Katya Richardson

Katya helps individuals make clear, informed decisions about their family and financial futures, focusing on how to legally achieve the best outcomes to meet each individual’s priorities. Katya practices in both family law and estate litigation, which are two areas of law that increasingly overlap as separating spouses, blended families, and inheritance disputes collide. That dual experience gives her a sharp read on cases where a family law matter has estate implications, or an estate dispute is really a family conflict in disguise.

She works with clients who want to protect what they’ve built, through prenuptial agreements, cohabitation agreements, and post-nuptial agreements. Katya takes a practical, non-adversarial approach to these agreements, helping couples design their financial futures so they can move forward with clarity and confidence.

For clients navigating divorce and separation or families involved in estate disputes, Katya is a strong advocate for out-of-court resolution. Katya’s focus on solutions and creative problem-solving have driven her to resolve numerous family and estate matters through mediation and arbitration, helping clients reduce conflict, protect their relationships with family members, and save on the cost of litigation. Where court involvement is unavoidable, she has represented clients at trial and secured a range of interim orders for clients leading up to trials, including disclosure orders, protection orders, exclusive occupancy of the family home, spousal and child support, parenting time and decision-making, and interim distribution of family assets.

Katya also recognizes that not every client needs or wants full-service representation. She offers unbundled (limited-scope) retainers for clients who wish to manage their own case, while offering targeted legal advice and support at the stages where it matters most. This may involve reviewing drafts, weighing in on strategy, and guiding decision-making. She’s direct about the options in front of a client, the trade-offs of each, and what it will take to get there, so clients who like to be organized and hands-on have what they need to lead.

Katya was called to the BC bar in 2018, having obtained her Juris Doctors from Western University in Ontario in 2017. She is a member of the CBA BC Family Law Executive, Vancouver Section (since 2024), currently serving as its Law & Policy Liaison (since 2025), and is also a member of the CBA BC Family Law Committee, which monitors developments in family law and practice, coordinates family law reform policy and submissions with the sections, and advises the Policy & Advocacy Committee on family law advocacy.

She has authored numerous publications, including most recently an article in Bar Talk on the Supreme Court of Canada decision, Ahluwalia v. Ahluwalia, which recognized a new common law tort of intimate partner violence centred on coercive and controlling behaviour.