Reasons for Marriage

[Colossus]

What if you accumulate wealth over the next 30-40 years?

The lawyers here can correct me if I'm wrong, but pre-nups cant protect you from accumulated wealth within a marriage.

Regardless, I dont think anyone here needs any convincing of the potential negatives. The decision will be different for every man.

I've preached this for years, but the BEST thing you can do to protect your future is to chose your woman very, very carefully. It's very much a business partnership as much as a romantic/emotional partnership. Marriage is high stakes, and like a high stakes business deal, you cannot eliminate all risks. If you just cant get over the risks, don't do it. If you have doubts about her, don't do it. But realize you incur many of the same risks by cohabitating in an LTR, and with shared children you are as good as married should you separate.

Everyone's path is different. No one can replicate mine, and I cant map yours. I can tell you how I got here and made my decisions, but the bottom line is it made sense for me---it may not for you.

 

[Bible_Belt]

how does getting married cut her tuition rate?

In Florida, there are a lot of International students, so the state universities made up a special high rate just for them. In-state tuition is the lowest. Out of state is drastically higher. International student rate is even higher than out of state. She went from being a foreigner to being a state resident.

 

[Bible_Belt]

The lawyers here can correct me if I'm wrong, but pre-nups cant protect you from accumulated wealth within a marriage.

It is technically possible to set aside a business in a prenup and keep the accumulation from the spouse at divorce. But the list of prerequisites is a long one. The wife can't ever touch any of the business money or business accounts. She can't have anything to do with anything...ever.

Plus. even assuming all of the above. a pre-nup is a contract, and a contract is only as good as the lawyer who wrote it. Just because you paid some sleaze bag attorney to write a prenup for you doesn't mean you're going to be invincible in divorce court years later. A better lawyer can likely get that prenup thrown out.

 

[Yewki]

The lawyers here can correct me if I'm wrong, but pre-nups cant protect you from accumulated wealth within a marriage.

I'm not sure as well, but one good way to protect your future wealth and assets is to not get married either.

 

[Yewki]

Where in society? The only place I see something that even remotely resembles this, is when you run for a very high ranking public office, which again doesn't apply to 99.999% of guys on this forum or in this country.

I can't find any studies indicating one way or the other, but I know if I had to blindly pick between trusting a 30 year old single guy and a 30 year old married guy with family I'd go with the married guy. But going back to LiveFree's post, I don't see why that actually matters. Like why would that impact your decision to get married?

 

[Tenacity]

The lawyers here can correct me if I'm wrong, but pre-nups cant protect you from accumulated wealth within a marriage.

As BB pointed out, they can if your attorney properly structures the pre-nup agreement and particular actions are taken during the actual marriage. But as I pointed out before, a pre-nup still isn't insurance, it will only hold up based on how the actual marriage itself was ran/operated.

Regardless, I dont think anyone here needs any convincing of the potential negatives. The decision will be different for every man.

Correct about the negatives, but dude I'm waiting to learn about the potential positives of the situation? What in the world are they?

I've preached this for years, but the BEST thing you can do to protect your future is to chose your woman very, very carefully. It's very much a business partnership as much as a romantic/emotional partnership. Marriage is high stakes, and like a high stakes business deal, you cannot eliminate all risks. If you just cant get over the risks, don't do it.

- The best thing you can do to protect your future is to NOT enter into bad business deals.

- You are right, the marriage contract does make the woman your "business partner", only in this business your "partner" doesn't bring ANYTHING to the table but gets access to control of your company and OVER HALF of the profits of said company. Because again, I'm still waiting to find out what does your "business partner" bring to your company (your life) that you can't get without that partner? For the life of me, if I'm a start-up business and I bring on a partner, usually that partner will have experience I don't have, equity capital I don't have, access to networks I don't have, or time/energy to work the business that I don't have...thus their VALUE is evident. What in the hell does a marriage contract bring to my life that I don't already have?

- Yes, marriage is high stakes and you can't eliminate ANY of the risks, so you are correct when you say if a guy just can't get over said risks, don't do it. Because at the end of the day, what in the hell am I taking the risks for when I'm not getting anything NEW in return?

But realize you incur many of the same risks by cohabitating in an LTR, and with shared children you are as good as married should you separate.

Not even close my friend lol. As long as the state you are in isn't a "palimony" state, having a girl stay with you doesn't provide the level of risks that being married does when you guys break up. And having children doesn't provide the level of risks either as long as you pick a woman that is NEAR your income level in terms of earnings.

Everyone's path is different. No one can replicate mine, and I cant map yours. I can tell you how I got here and made my decisions, but the bottom line is it made sense for me---it may not for you.

I still don't understand how getting married TODAY without even a pre-nup in place, made any lick of sense for you. I'm still waiting to know what benefits, positives, or anything rewarding you received from doing said agreement that you were not, did not, and could not receive without doing it.

 

[yuppee]

right, IF you are stupid enough to marry a woman who brings nothing to the table. But if you have any brains, you marry one who makes big money and kicks down plenty of it to YOU.

 

[Yewki]

I can think of one reason and one reason for you to get married:

Because it's what YOU want to do.

You can want to do anything, but doesn't make it a good decision. And this isn't one of those things you want just do then learn about the hard way later.

 

[LiveFreeX]

Where in society? The only place I see something that even remotely resembles this, is when you run for a very high ranking public office, which again doesn't apply to 99.999% of guys on this forum or in this country.

Yes, I'm not making my posts from the standpoint of the typical American marriage. For that I would advise no one get married.

 

[BeTheChange]

It wasn't anyone's "idea"; we both wanted the same thing in life. I asked her but it was more of a conversation, not a contrived down-on-one-knee thing.



You know in some ways I agree with you. Originally I wanted to just do a "less-then-legal" ceremony; meaning a wedding with our families but without an actual marriage license. The more I looked into it, the less sense it made. If you try to flip the government the bird the get you one way or another. In my state (and many others I suspect), if a couple lives together, refers to each other as husband and wife, wears rings, had a ceremony, etc---they are married in the state's eyes. So it would be moot, AND we wouldn't get any of the legal benefits like tax breaks, certain insurance, power of attorney for healthcare decisions, etc.

I did not do a pre-nup with her because I have no significant assets to protect. Yeah I make a lot more money but a pre-nup doesn't protect that prospectively. This was my decision---she was on board as well if it made me feel more comfortable.

If marriage is something a guy wants, I think a good metric is to find the girl who will stay with you even if you told her you will never ever sign a marriage license. That's a "ride or die" woman, and the one you want.

It's not for everyone, and in most modern cases I think the risks outweigh the benefits. My circumstances are somewhat unique and like I said, if it weren't my wife, I'd probably not marry.

That's quite interesting. From a legal perspective I still think it would be difficult for her to claim any assets if as a couple if you weren't legally married, especially in a state or country that doesn't practice common law marriage. As far as substance goes the state has about as much right to demand alimony from a ceremonial "marriage" as it would me giving my girlfriend a promise ring.

My gf knows a legal marriage is off the table and she's still around so perhaps in time (like ten years!) I might consider a ceremonial marriage (no government contract of course) as a "reward".

 

[yuppee]

It was necessary to bring my gal here from the third world and I"d have done it anyway., but I'm old and will guard my assets.

 

[mrgoodstuff]

It was necessary to bring my gal here from the third world and I"d have done it anyway., but I'm old and will guard my assets.

If I do it' I will pick an educated babe from Brazil. They stereotypically treat their men good and throw down in the bedroom too.

 

[yuppee]

China is a better choice, cause there you can find MD's, Engineers, dentists, etc. Keep to the kind that can make 150k+ per year, here, so she thinks nothing of giving you 50k per year for the 5 years it takes her to get her citizenship.

 

[Yewki]

so perhaps in time (like ten years!) I might consider a ceremonial marriage (no government contract of course) as a "reward".

In ten years get some pixie dust and throw it in the air, "Woo we're 'married' now, happy?"

 

[Tenacity]

"A fool and his money are soon parted." - Thomas Tusser.

I have no pity for any man, KNOWING that the marriage laws make no damn sense in this country, who STILL signs up for it based on "emotional" B.S. such as "the one", "she really loves me", "she treats me good", and (insert any other emotional B.S. here).

Marriages would last decades ago based on survival, not this emotional based B.S. that a lot of you proponents of marriage are spitting out.

So go ahead, make the Divorce Attorneys and Judges happy. As one Divorce Attorney said on the DIVORCE CORP DVD, "When I see a newly married couple I smile, because that's inventory."

 

[LiveFreeX]

If your goal is to live in America, I would not advise marriage. My goal is to escape back to the 3rd world and build a bridge between the two so that I don't have to deal with regular society in any capacity.

 

[yuppee]

you must be a weak punk if your woman even DREAMS of messing you over like that.

 

[Yewki]

My goal is to escape back to the 3rd world and build a bridge between the two so that I don't have to deal with regular society in any capacity.

I think I'd rather live in the US and never touch a woman again than move to a 3rd world country. Women are not terribly important, I'd rather have all the 1st world conveniences.

 

[yuppee]

it takes MONEY to live decently in the third world. More so than here in the US, actually (if you know anything) now that satellite Net can be had for $100 per month, and solar and biomass chargers are low cost. especially if you dont care about having a woman (or will settle for a low grade 3rd worlder) you can live just fine in the US on 5k per year and you can make that much easily. You can make 3k per year just selling your blood plasma. So can your wife.

All it takes is having a couple of "mining claims", One where it's warm in winter and another where it's cool in summer. You can have all the rights of a landowner, on 20 acres, for $120 a year (per claim).. You can have a garden, small livestock, a van and small tow trailer on your "claim site", plenty of room for 2 people to live in.

 

[yuppee]

I live ok in the US on 5k per year, right NOW. A year ago, in the Philippines, I was spending 1.5k per month. and I was NOT traveling, nor living on the nice spots, nor visiting the tourist traps. It was costing me $15 a day to eat decently (just me, not the girl also). here, I eat on $3 a day.