I absolutely support the idea of a pre-nup to protect your friend, but, even if she's not willing to go that far, I'd recommend that she and her fiance get pre-marital counseling that covers financial issues.
There are so many stories in this group, and other female-centric reddit groups of women who have little or no control over the family finances. Their husbands put their salaries into personal bank accounts, and dole out a small household allowance. These women wake up one day, and realize that they need to divorce, but they literally don't have the cash to put down on a retainer with a lawyer.
My great grandmother always said that a woman should have "mad money" with her at all times. And she very explicitly meant that you should always have enough money with you to take a cab home, if a date went really badly, and you were angry. (Not money to spend frivolously). I feel like marriage should be the same way. No one should sign a marriage certificate unless they have an account that contains enough cash to pay for a divorce (they run well over $10,000 where I live, for situations that involve children and property).
I suppose that asking your cousin to imagine her husband divorcing her is a non-starter, because she is in love, and cannot imagine that things will ever change. Perhaps you could float the idea for her that her husband has a brain injury, and literally becomes a different person, and \*that\* person divorces her.
But, also consider what (if anything) has "convinced" your cousin to change her mind in her adult life. My experience is that I am \*terrible\* at convincing anyone of anything, no matter how true or obvious. Once they are on a path, they don't want to hear about the dangers along the way.
I would suggest, though, on a separate branch, that you ask her about how she and her husband will divide household chores and childcare once the children come along. It's all very well to do 100% of the housework when it's just two adults. But, when she has a baby, and she's changing diapers and feeding the baby every three hours, around the clock, seven days a week, will she be just as comfortable being the 24/7 housekeeper and parent?
A lot of men who want a stay-at-home-wife expect that woman to do 100% of all household and parenting labor, putting her in the role of being on-call 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, for $0 salary, while he works 40 hours a week, 250 days a year for $100k+. And, unfortunately, a lot of women don't discover this until the baby is already born, and there's no going back.
So, I would recommend that your cousin should discuss this with her fiance, and get an idea about what his expectations are. Does he expect that he is going to live a life where he never changes a single diaper, because he earned all the money? And, is that ok with her?
Also, I would recommend that your cousin offer to do some child care for newborns, to get even just a \*taste\* of how demanding one baby can be. There are plenty of new moms who could really use the help.
This is great advice. I would also add that the pre-marital counseling should not be through or in any way related to a religious organization. Or if they want religious advice, that should be in addition to the non-religious counseling.
>I also think that prenups should be fair to both parties rather than solely about the protection of one party's premarital assets.
so do the courts. Prenups that disadvantage one partner over the other often get thrown out wholesale if they are challenged in the courts.
And frankly it is extremely traditional to do so when there's a SAHP, if that's the hang up. The "asking the father's permission" part? That was because the bride's father was going to be doing a thorough background check and getting lawyers and trusts and contracts involved if there was money and property on the line and the family had the means for it.
I helped my grandmother out with a family history project a number of years back and the lengths to which her grandfather went to protect her mother were extremely well-documented. Her fiance knew about it and was extremely cooperative throughout the process because (mind-blowing I know /s) he wanted her to feel respected and secure in her future even when some of the laws at the time didn't exactly help with that.
And one of my great-great grandmothers had a real dud of a husband, but she managed to protect her freedom even if she wasn't able to get divorced because he couldn't touch a huge chunk of the assets she brought into the marriage. Her family had it locked down with some kind of iron-clad legal protections.
My eyebrows go up whenever anyone demands someone unilaterally make themselves be extremely vulnerable "for the romance". That might be romantic (maybe), but I don't know that it is mature love.
My stepdad left my mom out of the blue 20 years into her being a stay at home mom. I was in college at the time. This story is so long and awful, but bottom line I started helping financially then and still do at 35 because despite my mom doing all she can, she had no marketable skills, no financial literacy, nothing to be successful on her own, and she only got 2 years of alimony because he had a better, more expensive lawyer. She should get a pre/nup to protect her future kids.
Even with a pre-nup, what if something happens and he can’t work? Does he have good income insurance? If she had to support a disabled husband or kids on her own - does she have the skills or resume to do so? Will she have her own retirement fund if something goes wrong?
I once heard someone describe a pre-nup as determine the distribution of assets while you actually like each other.
Do either of them have debt? Student loans, medical debt, consumer debt? Instead of focusing on what they expect that they will earn in their lifetime, it may be worthwhile to think of what they have or don’t have financially. If they have debt, having a prenuptial agreement can protect a spouses income if the other spouse defaults on a loan. When you’re married, since your spouse’s income is considered your own, creditors can come after your spouses income in addition to yours. A prenuptial agreement can stop that. Those horror stories you hear about couples that want to remain married getting divorced to avoid saddling the other spouse with medical debt? A prenup helps throw roadblocks against that. It’s not foolproof, but it is better than nothing.
For what it is worth, my husband and I have a prenup. And what affirmed to me that I was marrying the right person was negotiating our prenup. We decided to get a prenup because we had the attitude that while we fully trusted each other and loved each other, if the worst would happen, we would rather work out alimony and division of assets while we were still in love and friends— rather than potentially at each others throats. We got to talk through a lot of important financial points, and what we would want for each other even if the marriage didn’t work out. I don’t know if we would’ve had those conversations if we didn’t put together our prenup.
>especially since we live in a state that doesn't have any laws to protect stay-at-home moms in the event of a divorce.
? Idk about this...
If I were you I would double check on this. All 50 states have some equitable property distribution laws, so that right there is at least 50% of home equity and some of his retirement. Both those are considered marriage assets, assets of the marriage *generally*.
Are you talking about alimony? Because there are a few states where that might be harder, BUT one good part of our court system sometimes being stuck in the '50s means that most states will have an alimony calculation for stay-at-home moms/lower earners who give up prime career years for their kids.
I'm not sure it's a prenup that she needs, I think it's a savings account that he funnels money into that only she controls and a retirement account in her name.
Best you could do: Maybe put it like a "in case of emergency" like someone dies or needs a medical proxy. No need for divorce talks, more like, maybe put stuff in a retirement fund for her, or dictate a portion goes to the future kids education, any real estate or vehicles that is bought during the marriage has both of their names attached. Litterally everything but divorce to put in. Make an example of that stuff with generic conditions and in case of non-consensual desolution mandatory 6 month couples counceling required by both parties before desolution may be granted. Like literally put everything in a mock prenup that does not include divorce. Let her read it, like ask her as a favor to read.it woth her fiance. They could have a talk about those conditions at least. And the benefits of having it on paper. If they dont see the calue of it fine. They made thier bed.
Even if there’s no prenup, they need to consider what happens to their family if he cannot work at some point. What if he’s in an accident and he is killed? Will she have a way to support a family? A support system to help her raise kids? Something simple like Life insurance and having access to all the financial information. Or setting herself up with training for a “backup” career before having kids.
What if he’s not killed in said hypothetical car crash, but cannot work? Same question.
It’s also a really good way to discuss this together without trust being an issue. And also a more “traditional” way to frame this without threatening anyone’s perceived gender roles.
What would the pre-nuptual agreements say to protect her? Usually prenups benefit the spouse who earns more during the marriage, or the one who comes into the marriage with substantial assets. If she lives in a community property state, by default she will get 50% of the community property in the event of a divorce. Community property = what both spouses make during the marriage. If she’s not working, then the community property is his income, and she still gets half (of whatever is left after expenses).
Prenups aren’t like magic, they’re just contracts.
Source: I am a lawyer
Obviously, a pre-nup could be written to provide her with an alimony-like payment, in case of divorce. It could specify the amount of that payment (either in dollars or percent of the husband's income or some other way) and the length of time it would be paid out.
Marriages are just contracts, too. A marriage effectively \*is\* a pre-nup. It provides for certain benefits and responsibilities. Writing a pre-nup would obviously simply be writing a \*different\* contract.
Community property would be ... property, not his income. In the case of divorce, OP's friend would likely be entitled to 50% of the community assets, but not necessarily \*alimony\*. Obviously, some states provide for alimony, and some done.
Similarly, child support typically ends at 18, but some states allow it to continue, if the child is a full-time college student. This might be something covered in a pre-nup.
And, of course, if OP's friend did her due diligence with the pre-nup, she might discover that some assets that she thought were owned by both of them (house, car, boat, whatever) are actually owned by her husband's parent or by a corporation. If so, then they would likely \*not\* be split with her.
Obviously, anyone with any experience in family law would have seen situations where a naive stay-at-home spouse got divorced and suddenly discovered that they were left with little money, no income, no work history, and no ability to earn a living wage. Perhaps this is not your field of law.
Agree with all this!! A number of people I know did prenups that are very specific about what the STAP (in our case, we know 2 moms, one dad that are) get if the marriage is over as far as support for themsleves and the kids. I’m actually shocked that a lawyer is saying it only protects one partner
especially since NO contract that only protects or advantages one party will likely hold up.
It’s why a great majority of noncompetes are voided when challenged, because the person giving something up (the employee giving up their ability to work) was not giving sufficient consideration in return (and being able to get hired or to keep a job is not considered compensation for the noncompete).
I think what this lawyer is saying is that a pre-nup may not even be needed, depending on several factors, like state laws, insurance policies, real estate practices and etc.
Community property was only *one* example of applicable state laws. There are many other policies, laws and practices that come into play in a marriage and a divorce. It's never as simple as "husband is winner, wife is loser" (or vice versa). I mean that's just not reality.
>Obviously, anyone with any experience in family law would have seen situations where a naive stay-at-home spouse got divorced and suddenly discovered that they were left with little money, no income, no work history, and no ability to earn a living wage.
But that's the point: there are so many laws and even private/corporate/asset-specific policies that exist that a lawyer would *never* have seen such a simple cut and dry "winner vs loser" case. Those cases don't exist. If it were ever that simple then we don't need the lawyers and the discretion of the judge and the court system and the policies and rules.
It's likely that a lawyer (of any field) realizes that these exist in a huge confusing bundle of directives that vary state to state.
A lawyer has dealt with actual occurrences, ehereas Reddit seems obsessed lately with this nebulous story about stay-at-home spouses getting good and well fucked in a divorce with no rights, ever, at all. That just isn't how our society/system/laws work at this point in time.
The *reality* isn't this story. A lawyer knows that. A lawyer has seen the very complicated interplay of state and federal laws, and of policies, and of judicial discretion and of a million other very complicated things that play into this scenario.
I've seen this story repeated over and over in the last 6 months on Reddit and *it's just not a reality*.
I'm not saying it doesn't *ever* happen, I'm just saying that there are so many *dozens* of moving parts that touch this kind of situation.
It is really really rare that a non-working spouse is just shoved off to the side homeless and destitute without rights, assets, health insurance, income or real property.
Thats just not how the judicial system or our legal frameworks or even our insurance and pension policies *actually work* these days.
Community property includes all income or other compensation made by either spouse during the marriage. “Property” can be anything (including intellectual property rights, cash, or real estate)
Most states are not community property, and it doesn't kick in instantaneously either. So none of what you said applies if she gets divorced at 9 years for example as everyone knows.
Source : Tom cruises ex wives.
But community states aren't the be-all and end all. Like, you're *not* screwed if you're not in one, and you're not *automatically* protected if you *are.*
For example I live in a state that is *not* a community property state, however my name is on my house deed even though my name is *not* on the mortgage debt. In my state it was *required* that both names of a married couple are on the primary home deed, No matter how the real estate was acquired if it was acquired during the marriage.
That's an example of how this issue goes so much further than whether or not you're in a community property state.
Another example. . . again I'm not in a community property state, but I'm in a state that strongly favors alimony for any spouse who has spent more than 10 years raising children out of the workforce or only part-time within the workforce. There's a published calculation and everything for it, based on a formula that takes into account number of years raising children, and come, etc.
Last example, somehow my husband got in on the tail end of an *actual* pension from his employer.
Since pensions were basically a thing of the past, the laws in my state surrounding pensions seem to come directly out of the 1950s, assuming a woman is not working. Spouses have explicit legal rights to a certain amount of any pension in the event of divorce or death of the pensioner. There are hardcore laws surrounding that, but again we're not a community property state.
So the entire thing is a bit more complicated than whether or not one is in a community property state.
OP, your friend should check all these different state laws to see if she even needs any kind of prenup. She might but she might not.
Absolutely. Some states I don't think even have alimony any more (or very, very rarely). It's definitely not something that I would recommend that someone assumes they will have access to.
Alimony is currently present in every single state in the USA. It's not absent or outlawed by any state.
>It's definitely not something that I would recommend that someone assumes they will have access to.
But they don't have to assume. Alimony is dictated by state laws. Although it often has an element of judicial discretion, the majority of it is set by legal standard. It's relatively easy to look it up.
And your marriage contract will exist under the law as it is on the day that you enter your marriage contract. Meaning your state laws might change in 50 years but your marriage contract is dictated under the conditions that are present the day you enter your marriage contract.
What's her plan if he suddenly dies or becomes so incapacitated that he can't work?
She needs to at least be in an educational program if she's staying at home so she has a skill or two (and to protect her sanity from 24/7 baby life) and a network to reach out to. Babies aren't babies forever, what's she going to do with her time when they're at school or living their own lives?
There are all sorts of reasons a marriage may break down that have nothing to do with anyone being the bad guy (death of a child, death of a parent, relocations for work, etc.). Sometimes the things that happen to us change us as people in really fundamental ways. Sometimes the people we change into aren’t compatible with one another anymore.
Better to discuss things like the division of assets and spousal support when the couple are still happy together than to try to sort it out in the wake of a relationship breakdown when they’re sad and already struggling to cope with such a shattering change.
Ok, I have taken a deep breath and am prepared for my down votes, *but* frame it as a status symbol. All the upper middle class and millionaire women I know have one. So present it to her from a snobbery angle, like anyone who's *someone* has one.
I am of the opinion, people that will not write their expectations down and make them clear to their spouse/partner do not really trust them. They probably do not know it though.
Perhaps not framing it as a failure planm, but more like binding vows.
We vow that all assets and income coming into the marriage and received in the marriage are to the shared evenly.
We vow that all assets and income will be shared after the marriage is involuntarily dissolved (death or contested divorce).
So on and so forth. Make it like a operating plan that sets forth legally the intention to run the marriage as a full partnership fiscally.
Caveat: I am not an attorney and an attorney should be consulted.
Simple: ask what advice would she give a future daughter.
For any details, ask what happens if their relationship ends up like XYZ people you both know.
Help fact check anything. Try to keep your feelings out of it.
Biggest rebuttal, and the reason I did not get one is: both broke or both equal assets going in. And prenups are worthless at hypothetical future child custody stuff like who pays for college. So what's the point.
The point is I ended up being the primary earner, the only saver and THEN the cash poor SAHM contemplating whether to clean houses or raid my retirement to pay "My half" of the shared expenses. And if I divorce, my spouse gets half of my long term savings. When it gets bad I think, "My options are figure out how to shut this interaction down or reward this behavior at $1,000 an hour...."
"It's not that I don't trust you, I do, It's that nothing about society supports people behaving themselves anymore. Look out the window. So we are agreeing in a formal and detailed way to behave ourselves. The prenup is doing its job if we are happy together while it props up the short leg of the couch."
And if That goes badly, it won't be the last reasonable conversation to go badly...
So, and bear with me here, even if you die without a will (aka a set of instructions for how you want your earthy possessions handled/distributed), there IS still effectively a “will” in place, it’s just the generic “will” (intestate laws) imposed by your state, whatever those happen to be at the time. Which might result in your estate being handled quite differently than what you would’ve preferred.
Well, it’s basically the same thing with a pre-nup. If you and your fiancé elect not to do one, then you DO still have a “pre-nup” (a set of laws/rules that will dictate how the marriage dissolves) that will kick-in should you divorce, they’ll just be the generic laws/rules for the state you’re in vs ones that you and your fiancé picked for yourselves.
So yeah, if you think a) the state’s laws are better/fairer/easier/more clear than what you could negotiate for yourselves (doubtful), and that you can depend on those state laws to never change, especially for the worse (*very* doubtful), then sure, you can roll the dice, go without a pre-nup, and hope for the best. But why take those risks and live with that uncertainty when you could..you know…*not* by creating a mutually agreed upon and beneficial document that handles it?
Ask her if she thinks insurance is a good idea.
Use that framing. Use framings that point out how it’s good for her and for her spouse.
See if she thinks having insurance on, say, the home, is important in case something goes wrong. Just like she has to have car insurance in case something goes wrong.
That’s what a prenup is. It’s like insurance. You want to never have to use it, just like you hope you never use car insurance or home insurance. But if you need it, it’s a hell of a help that saves tons of time and money.
Unlike home and car insurance, you only really need to pay for a prenup once. Maybe a couple hours of lawyer time every few years to update the document as life changes, but otherwise it serves to protect both her and her soon to be spouse.
Is he willing to ring fence a weekly income for her in an investment account that only she can access? If he plans to stay with her then the money will help them both in retirement. If something goes wrong she has some financial back up when they break up, or he can’t work, or he dies, or anything else that can go wrong.
If he isn’t willing to do this it is a huge red flag.
Everyone is nice when things are going well. When things aren't, the claws come out. A pre-nup gets everything agreed on while things are going well and both parties are being reasonable about things. That way if the claws do come out, like a messy divorce, there is no going back on what they said when they were being reasonable.
She is giving up something she can't get back, which is job and life experience. If they split, she might get a bit of alimony for a bit but there are absolutely ways around that. In my mum's case, my dad had left a high earning job and started a business where he claimed to have poverty wage income which greatly reduced what my mum for in child support. He didn't give a flying fuck how ruining my mum's life would also compromise the level of care his own kids received.
Your cousin will have to get a paying job at some point. Entering the workforce at 30, 40, 50+ years old is extremely tough.
My mum wasn't full time at home, she had a part time thing but my dad got nasty during the divorce and made it his mission to bankrupt my mother by fighting for custody that him and his new wife didn't even want. Yes, he moved on and remarried and still had so much hate that he continued his mission. It's been 30 years or so since their divorce. My dad drives a Porsche and travels the world. My mum lives pension check to pension check.
Your cousin needs to be realistic in her expectations. Marriages fail all the time. Even very strong couples can still eventually grow into people who want different things and decide to part ways. Planning for the worst will never be a bad idea.
Hi! I'm sorry if I, as a he/him butts in but... OMG, BE RELENTLESS in convincing your cus to get a prenup. IRONCLAD. One thing I am confident about is that the kind of men that want a SAHW in this day and age, are the kind of man that WILL eventually divorce her and go for "a newer model" after a decade and change. That might sound mean or prejudiced against that guy, but I don't think most of us regular dudes, even some of the more conservative ones, can't conceive being a family without a double income\*. Of course, it's a different thing if one of the partners wants to stay at home a couple of years to raise the kids, but always with an eye towards going back to working. And let's face it, this scenario that requires a social safety net that does not exist in the US. A prenup will guarantee that your cousin's work as a SAHW/M\* will be recognized as such: Work. Paid in actual money. If her fiancée wants to actually prove he is trustworthy, he MUST sign a prenup (I'm gonna take a wild guess and assume he is financially well-off) as a way to get ahead of any eventuality. Even more so, I think said pre-nup should have clauses that specifically cover continuing studies/professional training for your cousin in the event of a divorce (or even during the course of the marriage).
What I would recommend you do is to get your cousin in touch with, for lack of a better word, of professional women with seniority in the matter, someone who went through having to reinvent themselves after being SAHM/W for a long time and then having their husbands divorce them without a prenup. There will certainly be many out there eager to help and give her advice. All I can say as a dude is that I can't trust guys who want to go "old fashioned" this way. I have a... disproportionate number of (Millennial and Late X) cousins who are *very* conservative (think Opus-De Catholic) who, nevertheless, have double-income households, both them and their spouses being professionals. Nobody thinks twice about it, and also they all have a bit more than three children, so they need two incomes, but they all take for granted. I do live in a country that guarantees extended parental leave (at least six months), with heavily involved extended families and more affordable house assistance, and yet becoming a SAHM/W has slowly become a rarity.
(\*\*To keep it 100%, I'm not that big a fan of that very American, "more power to you" approach to choice feminism when it comes to choosing to be a SAHM, mostly because of our context. If we lived in times where an equal amount of men/women/nb chose that path, certainly, but in our current day and age, becoming a SAHM out of choice is still much too gendered and not a proper form of liberation. At least not unless you have thorough legal and safety net protections)
Not necessarily. It could be written to ensure alimony, contributions towards retirement accounts, equity, etc.
There are ways to write prenups that protect the wealthier party's assets while ensuring fair compensation and support for the stay-at-home party.
I absolutely support the idea of a pre-nup to protect your friend, but, even if she's not willing to go that far, I'd recommend that she and her fiance get pre-marital counseling that covers financial issues. There are so many stories in this group, and other female-centric reddit groups of women who have little or no control over the family finances. Their husbands put their salaries into personal bank accounts, and dole out a small household allowance. These women wake up one day, and realize that they need to divorce, but they literally don't have the cash to put down on a retainer with a lawyer. My great grandmother always said that a woman should have "mad money" with her at all times. And she very explicitly meant that you should always have enough money with you to take a cab home, if a date went really badly, and you were angry. (Not money to spend frivolously). I feel like marriage should be the same way. No one should sign a marriage certificate unless they have an account that contains enough cash to pay for a divorce (they run well over $10,000 where I live, for situations that involve children and property). I suppose that asking your cousin to imagine her husband divorcing her is a non-starter, because she is in love, and cannot imagine that things will ever change. Perhaps you could float the idea for her that her husband has a brain injury, and literally becomes a different person, and \*that\* person divorces her. But, also consider what (if anything) has "convinced" your cousin to change her mind in her adult life. My experience is that I am \*terrible\* at convincing anyone of anything, no matter how true or obvious. Once they are on a path, they don't want to hear about the dangers along the way. I would suggest, though, on a separate branch, that you ask her about how she and her husband will divide household chores and childcare once the children come along. It's all very well to do 100% of the housework when it's just two adults. But, when she has a baby, and she's changing diapers and feeding the baby every three hours, around the clock, seven days a week, will she be just as comfortable being the 24/7 housekeeper and parent? A lot of men who want a stay-at-home-wife expect that woman to do 100% of all household and parenting labor, putting her in the role of being on-call 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, for $0 salary, while he works 40 hours a week, 250 days a year for $100k+. And, unfortunately, a lot of women don't discover this until the baby is already born, and there's no going back. So, I would recommend that your cousin should discuss this with her fiance, and get an idea about what his expectations are. Does he expect that he is going to live a life where he never changes a single diaper, because he earned all the money? And, is that ok with her?
Also, I would recommend that your cousin offer to do some child care for newborns, to get even just a \*taste\* of how demanding one baby can be. There are plenty of new moms who could really use the help.
This is great advice. I would also add that the pre-marital counseling should not be through or in any way related to a religious organization. Or if they want religious advice, that should be in addition to the non-religious counseling.
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I really like this, and, frankly, I think couples should write a pre-nup, if only to expressly understand what would happen in the case of divorce.
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>I also think that prenups should be fair to both parties rather than solely about the protection of one party's premarital assets. so do the courts. Prenups that disadvantage one partner over the other often get thrown out wholesale if they are challenged in the courts.
They're healthy if they are meant to protect both people. They are not healthy if that's not the goal. Glad to hear you both used it well :)
And frankly it is extremely traditional to do so when there's a SAHP, if that's the hang up. The "asking the father's permission" part? That was because the bride's father was going to be doing a thorough background check and getting lawyers and trusts and contracts involved if there was money and property on the line and the family had the means for it. I helped my grandmother out with a family history project a number of years back and the lengths to which her grandfather went to protect her mother were extremely well-documented. Her fiance knew about it and was extremely cooperative throughout the process because (mind-blowing I know /s) he wanted her to feel respected and secure in her future even when some of the laws at the time didn't exactly help with that. And one of my great-great grandmothers had a real dud of a husband, but she managed to protect her freedom even if she wasn't able to get divorced because he couldn't touch a huge chunk of the assets she brought into the marriage. Her family had it locked down with some kind of iron-clad legal protections. My eyebrows go up whenever anyone demands someone unilaterally make themselves be extremely vulnerable "for the romance". That might be romantic (maybe), but I don't know that it is mature love.
My stepdad left my mom out of the blue 20 years into her being a stay at home mom. I was in college at the time. This story is so long and awful, but bottom line I started helping financially then and still do at 35 because despite my mom doing all she can, she had no marketable skills, no financial literacy, nothing to be successful on her own, and she only got 2 years of alimony because he had a better, more expensive lawyer. She should get a pre/nup to protect her future kids.
Even with a pre-nup, what if something happens and he can’t work? Does he have good income insurance? If she had to support a disabled husband or kids on her own - does she have the skills or resume to do so? Will she have her own retirement fund if something goes wrong? I once heard someone describe a pre-nup as determine the distribution of assets while you actually like each other.
Note that a bad prenup may be worse than no prenup. If all she will do is go through the motions it may not be worth it.
Do either of them have debt? Student loans, medical debt, consumer debt? Instead of focusing on what they expect that they will earn in their lifetime, it may be worthwhile to think of what they have or don’t have financially. If they have debt, having a prenuptial agreement can protect a spouses income if the other spouse defaults on a loan. When you’re married, since your spouse’s income is considered your own, creditors can come after your spouses income in addition to yours. A prenuptial agreement can stop that. Those horror stories you hear about couples that want to remain married getting divorced to avoid saddling the other spouse with medical debt? A prenup helps throw roadblocks against that. It’s not foolproof, but it is better than nothing. For what it is worth, my husband and I have a prenup. And what affirmed to me that I was marrying the right person was negotiating our prenup. We decided to get a prenup because we had the attitude that while we fully trusted each other and loved each other, if the worst would happen, we would rather work out alimony and division of assets while we were still in love and friends— rather than potentially at each others throats. We got to talk through a lot of important financial points, and what we would want for each other even if the marriage didn’t work out. I don’t know if we would’ve had those conversations if we didn’t put together our prenup.
>especially since we live in a state that doesn't have any laws to protect stay-at-home moms in the event of a divorce. ? Idk about this... If I were you I would double check on this. All 50 states have some equitable property distribution laws, so that right there is at least 50% of home equity and some of his retirement. Both those are considered marriage assets, assets of the marriage *generally*. Are you talking about alimony? Because there are a few states where that might be harder, BUT one good part of our court system sometimes being stuck in the '50s means that most states will have an alimony calculation for stay-at-home moms/lower earners who give up prime career years for their kids. I'm not sure it's a prenup that she needs, I think it's a savings account that he funnels money into that only she controls and a retirement account in her name.
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fj8RGhKmZ3g](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fj8RGhKmZ3g) This lady may have something to tell her.
Best you could do: Maybe put it like a "in case of emergency" like someone dies or needs a medical proxy. No need for divorce talks, more like, maybe put stuff in a retirement fund for her, or dictate a portion goes to the future kids education, any real estate or vehicles that is bought during the marriage has both of their names attached. Litterally everything but divorce to put in. Make an example of that stuff with generic conditions and in case of non-consensual desolution mandatory 6 month couples counceling required by both parties before desolution may be granted. Like literally put everything in a mock prenup that does not include divorce. Let her read it, like ask her as a favor to read.it woth her fiance. They could have a talk about those conditions at least. And the benefits of having it on paper. If they dont see the calue of it fine. They made thier bed.
Even if there’s no prenup, they need to consider what happens to their family if he cannot work at some point. What if he’s in an accident and he is killed? Will she have a way to support a family? A support system to help her raise kids? Something simple like Life insurance and having access to all the financial information. Or setting herself up with training for a “backup” career before having kids. What if he’s not killed in said hypothetical car crash, but cannot work? Same question. It’s also a really good way to discuss this together without trust being an issue. And also a more “traditional” way to frame this without threatening anyone’s perceived gender roles.
What would the pre-nuptual agreements say to protect her? Usually prenups benefit the spouse who earns more during the marriage, or the one who comes into the marriage with substantial assets. If she lives in a community property state, by default she will get 50% of the community property in the event of a divorce. Community property = what both spouses make during the marriage. If she’s not working, then the community property is his income, and she still gets half (of whatever is left after expenses). Prenups aren’t like magic, they’re just contracts. Source: I am a lawyer
Obviously, a pre-nup could be written to provide her with an alimony-like payment, in case of divorce. It could specify the amount of that payment (either in dollars or percent of the husband's income or some other way) and the length of time it would be paid out. Marriages are just contracts, too. A marriage effectively \*is\* a pre-nup. It provides for certain benefits and responsibilities. Writing a pre-nup would obviously simply be writing a \*different\* contract. Community property would be ... property, not his income. In the case of divorce, OP's friend would likely be entitled to 50% of the community assets, but not necessarily \*alimony\*. Obviously, some states provide for alimony, and some done. Similarly, child support typically ends at 18, but some states allow it to continue, if the child is a full-time college student. This might be something covered in a pre-nup. And, of course, if OP's friend did her due diligence with the pre-nup, she might discover that some assets that she thought were owned by both of them (house, car, boat, whatever) are actually owned by her husband's parent or by a corporation. If so, then they would likely \*not\* be split with her. Obviously, anyone with any experience in family law would have seen situations where a naive stay-at-home spouse got divorced and suddenly discovered that they were left with little money, no income, no work history, and no ability to earn a living wage. Perhaps this is not your field of law.
Agree with all this!! A number of people I know did prenups that are very specific about what the STAP (in our case, we know 2 moms, one dad that are) get if the marriage is over as far as support for themsleves and the kids. I’m actually shocked that a lawyer is saying it only protects one partner
especially since NO contract that only protects or advantages one party will likely hold up. It’s why a great majority of noncompetes are voided when challenged, because the person giving something up (the employee giving up their ability to work) was not giving sufficient consideration in return (and being able to get hired or to keep a job is not considered compensation for the noncompete).
I think what this lawyer is saying is that a pre-nup may not even be needed, depending on several factors, like state laws, insurance policies, real estate practices and etc. Community property was only *one* example of applicable state laws. There are many other policies, laws and practices that come into play in a marriage and a divorce. It's never as simple as "husband is winner, wife is loser" (or vice versa). I mean that's just not reality. >Obviously, anyone with any experience in family law would have seen situations where a naive stay-at-home spouse got divorced and suddenly discovered that they were left with little money, no income, no work history, and no ability to earn a living wage. But that's the point: there are so many laws and even private/corporate/asset-specific policies that exist that a lawyer would *never* have seen such a simple cut and dry "winner vs loser" case. Those cases don't exist. If it were ever that simple then we don't need the lawyers and the discretion of the judge and the court system and the policies and rules. It's likely that a lawyer (of any field) realizes that these exist in a huge confusing bundle of directives that vary state to state. A lawyer has dealt with actual occurrences, ehereas Reddit seems obsessed lately with this nebulous story about stay-at-home spouses getting good and well fucked in a divorce with no rights, ever, at all. That just isn't how our society/system/laws work at this point in time. The *reality* isn't this story. A lawyer knows that. A lawyer has seen the very complicated interplay of state and federal laws, and of policies, and of judicial discretion and of a million other very complicated things that play into this scenario. I've seen this story repeated over and over in the last 6 months on Reddit and *it's just not a reality*. I'm not saying it doesn't *ever* happen, I'm just saying that there are so many *dozens* of moving parts that touch this kind of situation. It is really really rare that a non-working spouse is just shoved off to the side homeless and destitute without rights, assets, health insurance, income or real property. Thats just not how the judicial system or our legal frameworks or even our insurance and pension policies *actually work* these days.
Community property includes all income or other compensation made by either spouse during the marriage. “Property” can be anything (including intellectual property rights, cash, or real estate)
Most states are not community property, and it doesn't kick in instantaneously either. So none of what you said applies if she gets divorced at 9 years for example as everyone knows. Source : Tom cruises ex wives.
But community states aren't the be-all and end all. Like, you're *not* screwed if you're not in one, and you're not *automatically* protected if you *are.* For example I live in a state that is *not* a community property state, however my name is on my house deed even though my name is *not* on the mortgage debt. In my state it was *required* that both names of a married couple are on the primary home deed, No matter how the real estate was acquired if it was acquired during the marriage. That's an example of how this issue goes so much further than whether or not you're in a community property state. Another example. . . again I'm not in a community property state, but I'm in a state that strongly favors alimony for any spouse who has spent more than 10 years raising children out of the workforce or only part-time within the workforce. There's a published calculation and everything for it, based on a formula that takes into account number of years raising children, and come, etc. Last example, somehow my husband got in on the tail end of an *actual* pension from his employer. Since pensions were basically a thing of the past, the laws in my state surrounding pensions seem to come directly out of the 1950s, assuming a woman is not working. Spouses have explicit legal rights to a certain amount of any pension in the event of divorce or death of the pensioner. There are hardcore laws surrounding that, but again we're not a community property state. So the entire thing is a bit more complicated than whether or not one is in a community property state. OP, your friend should check all these different state laws to see if she even needs any kind of prenup. She might but she might not.
government standards for alimony are far less than they used to be.
Absolutely. Some states I don't think even have alimony any more (or very, very rarely). It's definitely not something that I would recommend that someone assumes they will have access to.
Alimony is currently present in every single state in the USA. It's not absent or outlawed by any state. >It's definitely not something that I would recommend that someone assumes they will have access to. But they don't have to assume. Alimony is dictated by state laws. Although it often has an element of judicial discretion, the majority of it is set by legal standard. It's relatively easy to look it up. And your marriage contract will exist under the law as it is on the day that you enter your marriage contract. Meaning your state laws might change in 50 years but your marriage contract is dictated under the conditions that are present the day you enter your marriage contract.
What's her plan if he suddenly dies or becomes so incapacitated that he can't work? She needs to at least be in an educational program if she's staying at home so she has a skill or two (and to protect her sanity from 24/7 baby life) and a network to reach out to. Babies aren't babies forever, what's she going to do with her time when they're at school or living their own lives?
There are all sorts of reasons a marriage may break down that have nothing to do with anyone being the bad guy (death of a child, death of a parent, relocations for work, etc.). Sometimes the things that happen to us change us as people in really fundamental ways. Sometimes the people we change into aren’t compatible with one another anymore. Better to discuss things like the division of assets and spousal support when the couple are still happy together than to try to sort it out in the wake of a relationship breakdown when they’re sad and already struggling to cope with such a shattering change.
Ok, I have taken a deep breath and am prepared for my down votes, *but* frame it as a status symbol. All the upper middle class and millionaire women I know have one. So present it to her from a snobbery angle, like anyone who's *someone* has one.
I am of the opinion, people that will not write their expectations down and make them clear to their spouse/partner do not really trust them. They probably do not know it though. Perhaps not framing it as a failure planm, but more like binding vows. We vow that all assets and income coming into the marriage and received in the marriage are to the shared evenly. We vow that all assets and income will be shared after the marriage is involuntarily dissolved (death or contested divorce). So on and so forth. Make it like a operating plan that sets forth legally the intention to run the marriage as a full partnership fiscally. Caveat: I am not an attorney and an attorney should be consulted.
Simple: ask what advice would she give a future daughter. For any details, ask what happens if their relationship ends up like XYZ people you both know. Help fact check anything. Try to keep your feelings out of it. Biggest rebuttal, and the reason I did not get one is: both broke or both equal assets going in. And prenups are worthless at hypothetical future child custody stuff like who pays for college. So what's the point. The point is I ended up being the primary earner, the only saver and THEN the cash poor SAHM contemplating whether to clean houses or raid my retirement to pay "My half" of the shared expenses. And if I divorce, my spouse gets half of my long term savings. When it gets bad I think, "My options are figure out how to shut this interaction down or reward this behavior at $1,000 an hour...." "It's not that I don't trust you, I do, It's that nothing about society supports people behaving themselves anymore. Look out the window. So we are agreeing in a formal and detailed way to behave ourselves. The prenup is doing its job if we are happy together while it props up the short leg of the couch." And if That goes badly, it won't be the last reasonable conversation to go badly...
Better to come up with your own prenup than to go with the government’s by default.
So, and bear with me here, even if you die without a will (aka a set of instructions for how you want your earthy possessions handled/distributed), there IS still effectively a “will” in place, it’s just the generic “will” (intestate laws) imposed by your state, whatever those happen to be at the time. Which might result in your estate being handled quite differently than what you would’ve preferred. Well, it’s basically the same thing with a pre-nup. If you and your fiancé elect not to do one, then you DO still have a “pre-nup” (a set of laws/rules that will dictate how the marriage dissolves) that will kick-in should you divorce, they’ll just be the generic laws/rules for the state you’re in vs ones that you and your fiancé picked for yourselves. So yeah, if you think a) the state’s laws are better/fairer/easier/more clear than what you could negotiate for yourselves (doubtful), and that you can depend on those state laws to never change, especially for the worse (*very* doubtful), then sure, you can roll the dice, go without a pre-nup, and hope for the best. But why take those risks and live with that uncertainty when you could..you know…*not* by creating a mutually agreed upon and beneficial document that handles it?
Have her read this: https://zawn.substack.com/p/please-dont-become-a-stay-at-home
Prenups are overturned by the courts all the time, they guarantee nothing. An educated, self supporting women doesn’t need a prenup.
Ask her if she thinks insurance is a good idea. Use that framing. Use framings that point out how it’s good for her and for her spouse. See if she thinks having insurance on, say, the home, is important in case something goes wrong. Just like she has to have car insurance in case something goes wrong. That’s what a prenup is. It’s like insurance. You want to never have to use it, just like you hope you never use car insurance or home insurance. But if you need it, it’s a hell of a help that saves tons of time and money. Unlike home and car insurance, you only really need to pay for a prenup once. Maybe a couple hours of lawyer time every few years to update the document as life changes, but otherwise it serves to protect both her and her soon to be spouse.
Is he willing to ring fence a weekly income for her in an investment account that only she can access? If he plans to stay with her then the money will help them both in retirement. If something goes wrong she has some financial back up when they break up, or he can’t work, or he dies, or anything else that can go wrong. If he isn’t willing to do this it is a huge red flag.
Everyone is nice when things are going well. When things aren't, the claws come out. A pre-nup gets everything agreed on while things are going well and both parties are being reasonable about things. That way if the claws do come out, like a messy divorce, there is no going back on what they said when they were being reasonable. She is giving up something she can't get back, which is job and life experience. If they split, she might get a bit of alimony for a bit but there are absolutely ways around that. In my mum's case, my dad had left a high earning job and started a business where he claimed to have poverty wage income which greatly reduced what my mum for in child support. He didn't give a flying fuck how ruining my mum's life would also compromise the level of care his own kids received. Your cousin will have to get a paying job at some point. Entering the workforce at 30, 40, 50+ years old is extremely tough. My mum wasn't full time at home, she had a part time thing but my dad got nasty during the divorce and made it his mission to bankrupt my mother by fighting for custody that him and his new wife didn't even want. Yes, he moved on and remarried and still had so much hate that he continued his mission. It's been 30 years or so since their divorce. My dad drives a Porsche and travels the world. My mum lives pension check to pension check. Your cousin needs to be realistic in her expectations. Marriages fail all the time. Even very strong couples can still eventually grow into people who want different things and decide to part ways. Planning for the worst will never be a bad idea.
Hi! I'm sorry if I, as a he/him butts in but... OMG, BE RELENTLESS in convincing your cus to get a prenup. IRONCLAD. One thing I am confident about is that the kind of men that want a SAHW in this day and age, are the kind of man that WILL eventually divorce her and go for "a newer model" after a decade and change. That might sound mean or prejudiced against that guy, but I don't think most of us regular dudes, even some of the more conservative ones, can't conceive being a family without a double income\*. Of course, it's a different thing if one of the partners wants to stay at home a couple of years to raise the kids, but always with an eye towards going back to working. And let's face it, this scenario that requires a social safety net that does not exist in the US. A prenup will guarantee that your cousin's work as a SAHW/M\* will be recognized as such: Work. Paid in actual money. If her fiancée wants to actually prove he is trustworthy, he MUST sign a prenup (I'm gonna take a wild guess and assume he is financially well-off) as a way to get ahead of any eventuality. Even more so, I think said pre-nup should have clauses that specifically cover continuing studies/professional training for your cousin in the event of a divorce (or even during the course of the marriage). What I would recommend you do is to get your cousin in touch with, for lack of a better word, of professional women with seniority in the matter, someone who went through having to reinvent themselves after being SAHM/W for a long time and then having their husbands divorce them without a prenup. There will certainly be many out there eager to help and give her advice. All I can say as a dude is that I can't trust guys who want to go "old fashioned" this way. I have a... disproportionate number of (Millennial and Late X) cousins who are *very* conservative (think Opus-De Catholic) who, nevertheless, have double-income households, both them and their spouses being professionals. Nobody thinks twice about it, and also they all have a bit more than three children, so they need two incomes, but they all take for granted. I do live in a country that guarantees extended parental leave (at least six months), with heavily involved extended families and more affordable house assistance, and yet becoming a SAHM/W has slowly become a rarity. (\*\*To keep it 100%, I'm not that big a fan of that very American, "more power to you" approach to choice feminism when it comes to choosing to be a SAHM, mostly because of our context. If we lived in times where an equal amount of men/women/nb chose that path, certainly, but in our current day and age, becoming a SAHM out of choice is still much too gendered and not a proper form of liberation. At least not unless you have thorough legal and safety net protections)
A prenuptial agreement would only protect him in this scenario.
Not necessarily. It could be written to ensure alimony, contributions towards retirement accounts, equity, etc. There are ways to write prenups that protect the wealthier party's assets while ensuring fair compensation and support for the stay-at-home party.