Pre-Nups for Ordinary People

Lord Snot

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Ordinary meaning not famous or particularly wealthy.

I'm watching an interesting debate unfold on another forum. Somebody posted about getting his fiancé to sign a pre-nup agreement, so that if they broke up she couldn't get half his house. Most of the replies are along the lines of "I hope she leaves you".

Would you be happy to sign one if you moved in with your partner?

Would you ask someone else to do it?

Are they a sign of mistrust and selfishness, or just good sense?

I see where the guy is coming from. He saved up for many years to pay a huge deposit and is now paying a mortgage, and he doesn't want somebody else taking half of it. A pre-nup that leaves her only entitled to half of what she physically put into the bank account during the marriage seems like a fair option, but I don't think it is. If she doesn't marry she's more likely to be able to buy her own property and develop her own assets. If she marries and puts her efforts into the joint house, and then has to leave it, she is worse off. I don't think she should be worse off from marrying someone.

Switch the genders if you like - I'm just using he and she because this specific example set me thinking.
 
Well at the very least prenups make divorces less painful.

Oddly enough I see the hate against prenups as sexist against women. Whether they realize it or not, the haters are effectively assuming the women doesn't have the ability to survive on her own without the husband's assets.

But let's also remember that without a prenup, the husband is entitled to half of the wife's assets..That's one thing the haters overlook.

At least a prenup defines what is whose.

The only problem is when one spouse is a full time homemaker and becomes fully dependant on the income of the other spouse. But full time housewives are a rare breed nowadays.
 
No, "haters" aren't assuming that. :???: Is there a specific group of people against pre-nups who all have the same opinion on it?

If both partners work, then generally they pool both their incomes into the house they share, their children, their holidays, etc. If the marriage breaks up and (let's envisage a gender swap here) the man has to leave the home, and only gets back exactly his income for the duration of the marriage, then he is worse off than if he was single. If single he would have put his income into savings, into his own place, into his own projects and desires. The income would have grown into something more. He's lost out by being married and having signed a pre-nup. The woman who owned the house at the start of the marriage has made a profit because her assets have grown.

Of course there can be a situation where the couple don't bother looking after the house and it's worth less after the relationship, but I would think that's not the common occurence.
 
Well sure, typically the man looses without a pre-nup and the women gains, and that why those who are against it (usually women) hate prenups.

But then again, this assumes the man is going into the marriage with greater assets than the women. That may have been an absolute truth in the past, but not so much anymore

Interesting point about the house. But it could also be argued that as a couple with combined incomes they can afford a bigger house, so they both gain in that respect.
 
But if the man then has to leave the bigger house, he's then left without any house of his own and probably not enough to buy one of a similar standard, or even be able to put down a deposit on a smaller one. The house owner could probably juggle her mortgage round so she can stay in the big house that they got together.
 
A marriage license isn't about love, it's a contract between two people in case things go to ****. If said contract needs expanded with a prenup to cover premarital assets so be it.
 
A marriage license isn't about love, it's a contract between two people in case things go to ****. If said contract needs expanded with a prenup to cover premarital assets so be it.

Some people think marriage should be about love, and not a contract in case things go to ****.

Do you have any comments about how a person may lose out from being married, if they sign a pre nup?
 
Some people think marriage should be about love, and not a contract in case things go to ****.

Do you have any comments about how a person may lose out from being married, if they sign a pre nup?

A marriage is about love, a marriage license is not. A prenup is so one party doesn't lose out with his/her premarital assets, the premarital assets are taken out of play so to speak, that's all. When I got married we had nothing... over 24 years of marriage we've accumulated significant assets. The assets we've accumulated together are fair play and I have zero problem with the mrs walking away with half of what WE built together, no one loses. The alternative would be if we entered into marriage later in life and we each had accumulated our own "stuff", it would hardly be fair to either party to lose the stuff obtained prior to marriage to the other spouse in the event things turned sour... so I really don't see a person losing out by signing a prenup. The only thing they would lose out on would be things they really had no right to.
 
It depends how long the people have been together. After 12 years Id be pretty devistated if M asked me to sign one. But if you meet someone and its a quick whirlwind romance, I can understand why people would want one.

I do think however it shows mistrust, youre basically saying you think the other person will be a dick if you break up. I thought the idea of Marriage was committing yourself to another for the rest of your life, Prenups are like saying 'we wont last'.
 
Realistically speaking, marriages rarely last for the rest of ones life.
 
It depends how long the people have been together. After 12 years Id be pretty devistated if M asked me to sign one. But if you meet someone and its a quick whirlwind romance, I can understand why people would want one.

I do think however it shows mistrust, youre basically saying you think the other person will be a dick if you break up. I thought the idea of Marriage was committing yourself to another for the rest of your life, Prenups are like saying 'we wont last'.

I don't think it shows mistrust so much as it reflects the realism of the situation. People break up/divorce all the time and more often than not when the breakup occurs and emotions are involved people turn dickish.
 
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Ordinary meaning not famous or particularly wealthy.

I'm watching an interesting debate unfold on another forum. Somebody posted about getting his fiancé to sign a pre-nup agreement, so that if they broke up she couldn't get half his house. Most of the replies are along the lines of "I hope she leaves you".

Would you be happy to sign one if you moved in with your partner?

Would you ask someone else to do it?

Are they a sign of mistrust and selfishness, or just good sense?

I see where the guy is coming from. He saved up for many years to pay a huge deposit and is now paying a mortgage, and he doesn't want somebody else taking half of it. A pre-nup that leaves her only entitled to half of what she physically put into the bank account during the marriage seems like a fair option, but I don't think it is. If she doesn't marry she's more likely to be able to buy her own property and develop her own assets. If she marries and puts her efforts into the joint house, and then has to leave it, she is worse off. I don't think she should be worse off from marrying someone.

Switch the genders if you like - I'm just using he and she because this specific example set me thinking.

Really in this case if she contributed to the house after they were married she would/should be entitled to anything she put into it after the marriage occurs and if the prenup doesn't reflect that it should. It's only fair. If she has to give up a job or the marriage in some other way causes her financial "harm" that otherwise would not have happened, that ought to be reflected as well.

If no other "harm" occurs because of the marriage she has to ask herself am I marrying him because I love him or am I marrying him because I can get more financially out of it (than she otherwise would have) if it all goes to hell.
 
Great idea in this climate of divorce.

We don't have one, but we both try very hard to be a team in our marriage and make it work. with that said, wise choice.
 
I don't think I have even known anyone in the UK to have a pre-nup.

They're really not that common here either. My uncle got one at the insistence of my grandfather because he was transferring the family homestead (wheat farm) to my uncle, he did not want the family farm to be lost or split up if things went to ****.

Wise man my grandfather because things went to **** in a bad way. Family farm is still in the family.
 
When I think prenup I think of people like Britney Spears and Kim whats her face.

And yes Forster, people do break up and become dicks. A girl a knew through her boyfriend posted some awful things about him on FB whenshe dumped him (basically telling people what he was like in bed and also some really private stuff hed confided in her with) I honestly cannot imagine doing that to someone. I supose it does depend on the circumstances of the break up. Perhaps Im too trusting of people but Id like to think the person who supposedly loves me wouldnt turn on me if we were to split.
 
If one partner is considerably better off than another then I can see why they would want a pre-nup and hypothetically I wouldn't be upset if someone wanted me to sign one if I was going to be married to a billionaire or something.:p