To not see the practical point of getting married?

And how would you cope with inheritance tax? Just because your estate isn’t big enough yet doesn’t mean it won’t be soon. £325 000 isn’t alot when you add up property, pensions, insurance etc.

I do not see it like that.
So, I am the only earner in my household at present. My worry is that anything should happen to me, in which situation will I leave my family. So, as I am married, my partner and child have the best legal cover I can offer. Both by marriage, birth and by being named as benefitiaries in my assets. So that gives me peace of mind.
If I were the one with lesser income, it would be the other way around.
In case of divorce, we are both covered and will have to share the assets we got together. And it is only fair, as we decided to get them together. Even if I would to stay home. I would contribute by taking care of the home, children, chores, food, shopping, allowing the other partner to focus on work and have quality family life, instead of coming back from work to house chores. Like most of us have to face, indeed.
It is only unfair if I decide to give up work against my partner's will or I stay home and do nothing, so my partner still has to do chores after work, without any leisure time in return.
Basically, it is a huge commitment, for good and for worst, for rich and for poor and it goes on till death, even after a divorce, if there are children.

I know what you mean about marriage - I've always really hated being a 'wife' with everything that symbolises. However, I agree with other people that marriage offers both partners valuable protections in the case of death or divorce and I think it becomes even more important if you have a family in the future. Why not just have a civil partnership? This covers all of the legalities without having to navigate the fuss and usual wedding-related wank.

@Queenofswords88 this is what you would need to clarify. Re next of kin. If you fell ill and did not stipulate your partner as the one to make decisions, that could then fall to your parents to decide on medical issues if you are unable too. So maybe need to get legal advice. My siblings and I officially became my dad's next of kin when he fell ill, even though he had a partner of sorts. We were the ones the Dr's contacted when needing to discuss treatment and next stages. And then we were responsible for all the legal stuff re wills and funerals when he died.

I haven't read all the comments so apologies if this is already covered. One thing to note is that without being married to register the father on the birth certificate the mother needs to "present" him at the registry office. Without that he cannot be registered. In the unlikely event that something went wrong with the birth it would be a legal nightmare. This happened to someone I know and the father at one of the worst times of his life had to go through legal procedures (and ultimately adoption) to be seen as the legal father of his own child.

We aren't married and I agree with you that I don't really see the point practically. We earn about the same, we have wills sorting out joint property and the only benefit would be inheritance tax but not an issue on our joint assets and I am leaving my other assets directly to my kids and have life insurance to cover the tax. I guess the decisions on care in case of accident would be one other thing but I think we get along well enough with each others family that I can't imagine this being an issue

I had more money and earned more than DH early into the marriage. a few years in, and 2 DC with SN later, I had to give up career, work now in a low paid part time role whilst DH now earn about 3x as much as me. You just don't know what is around the corner....

The Tom Ford film 'A Single Man' shows movingly the possible outcomes of a relationship that's long term but not "official". In that case, as it's set in the 50s and a same-sex couple, there was no other option.

For us it was, yes. But then we are older so it's got to be considered.
With no official tie it would make the surviving partner's life much harder at a time when they are also dealing with the loss of their life-partner. It's not just about not paying tax, more about simplifying things at a difficult time.

It really depends on your circumstances. I agree you can replicate the protections of marriage for the lower earning partner or the one who puts career aside (who is not always a woman !) outside marriage.

@Needlenardlenoo I see, thanks. So it is all about planning for your death, if you want your partner to receive the house without a tax bill.

@Movinghouseatlast whilst you’re alive does that only impact investment properties or shares, so not a huge impact on the average person?

Inheritance tax surely?

Capital Gains. Income from Property.

Next of kin being "whoever you want it to be" is simply not true. I knew a man who had kids and ended that relationship and started a new one, and then he died. His current partner was not your next of kin and was entirely disregarded by police and coroners. His children were next of kin in order of age and when he died as they are not of age yet believe it or not their mother, who he detested was his next of kin. The police only signed out keys to his council flat to her, not his own mother or his partner at time of death.
She went in and rummaged through everything looking for anything her kids would like but left the place in a burgled looking state when she finally passed on the keys to his girlfriend. Of course she never paid for the funeral though. His mum had no rights but had to pay the funeral costs.
The ex was point of contact of the police and coroners and left mother and girlfriend behind with updates.
Police said that if he had married and divorced his ex then there's no way the ex would have been next of kin considering the situation it may have been possible to go to kids and then his mother seeing as though the kids were underage. Girlfriend again was never going to be next of kin in these circumstances.

Our lives have also changed since we got married. We are now in our sixties and have sadly seen a lot of illness and death affect people we know. We are living in a different country to our relations and had to draw up wills which took that into account for our kids. Life doesn't work out the way it's supposed to for a lot of people.

I was thinking main breadwinner for the first 0 years of our relationship. Then got chronically I'll and things switched.

Lots of people are saying there are tax advantages to being married but I can’t find much about that online unless one of you earns a tiny amount - under £12,570? https://www.gov.uk/marriage-allowance

Are there any other tax advantages?

To be fair it was a lot more than due to practicalities it was also because of equality.

We had a very small wedding… 2 sets of parents, brother and our 2 children in registry office and a meal afterwards.
I, like you, had no desire for a white dress and a big party and my partner didn’t either. We were financially similar and had wills etc.
What changed? The value of our house went up and inheritance tax became an issue and my job didn’t progress in the way I hoped with our second child was born and there became a disparity and I felt financially a bit vulnerable. So we got married (no romantic proposal just a very honest chat) Still married 20 years later. Financially again more similar !
The only downside was my eldest felt a bit aggrieved when someone at school pointed out he was technically a bastard for being born out of wedlock and that seemed to be a big deal when he was 15.
It was really simple to get married, I just phoned and booked the registry office for a day during the week, plenty of availability for the small room.
Now I’m older, and we’ve had ups and down in our relationship, illness, redundancies, bereavements I’ve been happy with the sense of security marriage gave me … maybe I would have felt the same if we were unmarried but I guess I will never know.

This is the thing everyone forgets when they urge women to get married. Marriage is designed to protect a full time carer/home-maker. It's essential if you're a SAHM. If you are the breadwinner in the relationship getting married is an actively bad idea.

The divorce rate has been falling for more than 20 years. Yes fewer people are marrying but also a smaller proportion are getting divorced.
https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/birthsdeathsandmarriages/divorce/bulletins/divorcesinenglandandwales/2023

The divorce rate has been falling for more than 20 years. Yes fewer people are marrying but also a smaller proportion are getting divorced.
https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/birthsdeathsandmarriages/divorce/bulletins/divorcesinenglandandwales/2023

It's maintenance, which is ongoing, half your pension and any future assets if they are substantial. A deed of trust is not in any way comparable.

If one of you were to become seriously ill, get involved in an accident and were unable to give consent to share medical information, the hospital would tell you nothing. Neither would banks, you would be locked out from access to all that vital information.

Marriage is no longer the same as it was previously and the divorce rate is rather high. It’s a very sensible option to weigh up if it’s the right thing to do financially.

If you’re the financially weaker partner, going to be a SAHP or basically lose a lot of your income working PT in a low paid role, marriage offers some financial security.

However your circumstances are different as you’re not starting on a level playing field. Instead of early 20’s with similar assets, you are a bit older and you are the higher earner even when PT. Not just that but your other savings and pension as well as higher house equity. You will need legal advice on the impact of marriage for the declaration of trust and whether the marriage could negatively impact its reasoning in the first place