Prenuptial Agreements Alleviate the Financial Pain of Divorce, but Not the Emotional Pain

Years ago, when Julia Rodgers founded the startup company Hello Prenup, she did it with the goal of making prenuptial agreements affordable and accessible to couples in all income brackets. Rodgers is a family law attorney, and she had seen numerous cases where prenups enabled the divorce case to resolve with less stress and expense than if the couple had tried to negotiate everything from scratch in divorce mediation. The stereotypes of prenuptial agreements functioning as a vote of no confidence in marriage and that prenups are only for people who are unusually wealthy, stingy, or distrustful are outdated. Rodgers believes that everyone needs a prenuptial agreement, just like everyone needs an estate plan. It is possible to draft a legally valid prenuptial agreement without a lawyer. To be sure that your prenuptial agreement will accomplish its intended purposes, contact a Boca Raton prenuptial and postnuptial agreement lawyer.

All Marriages End, and the Court Always Gets Involved in the Distribution of Property

Rodgers frequently reminds her clients that, even though only 40 percent of marriages end in divorce, all marriages eventually end; the other 60 percent of marriages end when one spouse dies. In either case, the court must oversee the distribution of property, whether it is a divorce court signing off on a couple’s marital settlement agreement or a probate court administering a deceased person’s will. Also in both cases, writing down your wishes in a legally binding document ensures that the distribution of property will go the way that you intended it and not according to a judge’s interpretation of what is fairest. Therefore, your prenup should include provisions about what happens to your property if the marriage ends when one or the other spouse dies.

Your Prenup Can Specify Different Outcomes for Different Marriage-Ending Events

As with wills, prenups can never be too specific. Your prenup can specify the property division consequences depending on the circumstances under which the marriage ends. You might remember the news story about the Florida couple whose prenup indicated that the wife would keep the couple’s waterfront mansion if they divorced because of domestic violence, but the husband would keep it if the marriage ended for any other reason. They were in a better position than if they had not signed a prenup, but they still ended up in a legal battle over whether the incident where the police came to the house counted as domestic violence. Likewise, some couples include provisions in their prenups about what happens if infidelity contributes to the breakdown of the marriage; they, too, should be specific about what counts as infidelity. For example, should you rely on the infidelity clause if your ex was exchanging flirtatious texts with someone your ex met online, but they never met in person?

Contact Schwartz | White About Simplifying Your Marriage With a Prenuptial Agreement

A South Florida family law attorney can help you draft a prenuptial agreement that you can later rely on in probate court.  Contact Schwartz | White in Boca Raton, Florida about your case.

Source:

yahoo.com/lifestyle/articles/m-divorce-lawyer-divorced-truth-123000275.html