DP wants a prenup!

[HappyHattie]

I’ve taken legal advice so fully understand how they do/don’t work- not looking for technical advice just opinions on whether IABU??

I am 27 DP is 32 - he earns 3x my salary. (mine is respectable and I’ve just completed a masters so will increase).

DP owned his home with about £150k of equity before we met. (He paid top end of the asking price so has not gained value and may lose a bit post Brexit)

Anyway we’re financially merged- joint accounts- I’ve never held anything back from him- including my £7k of savings when I moved in. (I know I still don’t match his income but still)

He did mention getting something in writing to protect his £150k much earlier in the relationship - fine, I was happy with that- my sibling has one as he had a large inheritance- I’ve always been independent!

But now we’re actually getting married - my £7k of savings has been swallowed up, I’m not yet named on the mortgage and we’re both wanting to start a family post wedding (2-3 kids).

The plan is I’ll drop down to PT - only today whilst talking it through with a solicitor did I realise how vulnerable I’ll be leaving myself!

I don’t want to have small children and work FT (my career is demanding and DP whilst eager to help is very much consumed by his career and often works away for short periods) I work with so many women who try to juggle this and their lives look miserable! I’d rather not have children than live like that!

So this evening I’ve been really deflated- feeling like I’m getting the shit end of the stick really - I’m not after his money (not at all) but equally I don’t really want to be drafting up a 14 page prenup which even the solicitor said ‘is likely to get quite complicated’

It also seems like it’s going to escalate from ‘protecting the £150k’ to also including inheritance, pensions, earnings...etc.

I didn’t sign up for not being a ‘team’ if I wanted to build a financial future alone - I wouldn’t be getting married.

I’m probably ABU 😞 but would appreciate some opinions!

(DP is a wonderful guy - honestly 10/10 on everything else but he had a really bad experience as a teen when he lost his parent and their very recent new spouse tried to take everything- think this has made him overly cautious)

Is OP coming back?

My ex husband soon to be told me the wedding was off when I suggested a PN - he was actually going to leave me altogether- fast forward 13 months of marriage he has now left me and coming after everything! Let that be a sad lesson /(

@Mummaaon oh dear that's awful. Will he be likely to get much?
I don't always understand the attitude of sharing everything what with the divorce rate nowadays. Obv diff once children are involved.

@Springiscomingsoon I reckon courts
Will soon see what he is about since it was just after our first wedding anniversary. Yep I married for life, it's so sad. X

I’d agree in protecting property, but it’s not making it ‘fair’ to the OP if she’s not got anything to invest in bar the DPs house. I’d not pay the mortgage etc, ask for my 7k plus any rent money back and invest in another property so you’re both ok in the event if a split. But if he wants no touching of pension, earnings etc then he’d have to go 50:50 with everything around house/childcare etc while you try and ma I use your earnings as well irrelevant of how much lower they are as you need to invest in case you split.

We had a prenup to protect DH inheritance that was put into our property. Become void once we had children.

Op, I have a friend who merged bank accounts. Its a nightmare, every penny accounted for and running arguments. Keep your own bank account. If you want a joint one set it up for bills and holidays and both put cash in to pay for stuff. Please don't get a joint account and that is your only account.

That aside, why the prenup at all? I would feel a bit stunned by all this. And it sounds like if down the road you split up he would be quids in and you woukd be left with practically nothing and his children. I would not marry him to be honest. Sure, start the family together and everything elce but don't go mixing your money with his. Protect your stuff op. I know he is nice now but things can change 10/15/20 years down the road.

Think long and hard about your potential future earning potential if you decide to take time out and have children.

Imagine the following scenario - based on a real person I know who is lovely but has been shafted by her dickhead husband.

They split up after his long term affair was exposed.
He owns his own business and gets to keep the nice big house and he moves his new girlfriend into it.

Ex-wife who has the 3 children much more often than the 50/50 they initially agreed (things 'crop up' so he often cancels or re-arranges last minute) can't afford a nice house in the same area so is living in a much smaller property that could do with a refurb. She sleeps in the tiny box room and 2 of the 3 children share a large bedroom. The male child has the second biggest bedroom.

Ex-wife is struggling to cover the bills and run her old car whilst still working p/t on a lower wage.
She is well qualified and had a good job in a large company before marriage and kids but because she took a few years off for maternity and can only work p/t hours, she knows she won't ever get considered for the higher paid jobs.

She can't work f/t as she needs to be around for the school run and several after school clubs and some weeks of the school holidays. Her holiday allowance isn't enough and she relies on her ageing parents to help out but they live a couple of hours away so they can't help out that much and struggle to look after the children for more than a few days at a time.

Ex-husband gets the girlfriend to collect the kids from school and he takes them on nice holidays together in the summer and at Christmas, they went ski-ing together.

Ex-wife is thinking about whether she can afford a week at Centre Parcs.

Ex-husband gets to play Disney dad and the kids think it's great that his new girlfriend takes them out for treats all the time.

My friend thought she had it all with the handsome chap who put her on a pedestal, living and entertaining in a big house in a swanky part of town but now she's the wrong side of forty, she's wondering how it all went so badly wrong for her.

This does not sound good. If you managed to lose all your savings to improve the quality of his life now, just think what it is going to be like when you have lost the freedom, the earning opportunities and became bound hand and foot, i.e. had children. You will have your potential severely curtailed in every way just by the virtue of having to care after children, for at least 15 years, possibly more depending on how many you have and the age gaps. I can’t believe he took that £7K savings off you with his salary of x3. This has got a great potential for financial abuse. And if you can’t stop/prevent it happening now when you are a young able adult with no responsibilities, think the hold he will have over you when you become vulnerable due to childbearing.

As a mother of three who is Masters educated, I cannot tell you how much having children has fucked my career over and my earning power in general. Fortunately, my DH fully supports us all financially (I work PT hours around the family). Knowing what I do now, no way would I be tying myself to a man whose main preoccupation is selfish concern of whatever kind. This is not how marriage works. Both partners will end up making sacrifices and giving up things they want/enjoy to care for the family. This is what marriage is like

If he can’t get that now, run for the hills. Otherwise you have got a lifetime a humiliation, powerlessness and misery. And I am not talking just about money.

OP isn't coming back.

She's probably cancelled the wedding because her wedding hairdresser has tattoos.

Harry's

My amazing, academic, sensible, quiet DH who I knew for 13 years prior to marriage and kids (whom I considered to be as solid as a rock and totally loyal) turned out to spectacularly fuck my life up and it came as a huge shock.

Don't put yourself in a vulnerable position with this man now he is doing you the flavour of showing you who he is and waving a big red flag right in your face.

Well if your 7k has gone on the house then you are entitled to 7 k of his 150k!!! He sounds like a tight arse. I’d think twice before marrying him.

I didn’t sign up for not being a ‘team’ if I wanted to build a financial future alone - I wouldn’t be getting married

Well then that's what you need to say to him. I wouldn't bother to get married to him to be honest, you may as well be housemates.

When DCs come along you are at great risk of being skint. He doesn't want to share with you financially, it's not as if he's hiding that.

Pre-nups aren't legally-binding anyway, so I don't know where he may have got that idea from.

he is wonderful and very loyal/shy academic type- I’m his first partner and he’s devoted to me

Don't make him sound saint-like, he's just a man. If he was wonderful you wouldn't be posting this issue, and anyway what's wonderful about being tight!? He wants all the benefits of a relationship, as long as you fully support yourself and he doesn't have to shell out. Boring, un-romantic, and as said likely to leave you skint somewhere or down the line

Can you elaborate dharma