Jodylee Bartal

Viewing every family law matter through her ‘specialist lens’, Jodylee has dedicated 20 years to advising couples on everything from separation and divorce to parenting disputes as well as binding financial agreements and all areas of financial issues and property settlements.

Jodylee is renowned for her expert, responsive and compassionate assistance where each client receives an individualised approach to all aspects of family law, including:

• Children’s matters including relocation applications, lives with/spends time with disputes, passport applications, paternity disputes, name changes, child support and child maintenance (for over 18s), medical treatment (including vaccination).
• Binding financial agreements (BFAs) in contemplation of marriage/cohabitation, during a marriage/relationship, and post separation to document an agreed settlement.
• Divorce, including objections.
• Family violence and intervention orders.
• Family law settlements (reached via negotiation and mediation) and litigation/defended matters.
• Generational family wealth protection and family business succession planning.
• International property and parenting disputes.
• Spousal maintenance.
• Superannuation splitting, including splitting of SMSFs.
• Family business succession planning.

Jodylee uses negotiation, mediation, arbitration and litigation tools to achieve the best outcome for her clients and makes herself readily available to attend conciliation conferences and appear in applications in a case, interim and final hearings, both within the court system as well as mediation and party to party negotiations.

Family business succession planning

Succession planning in family owned businesses is crucial to the thoughtful and controlled transition of the management and ownership of a family business to the next generation.   The use of Financial Agreements prepared pursuant to the Family Law Act are another useful tool to protect the structure/ownership and value of a business against ‘outsiders’ in the event of relationship breakdown of one or more of the owners of a business.  Jodylee works with Accountants, Financial Planners and Non-Family Lawyers to provide a kind of ‘relationship insurance’ to protect businesses where ‘traditional’ tools such as unit holder and shareholder agreements do not necessarily keep the business ‘off the table’ in family law disputes.

Over the past two decades, Jodylee has invested a great deal of time and energy in her relationships outside the firm to ensure her clients always have access to the best possible team of experts in all areas of law and professional disciplines.

Jodylee is widely recognised as a leader in the industry, having received the converted title of Accredited Family Law Specialist by the Law Institute of Victoria (LIV) and was named “Lawyer of the Year” by Best Lawyers for Family Law, Melbourne in 2020. Additionally, Jodylee is consistently recognised by Doyle’s Guide and Best Lawyers in Australia for her work in Alternative Dispute Resolution and Family Law.

Additionally, Jodylee is a regular speaker and author (for firm and industry publications) on family-law-related issues and is regularly quoted in the media.

“Now, more than ever, our clients need expert, responsive and compassionate assistance.”

Jodylee has dedicated the last 20 years to advising couples (married, de facto and same-sex) on everything from separation and divorce to parenting disputes, including IVF, as well as binding financial agreements and all aspects of financial issues and property settlements.

“Each case deserves an individual and specialist approach to achieve the best possible outcome”

Jodylee uses negotiation, mediation, arbitration and litigation tools to achieve the best outcome for her clients.

She also invests a great deal of time and energy in her relationships outside the firm to ensure her clients always have access to the best possible team of experts in all areas of law.

“Widely recognised as a leader in the industry”

Jodylee was named “Lawyer of the Year” by Best Lawyers for Family Law, Melbourne in 2020 and recognition for 2022 and has also been recognised by Doyles Guide and in The Best Lawyers in Australia for her work in Alternative Dispute Resolution and Family Law.