Would you advise marriage in this financial scenario?

[ABagLady]

I see a lot of posts on here about making sure to get married before having kids etc. to avoid being left in a bad financial situation in the event of a breakup. But if I, as the woman in the relationship, was earning an order of magnitude more than the man, and had enough saved up to be able to live comfortably for a very long time, would you still advise marriage? Given how much people can change over time, I don't think I'd ever want to take it for granted that a partner would never leave me. Are there any legal protections that would still make it advisable from my point of view?

No unless you were getting end of life treatment or told your illness was terminal, and wanted him to inherit without paying loads of tax.

Ken Dodd was married 2 days before he died to his long term partner of 40 years for that reason alone.

No, I don’t think you should get married. I would advise the opposite if you were the financially vulnerable person as a woman but if the man is financially vulnerable it’s very different to being a financially vulnerable woman in this society. No matter how little a woman has she is almost always expected to take the children, pushing her further into an already impossible situation. If the man is the low earner, so what? He rarely needs protection from the situation of having no work, no cv and kids to mind full time alone as it’s highly highly unlikely his female partner will dump the kids on him and fuck off, never to support again. Happens occasionally but this is hypothetical so statistical probability are what I have to form my opinion here.

Depends on where you live and what your priorities are.

Marriage should never be recommended as a blanket statement for all people.

It totally depends on the situation.

A big question is are you expecting him to take a hit career/finances wise when you have children. If he is expected to come out of work when they are ill and can’t go to childcare, reduce hours, stay at home for a period and so on then it would be shitty to refuse to get married. But that rarely happens that way round.

Thats why women, are often told to get married before having kids. Because having kids usually means the woman takes a financial/career hit which can go on for years. Even when women work, childcare is often viewed as their role. So they may pass over opportunities that mean the man has to do the bulk of the childcare or often leave to pick up a sick child. This, in turn, damages their security.

I would recommend everyone seeks financial advice when deciding whether to marry. Especially if kids will be or are involved.

I would also tell anyone, that if they have a partner that earns a lot more than them and wants them to take a hit to their own security to have kids, they should walk away.

Obviously your current financial situation is important. But are you planning on having children? Has it been discussed what might happen eg will you both continue to work full time, will one of you go part time or give up work entirely?

Obviously planning to have children is no guarantee, but future plans are relevant.

And there was me thinking that people get married because they love each other.

Marriage is a legal contract.

Most of the straight people I know who have got married have done so because they plan to have children together or already have children.

Otherwise they may as well have lived together.

Hopefully that’s not the only reason anyone gets married.

If you’re poorer get married, if you have the assets don’t.

I'm more than intelligent enough to realise that it's a legal contract, thanks very much. My sarcasm clearly passed you by though.

Hopefully it would be one of them.

do you mean you hope it’s one of them in Your own marriage or when you get married?

If that’s what you wish, then of course it should be one of the reasons.

But this thread is about finance and assets and marriage. Not love and marriage.

Depends on where you are, OP. If you're in the UK and have significantly more assets than your partner, that could be a big risk. Prenups have some weight but aren't legally binding.

The problem is you do not know what tomorrow will bring.
What if you suddenly drop dead with young children? If not married my understanding is he wouldn’t automatically inherit and he could any up paying tax on anything you do leave him. Could you potentially end up leaving children in the care of a parent who would struggle financially to care for them?
Probably best to get some proper legal advice and good wills drawn up.

Definitely. If you decide against marriage, you'll want to know where that leaves you legally and whether there are any other provisions you might want to put in place. Again, varies hugely depending where you are.

For clarity, I am based in the UK.

There are different laws in different parts of the UK. I've heard the Scottish position is quite different to England and Wales. not sure about NI.

To my knowledge Scotland is the only part of the UK where the wealthier spouse has some protection. Otherwise the starting point is for everything to go into marital assets and potentially get split down the middle in a divorce.

I wouldn't advocate a man who was high earning and home owning hold off marriage just so he can preserve his assets. Indeed the men I've known like this are very selfish.

Marriage should be about equality. So as long as you are both working equally hard and contributing to domestic burden then it's fine.

I would advise a man or a woman to enter into a prenuptial agreement as far as it can be made legal to ring-fence assets brought into a marriage. This should be rescinded on the birth of children.

I had a good friend who did this. She was happy to accept that his house was not hers when they married. Then as they've been together for decades and they had children together the house became the family home. They would never break up but if they did they'd divide the assets equally.

Pre nups can be contested and if children are involved and the children would end up in poor circumstances likely to be dismissed.

I would advise people to marry if they are going to have children. If very obviously no children will appear due to age or hysterectomy I would advise to never marry if there are very unequal assets. My friend is like you and has married someone with almost nothing. She was close to 50 so no children were ever going to appear. I thought she was crackers marrying.

It is blisfully naive to think people will never break up and that if they do it will be civil I have a friend currently divorcing her unfaithful DH, she had been with him for close to 35 years. He really did seem like one of the good guys and the least likely ever to do the dirty. It’s getting pretty horrible all round.

No, I wouldn’t advise anyone, man or woman, to marry in such circumstances. At least not without a prenup (which are usually upheld, with some caveats) drafted by a solicitor with expertise in the field.

It’s sensible to protect yourself. It doesn’t mean you’re anticipating a failed marriage any more than wearing a seatbelt means you expect to crash.

Then the children inherit everything.

However if there is no will, so no trustees etc, then the poorer parent will have to go to Court to get any money.

Sarcasm doesn't work on the internet especially if you don't use emojis.

Can he afford to financially support you whilst you have babies?

Can he afford to have you drop your hours when your babies are young?

If no, then why would you marry him? You'd be giving away half of your assets AND raising the children