Prenuptial and postnuptial agreements may be associated with celebrities and extremely wealthy individuals \u2013 but they\u2019re for everyone! In fact, a 2023 poll by Axios\/Harris found that over 50% of American adults\u00a0polled said they were open to signing a prenup. If you\u2019re considering a prenup or postnup, it\u2019s important to do it the right way to ensure it is valid and enforceable. Here are ten things to know about prenups and postnups.<\/p>\n
For a prenup, don\u2019t bring up the topic for the first time a few weeks before your wedding date. It\u2019s important to take time to discuss what you and your intended spouse want the prenup to achieve, to hire counsel, and to take time to review, consider, and fully understand the specific language in the agreement before signing it. Ideally, bring it up before you even get engaged. It\u2019s harder to consider your interests in signing a prenup, or to refuse to sign one at all, once the engagement ring is already on someone\u2019s finger!<\/p>\n
Even if you don\u2019t have significant wealth now, many marriages end in divorce, and a prenup can help simplify that process by addressing non-child-related issues like division of assets and debts, and alimony. It can also protect gifts or inheritances received during the marriage in the event of divorce. Significantly, it can also protect you from liability for your spouse\u2019s debts in the event of divorce.<\/p>\n
A postnup must be \u201cfair and reasonable\u201d both at the time of execution and at the time of divorce. An experienced family law attorney can help you ensure that the terms you\u2019re agreeing to will be considered fair and reasonable, which helps ensure the agreement is valid.<\/p>\n
This can result in significant alimony payments, liability for one another\u2019s debts, and division of all assets held by either party, including gifted and inherited assets \u2013 and in a long-term marriage, this could mean an equal division of all assets the spouses hold, regardless of how they acquired them.<\/p>\n
You\u2019ll pay for lawyers to negotiate and draft the agreement, but the legal fees can be significantly less because you\u2019ve already dealt with some significant issues that won\u2019t need to be renegotiated if you divorce.<\/p>\n
Because the spouses are already married when signing a postnup, some different considerations apply. After all, neither party has the option to simply refuse to get married like when signing a prenup, which means they\u2019re giving up rights that they already have. If the knot hasn\u2019t been tied yet, walking away is much easier.<\/p>\n
In the absence of a prenup or postnup, a surviving spouse could challenge the will in Court and seek to disinherit children from the prior relationship in the spouse\u2019s favor.<\/p>\n
This may be due to marriages occurring later in life than they did previously, after spouses have started a career and begun to build their own wealth. Prenups and postnups are an effective way to protect that wealth, as well as wealth acquired in the future, if they\u2019re done well.<\/p>\n
No verbal agreement would ever be upheld by the Court.<\/p>\n
Without independent counsel, there is a significantly higher chance that the prenup or postnup will be determined invalid and unenforceable. You want your prenup or postnup to be worth the time and effort that went into it.<\/p>\n
If you need assistance with creating your prenup or postnup, please contact your Bowditch attorney.<\/p>\n
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Prenuptial and postnuptial agreements may be associated with celebrities and extremely wealthy individuals – but they’re for everyone! In fact, a 2023 poll by Axios\/Harris found that over 50% of American adults polled said they were open to signing a prenup. If you’re considering a prenup or postnup, it’s important to…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":73,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[64,54],"tags":[56,66,65],"class_list":["post-72","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-postnuptial","category-prenuptial","tag-divorce","tag-postnuptial-agreements","tag-prenuptial-agreements"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n