instead held in private and are confidential under Family Code section 3177. Simple Divorce Mediation is a private practice and is not connected to the court, Family Court Services or any government program.

Why a Long Marriage Shapes the Issues in Mediation

California is a community property state, and the length of a marriage affects how much there is to sort through. Community property is, generally, all property acquired by a married person during the marriage while living in California (Family Code section 760). Separate property includes property owned before marriage, property acquired during marriage by gift or inheritance, and the rents, issues and profits of that separate property (Family Code section 770).

Under Family Code section 2550, the court divides the community estate equally, except upon the spouses' written agreement, an oral stipulation in open court, or as otherwise provided by law. In mediation, you and your spouse can reach your own written agreement about who keeps what.

More years usually means more to divide. A long marriage often brings retirement accounts, home equity, business interests and deferred compensation built up over decades. Each of these tends to need its own conversation:

• Retirement plans. The community interest in a retirement plan earned during the marriage is community property. Family Code section 2610 directs the court, except as its subdivision (b) provides, to make the orders needed so each spouse receives a full community share in any retirement plan, public or private, including survivor and death benefits. More detail is in our article on retirement accounts in mediation.
• A family business. A business's value can include goodwill. That value is decided on the evidence, often with the help of experts.
• Separate money put into community property. Under Family Code section 2640(b), a spouse is reimbursed for contributions to the acquisition of community property traced to a separate-property source, unless that spouse made a written waiver of the right or signed a writing that has the effect of a waiver. Under section 2640(a), contributions include downpayments, payments for improvements and payments that reduce the principal of a loan used to buy or improve the property. They do not include loan interest, maintenance, insurance or taxes. Reimbursement is paid without interest or adjustment for inflation and cannot exceed the property's net value at the time of division.
• Community money paying a separate-property mortgage. The reverse case is different. Where community funds paid down the loan on one spouse's separate-property home, the community may acquire a proportional interest in that home, often called Moore/Marsden apportionment. It is not a section 2640 reimbursement.
• Debts. What you owe is part of the picture too, as our article on debt in divorce mediation explains.

One common misunderstanding concerns timing. Property is not automatically valued as of the date of separation. Under Family Code section 2552, the court values assets and debts as near as practicable to the time of trial, and, on 30 days' notice by the moving party, may for good cause use a date after separation and before trial.

If you and your spouse have children still at home, parenting and child support belong in the conversation as well. Parents may agree on child support, but under Family Code section 4065(a) the agreement is subject to court approval, and the court will not approve an amount below the guideline formula unless the parents declare that they are fully informed of their rights, that the order is agreed to without coercion or duress, that the agreement is in the children's best interests, that the children's needs will be adequately met, and that the right to support has not been assigned to the county and no public assistance application is pending.

Financial Disclosure: What Both Spouses Must Do

Mediation does not remove the duty of financial disclosure. Both spouses complete the declarations of disclosure the Family Code requires, whether they mediate or not.

The first step is the preliminary declaration of disclosure. Under Family Code section 2104(f), the petitioner serves it with the petition or within 60 days of filing the petition, and the respondent serves it with the response or within 60 days of filing the response. Those times can be extended by written agreement of the parties or by court order. When the petitioner served the summons and petition by publication or posting under a court order, and the respondent files a response before a default judgment is entered, the petitioner has 30 days from that response.

The second step is the final declaration of disclosure, along with a current income and expense declaration. Under Family Code section 2105(a), except by court order for good cause, each spouse serves these before or at the time the spouses enter into an agreement resolving property or support issues other than temporary support, or, if the case goes to trial, no later than 45 days before the first assigned trial date.

The spouses may waive the final declaration, but only together. A mutual waiver must be executed under penalty of perjury in open court or by separate stipulation, and must include the representations listed in Family Code section 2105(d). One spouse cannot waive it alone.

After a long marriage, one spouse often handled the finances while the other did not, and the less-involved spouse may feel uneasy about what they do not know. Disclosure is the part of the process designed for that gap. Our article on financial disclosure in mediation goes into more depth.

Spousal Support in Mediation: How the Factors Work

Spousal support, sometimes called alimony, is often the hardest conversation after a long marriage. You and your spouse may negotiate it in mediation and include your agreement in a marital settlement agreement, the written contract that sets out your divorce terms. Family Code section 4065, which requires court approval of stipulated amounts and sets conditions for approving amounts below the guideline formula, applies to child support agreements, not spousal support.

When a court orders spousal support itself, Family Code section 4320 tells it which circumstances to weigh. Among them is whether each spouse's earning capacity is enough to maintain the standard of living established during the marriage, taking into account:

"(1) The marketable skills of the supported party; the job market for those skills; the time and expenses required for the supported party to acquire the appropriate education or training to develop those skills; and the possible need for retraining or education to acquire other, more marketable skills or employment. (2) The extent to which the supported party's present or future earning capacity is impaired by periods of unemployment that were incurred during the marriage to permit the supported party to devote time to domestic duties."

The section goes on to list other circumstances as well. In mediation, these factors give you and your spouse a shared framework for an agreement that reflects what a court would consider.

Length of marriage matters here in a specific way. Under Family Code section 4336(a), in a marriage of long duration, the court keeps jurisdiction over spousal support indefinitely, unless the spouses agree otherwise in writing or the court has terminated support. "Retains jurisdiction" means the court keeps the power to revisit support later, for example to change or end it if circumstances change.

Section 4336(b) creates a presumption affecting the burden of producing evidence that a marriage of ten years or more, from the date of marriage to the date of separation, is a marriage of long duration. The court may consider periods of separation during the marriage, and may find that a marriage shorter than ten years is of long duration. Ten years is a starting point, not a fixed line.

For a mediated agreement, that means you and your spouse can agree in writing to limit or end the court's continuing power over support. Couples who address that choice in their written agreement with full financial information on both sides may have greater clarity about what can happen years from now. No one can predict the amount or length of support a couple will settle on. Our article on spousal support mediation covers this in more detail.

Confidentiality in Private Divorce Mediation

Evidence Code section 1119 is the core confidentiality rule for private mediation. Except as the Evidence Code's mediation chapter otherwise provides, anything said and any writing prepared for, during or under a mediation or a mediation consultation is generally not admissible, not subject to discovery, and cannot be compelled in civil and other noncriminal proceedings where testimony can be compelled.

That protection is real, but it is not absolute. A mediation consultation, defined in Evidence Code section 1115(c), is a communication between a person and a mediator for the purpose of initiating, considering or reconvening a mediation or retaining the mediator.

The written settlement agreement is the key exception. Under Evidence Code section 1123, a written settlement agreement prepared in or under a mediation is not made inadmissible or protected from disclosure by the chapter if the settling parties sign it and any one of these is true: the agreement says it is admissible or subject to disclosure, or words to that effect; the agreement says it is enforceable or binding, or words to that effect; all parties expressly agree in writing, or orally in accordance with the specific Evidence Code provision that section 1123 cross-references, to its disclosure; or the agreement is used to show fraud, duress or illegality relevant to an issue in dispute. A mediated settlement agreement is not always private or always inadmissible.

If either spouse has a lawyer for mediation, Evidence Code section 1129 requires that lawyer to give the client a printed disclosure of these confidentiality restrictions and obtain the client's signed acknowledgment, as soon as reasonably possible before the client agrees to participate, or as soon as reasonably possible after being retained if retained later. As noted above, these Evidence Code rules do not govern the court's own custody mediation.

The Six-Month Waiting Period and the Divorce Timeline

A common assumption is that the six-month clock starts when the divorce is filed. It does not. Under Family Code section 2339, a judgment of dissolution cannot become final until six months have passed from the date the summons and petition are served on the respondent or the date the respondent appears in the case, whichever occurs first. The court may extend that period for good cause.

Mediation can happen during that window. You and your spouse can reach and write up your agreement before six months have passed, but the marriage does not end until the period has run. Our articles on the divorce mediation timeline and on when a mediated divorce is final walk through the sequence.

Six months is a floor, not a ceiling. After a long marriage, with retirement plans, a business or a support question to work out, a case may take longer whether the spouses mediate or go to court.

California also offers summary dissolution, a simplified procedure for couples who meet specific statutory criteria. Its dollar limits are set by statute and adjusted periodically under Family Code section 2400(b), so any fixed figure quickly goes out of date, and many long marriages will not fit within them.

Where a case is filed depends on the spouses' circumstances, including where they live. Family law cases in San Diego County are heard by the Superior Court of California, County of San Diego, and couples elsewhere in California file in their own county.

When Mediation May Not Be the Right Path

If you are in immediate danger, call 911.

Mediation may not be right for every couple. Where there has been domestic violence, coercion or a protective order, safety comes first, and no one should feel pressured to sit down and negotiate with the other spouse. In the court's custody process, domestic violence cases are handled by Family Court Services under a separate written protocol approved by the Judicial Council (Family Code section 3170(b)).

Other situations can also keep mediation from producing a fair or lasting result. One spouse may hold far more control over money or decisions. One spouse may be holding back financial information. One spouse may feel unable to speak freely, perhaps after years of deferring to the other. A long marriage can make these patterns feel normal, even when they affect what a fair agreement would look like.

None of this means a long marriage rules out mediation. It means the process works only when both spouses can take part honestly and freely. Our article on when mediation is not appropriate describes these situations more fully.

If You'd Like to Talk Through Your Situation

A long marriage brings questions that rarely have tidy answers: how decades of retirement savings fit together, whether separate money went into the house, what the court's continuing power over support could mean for both of you. A conversation can be a place to sort out which of these issues apply to your marriage and how mediation would approach them, whether you live in San Diego County or elsewhere in California and would mediate online.

When you and your spouse are ready, you can call Simple Divorce Mediation at 858-330-1378 for a joint mediation consultation.

About this article. Reviewed by Amy J. Lass, CA Bar No. 246779. Last updated 2026-10-08.