To ask you why you chose to get married?

[PoesyCherish]

Was it purely practical reasons or does / did it mean more to you?

DP has been married before and the divorce cost him no end of stress and money. He would get married again but I'm half wondering why? I've been engaged previously to someone who was abusive. I stupidly and naively thought marriage would make us happier and more stable. That is until a friend kindly pointed out that marriage doesn't change anything and actually if anything, in my situation it would've made things worse.

I think I'd like to get married to DP but given mine and his past experiences, I can't help but question my motives. I only want to get married for the right reasons.

So, why did you get married? Do you feel it changed anything - for better or for worse? If you had your time again, would you make the same decision?

@GreenTulips there's a difference between tenants in common and joint tenants. I'm unsure on the inheritance tax issue but in terms of who automatically owns the property on the event of one of us dying - with joint tenants the ownership is automatically transferred to the other owner. In the case of tenants in common then yes you're right in that it probably would automatically go to your DC first. This is why we wanted to go down the joint tenants route as we'd rather the other person be able to remain the house whilst still alive.

Ahh thanks @Gottagetmoving re inheritance tax issue. The estate is nowhere near worth 325k as it currently stands so wouldn't have that issue.

We were together 8 years before getting married. At first I didn't really see the point. But after 4 years and owning a house together...I just started to feel odd calling him partner or boyfriend - like there was nothing then to distinguish him or me from all the other partners or boyfriends before (when we knew it was more serious). We wanted to let the world know we were committed to each other.

Also I started worrying if something happened to him, it would be his parents who live in another country who got to make decisions like turning off life support (a bit morbid I know!). We had already made out wills to each other and made each other beneficiaries of pensions and life insurance and stuff but legally there are gaps between that and getting married I think.

Lastly I think I would be lying if I said pressure from society didn't play a part. I started thinking 'well why doesn't he want to marry me' and got sick of answering questions at weddings etc about our turn. I know that's a rubbish reason but when you're asked for the 100th time I does make you think.

We had a small registry office wedding (like 6 guests) in the UK and I don't always wear my ring (just don't like the feel of jewellery and I do a LOT of cooking and kept taking it off and forgetting about it so sometimes easier just to keep it safe and not wear it). I also didn't change my name.

I've always believed in marriage and wanted it to be something that would happen in my life. My parents divorced when I was 4 and I cannot remember them ever being together; I had a very happy childhood however always wanted my own children to have a solid family unit. Obviously you don't need to get married to have children and stay together forever, but I do very much believe in that ideal.

Quite simply I married my husband because I love him and want to share the rest of my life with him. He's a decent man and I know he will always do his best to look after me and our children.

With tenants in common it goes to whoever the dead person willed it to. Be that the other tenant, the kids or the cats home. Easier to challenge a will that doesn't provide for you if you're married though.

What you don't want is to be cohabitants without wills, because then, the estate is distributed through the intestacy rules. Which are pretty shit for unmarried partners. If you intend to remain unmarried, wills are essential. As I said upthread, think of cohabitation as an active choice not just something you do if you don't think marriage is ideal. Pick the one that suits you best and make it a deliberate choice.

Do also remember that either of you can sever a joint tenancy any time you feel like it and you don't need the permission of the other one to do it. This is true whether married or not.

Cos we wanted children, if I had if fell pregnant unplanned I’d have demanded we got married - for both our rights and legalities.

@HesterShaw1 I’m so sorry for what you’re going through. It can and will get better. I think that putting in all that effort shows you the type of person you are, and just how committed you can be. It’s admirable and something you can’t truly know about yourself until you’re tested.

Take care of yourself.

I met DH when I was 26 and he was 23. I had always said I would never get married but not because I didn't believe in it.

The opposite in fact. I have very strong views on marriage - I believe it is for eternity, I don't believe in divorce (even if my marriage broke down I would not get divorced) and very strong ideas on infidelity. My parents had and still have a very strong happy marriage and I wanted the same.

I didn't honestly think I would meet anyone with the same views as mine but I did. I fell head over heels in love but also, maybe more importantly, I found my best friend, someone I wanted to spend the rest of my life with.

Luckily he felt the same about me and has exactly the same view on marriage, divorce and infidelity as I do. He proposed after 2 months. I did suggest living together but as I had lived with someone before (never with any view of marriage or it being a long term thing) DH wanted our relationship to be different and more special.

We got married 5 months after meeting. We had no money but wanted to be together. We have been married almost 40 years. Of course we have had our ups and downs but are still very very happy.

Everyone in my family is married or, in the case of younger nephews and nieces, engaged to be married. There is literally no divorce in my family - parents married over 60 years, siblings married 38 years, cousins married at least 28 years, aunts and uncles married over 50 years

Do also remember that either of you can sever a joint tenancy any time you feel like it and you don't need the permission of the other one to do it.

That's not what our solicitor told us. She said be damn sure about making it joint tenants not tenants in common because in the event of us splitting, if we made it joint tenants we'd need the others permission to do anything other than 50:50 when we come to sell.

We were very young (22 and 21 when we decided to get married, both 23 (but DH only just) when we actually did it. I'd just finished uni and DH was doing post-grad. A few friends were beginning to get engaged and married and I guess we just thought it was the natural next step. We're still happily married nearly 30 years later, so it seems to have been the right thing for us, but I'd be puzzled if my DC (who are around the age we were when we got together) wanted to do the same thing now - it sounds awfully young.

For older people and those who have been married before, I can see 2 sensible reasons for getting married:

1. for administrative and financial protection

1. because it just feels right

I think number 1 would be the bigger motivator for me now.

I got married because part of my religion is that you shouldn’t have sex before marriage (don’t get me wrong, I did and my husband was really frustrated by the period of time between when I unilaterally decided to start being faithful to my religion and us getting married). On a more practical note I didn’t want to have a family without being married first, both for legal convenience and because that’s the example I’d like to set. Finally I think making marriage a condition of my husband and I’s relationship was a good test of his commitment.

On the financial side, you have to consider not just what your current assets are, but also what they are likely to be in the distant future. If you have children, one of you may compromise your finances to be on hand for your children. If you are not married and one partner cuts down on their career to take on more family responsibilities, the other partner may continue to pursue their career full tilt. If your partner does this, earns loads of money and invests it for himself or buys himself more houses with his money, will you be content with him doing that? If you would, it is ok to stay unmarried. If you plan to have the career and let him take on more family responsibilities, and you become rich, would you prefer that he didn’t share in your wealth? If you both don’t want to share future assets, don’t get married!

More info about joint tenancy severance without the agreement of the other tenant.

www.gov.uk/joint-property-ownership/change-from-joint-tenants-to-tenants-in-common

Although this is for England and Wales, maybe you are in Scotland or NI. I don't know the position there.

Because I loved him and because we wanted to be a team.

Married 7 years today!

Love each other, like being married - it feels different somehow. More solid maybe. I appreciate it isn't always the reality!

From a practical point of view though, legal protection with having dc. I've had a year out of work, will likely have another if we have more dc. I currently earn less and couldn't keep our home/pay childcare on my wage alone.

If we were to separate then I want to be as sure as possible that I'm legally entitled to financial support from dh so my dd doesn't lose out. Not that I'd expect him to be a dick about it anyway, but you can never know.

When I was growing up I witnessed so much from my parents relationship. From about 91/92 onwards their relationship was sour. My father was an alcoholic and a cheat and he was abusive. He left in 99 but didn't pay any maintenance. My mother was afraid of him and never rocked the boat. Nearly 20 years later, they are not divorced and recently debt problems from my father came to light. Huge debt problems.

Here I am, the go between between my parents. So much from the past dug up. I suggested divorce down through the years to my mother but she never did. The man was gone from the house and the home left us alone and she didn't want to rock the boat. I had to be firm with my mother recently and tell her that she had to go for divorce now. She has no choice or his debts will become hers if he was to take a turn. Here I am, pushing her into solicitor office and sorting out so much and trying to keep the family home protected. What a way to sort out their divorce - wait until the offspring is old enough to do it for them. I thought recently, why would anyone get married?

18 months, I started dating a man and things have been good between us. We get on so well. We go into a world of our own and a world of calm when we are together. He very recently produced a ring and popped the question. I got the shock of my life and I was very surprised. I said yes to him. I didn't know how to turn him down or if I should. I do love him very much but I'm torn. My parents rubbish relationship was at the back of my mind and still is - why would anyone go and get married.

I'm unmarried, 2 DC by 2 fathers I have assets. DP doesn't have any assets at the moment. My will would mean that the children get everything.

Marriage worries me in that they are not necessarily protected. And that puts me off massively.

So I understand for those who have gone the traditional route of marriage then kids, it's a positive. But what about those of us who stand to lose more and so do our DC?

It didn’t matter to me at all until we had our first child. Then it dawned on me that for financial security for me and our child, we needed to be married. DH wasn’t fussed really, but when he saw how important it had become to me, he agreed.

Never gave a stuff about big dresses or ‘our special day’. It was a nice day, though .

Other than the security it has given us, the only other benefit had been using ‘husbabd’ to refer to him. I was getting a bit old for ‘boyfriend’ and ‘partner’ always made me cringe.

I think I would have married anyway (very traditional upbringing) but, just before I met DH one of my work colleagues partners died very unexpectedly. She had no rights whatsoever (they rented) - she wasn't his next of kin so the hospital wouldnt deal with her and his parents, clearly deeply anguished, just sidelined her, like she meant nothing. Had they been married, she felt that it would have been very different - she once told me that she felt saying 'my boyfriend died' just didn't express her situation as well as 'my husband died'.

They had been together for 14 years.

I understand @MingeUterusMingeMingeYoni Sorry I misunderstood the earlier post regarding it. Purely from that perspective, marriage wouldn't actually stop that from happening though would it?

I knew that I was going to marry DH as soon as I met him. It does generally show a greater commitment than just living together as you actually have to decide to do it whereas you can end up living together by accident as staying over just gets more frequent and for longer

I mainly got married for the security for my children, it was important to me growing up in a broken home, that my children all have the same father and we all have the same surname.

I was 19 when i got married, been 31 years so far

No OP, I was just dropping it in to make sure you knew! Marriage does mean that if each of you potentially has more of a claim on the others assets if you split, but that would be true whether you hold as joint tenants or tenants in common.

I wasn't aware of it at all @MingeUterusMingeMingeYoni so thank you!

I was 22 when I got married and already had a 3 year old DD with DH. We got married because we thought it was the right thing to do, we loved each other and I wanted the legal protection marriage offered since I was a SAHM. I guess we also wanted to create the stability neither of our parents offered us as kids. We have been married 5 years this year and have a DS who's 3.
Good luck with whatever you decide OP