“Everybody knows somebody where at the end of the day, the divorce was not equitable,” she said. “We want to help those people, the underdog, to make sure they get their fair share.”

Divorce cases may be a promising niche for lenders because costs can mount quickly  some top lawyers in Los Angeles charge more than $500 an hour  and because state laws uniformly require plaintiffs to pay lawyers upfront, rather than promising them a contingency fee, or a share of any winnings, as is common in other civil cases.

The state laws were written to make people think twice before pursuing a divorce. But Madeline Marzano-Lesnevich, a New Jersey lawyer who serves as a vice president of the American Academy of Matrimonial Lawyers, which sets ethical standards for divorce lawyers, said she welcomed the use of divorce financing as a workaround because, in her view, society also has an interest in helping people who are determined to separate.

“It furthers the concept of putting both spouses on an equal playing field,” she said.

Ms. Napp developed the idea for Balance Point during an eight-year legal battle with her former husband, which she paid for with loans from family and friends. She filed to divorce David Napp in 2001 after 13 years of marriage. Mr. Napp, an investor in mobile home parks, agreed to pay $500,000 and allow her to keep the family home. But shortly after the deal was finalized, Ms. Napp was stunned to discover that Mr. Napp was about to sell his stake in the parks for $5.7 million. She asked the court to reopen the settlement, setting off a legal dispute that lasted until the spring of 2008, when an Arizona judge ruled in her favor.

“Somewhere along the way a light bulb went off,” Ms. Napp recalled. “I said, ‘I’m kind of a perfect storm. I know how to find assets, I understand litigation, I have resources  what happens to people who are missing even one of those elements?’ ”

She decided to seed a business with some of the money she had won in Los Angeles, the city of fleeting marriages. Balance Point has since raised additional money from private investors. Ms. Napp said she expected the first case to be resolved later this fall, providing her first profit.