Decades ago, only people with considerable assets drafted prenuptial agreements. Nowadays, they’re far more common for people with any assets that they want to protect as they enter marriage. More younger people are seeing the value in these legal documents. In fact, over 40% of the young married couples in Gen Z have reported having prenups. How many of these prenups were crafted at the encouragement of parents isn’t known. However, parents with considerable assets (including their own inheritances) often have strong feelings about their children putting prenups in place before they marry.
If you are a parent, you can’t require your child to get a prenup – and threatening them with disinheritance or lack of any kind of financial help if they don’t get one is likely going to backfire. Even if you convince them, their spouse-to-be still has a say in the matter, but more about that later.
Talk about prenups before your child is considering marriage
There are other, more effective, ways to encourage your child to seek a prenup. It’s best to bring up the subject before they’re in a serious relationship. This keeps it from being seen as a reflection of your opinion about their chosen partner. You can talk about why it may be necessary to protect hard-earned family assets (including businesses and real estate) that may one day belong to your child. If you’ve never discussed family assets with your child, this is the time to do so. They may only be thinking of their small apartment, used car and student loan debt and not realize they have anything worth protecting in a prenup.
Don’t pressure their spouse-to-be
As noted, your child’s future spouse has to agree to the prenup. Further, it needs to be fair to both parties, and each should have separate legal guidance as they draft it. As parents, you can’t get involved in its drafting. You also can’t pressure your future in-law into signing it. That’s a sure way to render it invalid if it ever needs to be used. Even presenting someone with a prenup after money has been spent on wedding preparations and invitations have been sent out can be viewed as undue pressure. There are other ways to protect family assets from divorce that you can explore.
If you have questions or concerns about your child’s prenup, whether it may need to be drafted in the near or far future, it can help to get experienced legal guidance. After all, just as every marriage is different, so are the needs associated with every prenup.