Oh, the wise words of Kanye West. Just kidding 😉 All this marriage and money talk brings up the obvious – what about pre-nuptial agreements? My wife and I discussed it only briefly, and we don’t have one.
This may surprise people, but I think that a prenup should be legally required for every married couple, just like you have to choose beneficiaries for your IRA. That way nobody is the bad guy/girl for bringing it up and everyone can have an open discussion about money before getting hitched. At the very least, every couple should be taught what will happen without a prenup, as this can vary widely among states. Maybe a good one will even make having separate accounts pointless? I have no idea, not being a lawyer. If you have a prenup, what did you put in it?
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Bleh, Kanye West sucks.
We too do not have a pre-nup. We discussed it briefly and my wife wanted one, I didn’t and that was that.
Ha, actually I was open to the idea (as you can see), and my wife didn’t want one. That was that. =)
There was no need for us. We were both coming out of college with no real assets and everything we’ve built together was as a couple.
I don’t think you’re planning to stay with someone forever if you’re planning who gets what when its over.
My 2 cents.. if I had $5M in the bank and she were broke I might think a little different but I plan on being with her forever.
🙂
kanye west is okay, but gold digger plays on the radio like 540 times per day. so yeah.
Prenuptial agreement seem like another weird thing to have. Maybe I’m too traditional. *shrug*
I just figure, if I’m going to marry someone, I’ll know them well enough to trust them with my life, and along with my other worldly possessions and all those other junks.
its a good thing to discuss, I suppose. There’s no reason why what each person expects from the other (financially specifically) shouldn’t be made clear.
Kanye is a musical genius in my opinion…it just goes down hill when he opens his mouth on political issues. That, however, is another story.
As for a prenup, my wife and I don’t have one, but I don’t think that it would be a bad idea for everyone to have one. We also got together right out of college so we didn’t really have anything anyway. If we did have anything coming in, I don’t think that it would hurt to have one. Especially with the divorce rate so high in our country. I am sure that man of those people go into marriage loving eachother too…but things happen, why not be prepared.
I think pre nups certainly have their place. While I am at least a few years from getting married I’ve discussed it with my girlfriend. Since I have a good deal of family assets, I think it’s only wise to make sure that should the marriage end I will leave with the assets I brought to the marriage. She takes offense, feeling that I should trust her not to take what isn’t hers should the marriage end. I don’t see it as a matter of trust; I entirely trust her now, but if the marriage came to an end presumably she’d be upset. And who doesn’t want money they could get?
For those unfamiliar with ‘Gold Digger’, here is an excerpt of the lyrics:
Issues like this have really changed over the last generation or so. We have to remember where this sort of thing came from. House wives, right? Well, with women in the work place, etc (which I fully support), suddenly perhaps the issues here get a little more blurred since their original intention (again, house wives) is becoming ever more obsolete.
I understand what people say about getting a prenup is kinda like not taking seriously the fact that marriage is a life commitment. I agree with this too… however! For whatever reason, something like 50% of marraiges end in divorce these days. No, I don’t know where I got that number off the top of my head, but I do recall hearing it numerous times. So, maybe people aren’t understanding the commit marriage is supposed to take. Given. But again, regardless, if it is true that 50% of marriages fail, I truly do think the issues of prenups need to be addressed.
In an ironic twist, my parents are actually separated but never divorced because their finances were too hairy to separate! Neither has dated anyone (its been like 10 years) and they still see each other, so its not totally weird (that they didn’t formally divorce, that is). But anyway, here’s a case where no prenup actually saved their marriage! haha (well, “saved” strictly in the formal title sense).
=)
A prenup is like car insurance. Saying you don’t need one (assuming you have premarital assets to protect) is like saying “I don’t need car insurance because I’m a good driver.” No one gets into a car with the intention of crashing and no one goes into a marriage (hopefully) with the intention of divorce. But either thing can happen so why not be prepared?
For normal people (99% of the world), prenups are a ridiculous concept. You’re tempting fate and setting the stage for a divorce. What you’re saying is, “I think I love you, but when it really boils down to it, I’m not sure. So, since I have more money than you, I’m going to protect myself in case our so-called love isn’t for real, isn’t forever.”
What’s really hilarious is when normal people do have prenups thinking that they are richer than they are. So a person gets married at 27 and has $100K in the bank. They’re rich? Not really. The only people who should get prenups are the very rich or those who are already in the public eye before getting married. If I’m Derek Jeter, and I’ve been making $15,000,000 plus a year for a long time, and I meet you in the context of me being a rich superstar, I’ll get the prenup. When you have that much dough, you’re susceptible to getting together with people who will marry you for the wrong reasons. But if you’re a normal guy or girl — get over yourself!
22 and worth 7 figures. Rich yet?
To me prenups are like getting married but preparing for divorce. What happened to “until death do us part?” When you die, you can’t take it with you.
I did a prenup. I wasn’t really thinking about doing one, but a lot of my family’s assets are under my name, and the prenup covers only those assets – in order words, should there be a divorce, she would have no claim on those assets.
The 27-year-old wth $100k may not be as rich as Jeter, but taking half of what he owns is more devastating to him than taking half of what Jeter owns.
You hear of ordinary people getting financially ruined through divorce, but celebrities shouldn’t have trouble surviving off of half of their 8+ figure net worths.
Now I’ve said all this not to argue that the wealthy shouldn’t get prenups. But I don’t think we should trivialize “normal” people for wanting to protect their assets from divorce.
Prenups are practical. Forget total net worth – even for the average divorced couple, they probably spend half their total assets in lawyers fees. Maybe it is only a piddly 500k (sarcasm), but would you rather drive away from a divorce with 250k or walk away (car taken in settlement) with 125k while watching your lawyer drive away in his/her benzo cuz they charge 300/hr?
I dont have a prenup, but I strongly support working out the details of a future split. Not doing so means there is a 50% chance you will hand over your hard-earned money to a lawyer in 10-15 years. As you obtain worldly “things” you should immediately log them with a. your insurance company, b. choose who gets it in the end.
Now for all you idealists – Come on, 50% divorce rate!!!! You got to play the odds – and the odds are that love isnt going to last. Im sure that a study would show that a prenup doesnt increase the risk of divorce. Emotional neglect, boredom, and debt stress causes divorce, NOT a prenup. Think about it, as society becomes more sophisticated, people are too busy in the careers for marriage or children. It isn’t little house on the prairie any longer. There are just too many distractions, too many interactions with potential mates, too much everything. I think prenups are as important as setting up IRAs, allocating assets, buying RE, etc..
Face it, how many people would bet their life savings on black right now? Why would you not set up a legal document to cover you assests on the same odds?
You calling me a Gold Digger??????? 🙂
Ok, I did Pre-Cana (Catholic pre-marriage counseling) like every other silly catholic and this came up. They asked how many believed in pre-nups. Me and another guy stood up, although his fiance’ was pissed that he was standing. (Yes, it was amusing).
My wife and I don’t have a pre-nup, like most of you, she can have 1/2 of whatever we have if by some chance that we end up divorced. But I did tell her and everyone else in the our discussion group that if I died, I expect her to get a pre-nup with whomever she remarries to protect the assets that I have accumulated and make sure that the assets stay with my wife and my children. This avoids any sticky situations, since I expect my children to inherit my wealth once both my wife and I are gone, not some other schmoo’s kids…
[trying to see if this will help fix things]
No prenup here, for two reasons:
1. We’re Catholic. Like, actually Catholic, not cafeteria Catholic.
2. When we married, I quit my high paying job to raise the kids.
I have noticed from the posts that the focus tends to be on current assets and not future assets. I always thought a prenup protects your future assets. So if your spouse makes more now, but later you make more (i.e. inheritance or raises), then divorce, you lose out.
And not to mention if you live in a community property state (Arizona, California, or Texas to name a couple), it will protect you from having to pay alimony (with or without having children). Splitting current and FUTURE assets right down the middle will make life a lot harder, if you want to move on.
But prenups are easier said than done
All this talk about Pre-Nup got me thinking. How do you bring it up in the first place and when? For example lets say you have quite a bit of money saved and your future wife/husband has nothing. What do you say to them? And more importantly what if you want a Pre-Nup and they say NO. What do you do then?
How do you bring up a prenup? Just ask them. If you can’t have an intelligent conversation about financial topics with the person you want to marry how are you going to work though the tough times ahead.
It’s worth noting that the 50% divorce rate statistic isn’t terribly meaningfull.
It can mean that 50% of the marriages that end in a given year, do so because of divorce. Of course, that means the other 50% end in death of one or both spouses. Does that really mean 50% of all marriages will end in divorce? Of course not.
The census bureau, in 2002, published a report suggesting that the divorce rate for marriages taking place right now would be 50%, based on recent trends of divorce. However, it is only a prediction not a statistic.
Stating that an individual marriage has a 50% chance of ending in a divorce, would be similar to saying that because stock Y has earned a 7% return over the past 5 years, it will have a 7% return over the next 5 years.
I’m actually fairly certain that the odds would show that people with pre-nups gets divorced more often than people who don’t, but I think that would have little to do with the actual pre-nup. There is a correlation does not imply causality issue in place, similar to the high correlation between people who live together before marriage being more likely to get divorced. I would guess that after accounting for significant socio-economic factors (such as income disparity, marriage status of parents, religious background, etc.) whether a marriage does or doesn’t begin with a pre-nup is unlikely to be significant.
Some links worth looking at:
http://www.divorcereform.org/rates.html
http://www.census.gov/prod/2002pubs/p70-80.pdf
I have never seen a marriage with a pre-numptual agreement work.
If you live in California or Florida your marital assets are split 50 / 50 regardless of who’s fault the divorce is or isn’t.
Assets aquired BEFORE the marriage stay with the aquiring person, but ANYTHING aquired after the marriage is split 50/50, period.
If people actually acted civil during a divorce, there would be no need for a pre-nup. Why can’t people be fair and reasonable?
who knows. all I know is that any man or woman who becomes a greedy monster during a divorce was a greedy monster all along.
No prenup. In Wisconsin, any pre-martital assets are also split 50/50. I had a house and some money in my 401(k), but still chose not to go the prenup route.
I have a coworker who has been divorced twice. He lost half his 401(k) each time. He’s looking at getting married his 3rd time.
The car insurance line is classic and so true. People need to be serious
“I have never seen a marriage with a pre-numptual agreement work.”
Ok, and how many people do you know that got married with a pre-nup? 2? 3? Man, that’s a great basis for study.
I think it’s not outrageous after living as a man for almost 25 years and not to mention catch the occasional Dr.Phil to realize that the woman you love can turn into a psycho bitch in about 2.3 seconds when the right factors are in place. Also, many women tend to become outrageously lazy after marriage, gain weight, not try hard at their jobs, just kinda stay in one place, which is fine for some people, not me though, and yes I know guys can be like this too. Fortuanetly the gf I’m with now said she wants a pre-nup as well and she is going into elementary education, while I work in finance (investing), she is very intelligent and does realize that I will be making more than her. Kids are a different story and when woman or man make the decision to not work to raise the kids, that is when I think a pre-nup is not needed since one party is making a great sacrifice in income, so let me just state that before I’m attacked.
I feel that not having a pre-nup is setting you up to be a slave if the marriage ends, we are talking spousal support, half your assets, etc., there have been divorced men that have been financially ruined and personally and professionally devastated, you don’t have to sign me up for that one.
There is no way that someone should throw away everything that they personally worked hard to achieve just to pay it out for the rest of their life to a woman they could now hate who could’ve been unsupportive all along.
For those of you out there who don’t think a PRE-nup is romantic…. there is always the POST-nup.
If you get married out of college and immediately get married you probably dont have much of anything and have a hectic live. After a few years you start to gain assets and settle in. What about doing a post-nup at that time and before kids when one person (presumably) stops working to raise the kids?
If my now-husband had suggested a prenuptial when we were engaged, there would have been no marriage.
I don’t want a guy looking at the possibility of divorce before we are married. I want the guy going in from day one committed to NOT divorcing, “Till death do us part” “Divorce is not an option”
I would not be happy with the government forcing this “option” on us either.
a response to the commenter, Nick. You’re points about the statistics are well made, but I still think it is obvious that many, many marriages (perhaps even a majority) that end for reasons other than death, end because of financial stress/emotional devastation (e.g., one spouse has an affair). Moreover, it is clear that society has moved a long way from the “nuclear family” being the norm. In fact, many new educators entering the workforce are being taught that what was once viewed as “abnormal” (e.g., a single parent family, a student being raised by extended family members, etc.) is now, in all reality, the “norm.” To be honest, when I have students that *don’t* come to class with at least some experience with divorce (and some emotional baggage from their parents splitting up), I am shocked. The numbers might be smaller than “50%” implies, but there are still tons of divorces ripping families apart. . . whatever the number, divorce permeates our society (and any who deny that are living in fantasyland)
And, to Chris’ point about people being reasonable. . . well, people just aren’t reasonable. The world isn’t perfect (hence the car insurance analogy. . . because, after all, if people obeyed the traffic laws, maintained their vehicles, etc. . . . well, we’d hardly have a fraction of the accidents that we do now). It’s sad, but true. In the same sense, when kids, emotional investments of years, infidelity, and outright rejection come into play — when it is a matter of the heart (and not one of reason or cool, rational analysis), people are SELDOM reasonable. Because of this reality, because of this undeniable human flaw, it becomes all the more rational to get a prenup. . . . To just deny the validity of that point on the grounds that people *should* be more reasonable when their lives are falling to pieces around them. . . well, that’s mighty naive. Oh, and about the person being greedy monsters all along. . . well, you have a point, but one of my points was that there are sociopathic people who can totally scam others into trusting their motivations (then, they take the poor trusting S.O.B. to the cleaners). I agree that those type of people are greedy monsters, but I’m not sure their partner can always know.
And, to Eric, just one thing. . . there are plenty of guys who marry successful/professional women, and become “fat and lazy” too. Stereotype of the gold-digger notwithstanding, women don’t have a monopoly on the type of sponging you describe. I’m somewhat ashamed to admit it, but I have plenty of close friends who are masters at leeching off of their wife’s efforts.
I think too many people assume that prenups are going to seperate each person’s assets inequally, either based on their assets coming into the marriage, or their expected income after the marriage.
A pre-nup can be made to split everything 50/50, *if* that’s what both people want. If fact, if I was to go back in time and do a pre-nup, that’s what I would want. By doing nothing, you are basically agreeing to the state’s generic prenup.
Having been married for over almost two years, and seeing all the compromises that have been made in that time alone, if you can’t even agree on this, even if it is to do a 50/50 split, then maybe marriage isn’t a good idea in the first place.
Where are 90% of Americans with no savings gonna get the money to pay for the lawyer to draw up even a simple prenup?
Where do the 40-50% of people who get divorced afterwards get the money to pay for their divorce lawyer? 🙂
If it were mandated, I’m sure the process could be simplified, like creating a will. Of course people who want something more could pay for a lawyer.
45 years old. Living with my future wife. It’s been off and on but usually good. I have 2 kids I raised myself as a Father. She has 2 kids an a granddaughter, which I adore.
Her kids dropped out of high school, mine are currently in college. I have 850,000 in assests if I die, 600, 00 if I don’t. I would like to see prenups but she doesn’t. I can wait and have discussions on the subject of prenups, but I don’t think my mind will change. If I die, I want my children to have what I have worked very hard to obtain. My agreement would be 1/3 for her, 1/3 for each of my children. I die, she will go on and find another I’m sure. My children need to have some of what I worked for.
I pay all the bills and do my own laundry, cook at times and clean up after myself and as needed for others. I don’t think it is unreasonable to say if we get married and it doesn’t work out that this would be unfair.
Also, I have much of my assets tied up in 401k’s and house. If I had to pay 1/3rd of this, I would have to take out loans or be charged a 30% penalty for withdraw fee for taking money out of 401k.
I have provided for her and her 2 children and then a grandchild. I have paid for everything except groceries,(which I pay for going out 3 times a week and the kids lunch money) and she has a 40k a year job.
She is also in debt probably 10k. Everything is fine so far but I would like to marry her with prenups.
I kinda get the feeling that she thinks that” what’s mine is mine and what’s yours is mine without a prenup. Probably because I have more.
I worked for everything I have. I never got anything given to me but love.
Prenups also are not the only thing that stand in the way but she won’t discuss them. We have called off the marriage for a future date.
I do pray about this.
Comments??????????
jman – perhaps have her read this post? maybe if she understands your position she can express her own concersn.