Helping clients through divorce is the ‘most rewarding feeling’

Even though February brings plenty of love and chocolate for many Americans, it also brings the end of marriages for many in the US.

Eric Ashburn, partner and private wealth advisor at Argent Bridge Advisors in Tysons Corner, Virginia, said his decision to get his certified divorce financial analyst certification came from seeing the value his colleagues were able to provide to individuals going through divorce.

“I felt like with my prior experience with working with business owners, it’s just an extra area where I could add a lot of value when it came to divorce, because that's just an added complexity,” Ashburn says. “We work very closely as a team, and I felt like that would be a great contribution.”

Personally, Ashburn points to a need to serve business owners and military contractors in the area who are getting divorced.

“If someone has a business and goes through a divorce, how does that get treated and what are the considerations? That's where I started to get heavily involved,” he says. “I work very closely with them, understanding the value of their business, how to grow the business, [and asking] ‘What's the ultimate exit strategy to plan? How do we get there?’”

According to the American Psychological Association, approximate 40 percent to 50 percent of first marriages end in divorce. Things get even worse the second time around, with approximately 60 percent to 67 percent of second marriages ending in divorce.

Seventy percent of divorcees who work with Ashburn’s firm consist of single women or a married couple where the woman is making the primary financial decisions or is the “breadwinner,” Ashburn says; the women are in their 40s and 50s or older, and are going through a divorce for the first time. He adds that his firm focuses on divorce because it’s a “a high-need area, especially in the Washington, D.C.-Virginia area.”

Divorce advisors at Argent make up a small team of six, all of whom have CDFA certifications. The number is small so they “can give each client a good deal of time and attention,” Ashburn said. They work hourly at $400 an hour, with a five-hour retainer because it takes that long to put everything together, he says.

Another service offered is what the firm calls “collaborative divorce.”

"It's a different side of divorce," Ashburn says. Collaborative divorce is a method for ending the marriage through cooperation and negotiation. Couples who participate in collaborative divorce are encouraged to work together from the beginning to the end of the divorce settlement. 

While the firm offers several services in financial planning, Ashburn highlights the additional services it provides, such as webinars, educational events, free education material and a complimentary consultation. The workshops consist of education on several things, he says, from understanding the importance of a marital asset, what steps are needed to get started, what individuals are needed on a team and what roles they serve.

“It’s kind of a checklist, just so you're prepared going into it and it's not a scramble,” he says. “It can be a highly emotional time and it can be difficult to scramble and get all these details after the fact.”

The best moment for the client, however, is when the process is over, and the divorce decree is received, Ashburn says. “It's probably the most emotional time in most people's life. It's very difficult to make informed decisions and look at it from an objective point of view on understanding the pitfalls and maximizing outcomes.

“It can be a very long process, and we're there with them the whole way. There's a bond that forms. Getting that closure, that's very often the most rewarding feeling,” Ashburn said.

Name: Eric Ashburn 
Position: Partner and private wealth advisor
Company: Argent Bridge Advisors
Founded: 2019
AUM: $500 million