Prenup, Post-Nups & Relationship Agreement FAQs

Get answers to your relationship agreement FAQs: What is a prenup? How do I get one? I want to live with my partner, what are the requirements to register a domestic partnership in New Jersey? Why do I need a palimony agreement? And more. We have taken all of the questions we are frequently asked and have answered them below. If your answer is not here, submit your question and an attorney will answer you directly.

Relationship Agreement FAQs

Why should I get a prenuptial agreement?

So many people want to know if they should get a prenuptial agreement but they consider it to be unromantic. The reality is, it’s not exciting to create a contract between a soon-to-be husband and a wife, it’s a business situation. The most common element that you have is to try to protect prior business interests that might be generational. So let’s say your great-grandfather established a business that’s flown through the family and it’s developed and you want to keep it in the family. Well, it’s really a responsible business decision to make sure that you protect that asset for the person who originated the asset.

Many people also create prenuptial agreements when they’re starting a relationship and they already have children from a prior relationship and they want to make sure that those prior children are protected, not only from their new union but also from an estate planning purpose. So just be mindful that it’s not about not looking forward to your new marriage and your new life, it’s about sometimes just being responsible so that the two of you, you and your new spouse, don’t have to disagree and fight about things into the future but you go into your new union with certainty, understanding and a greater degree of expectancy.

Should we mediate our prenuptial agreement?

Prenuptial agreements are interesting, because you need to think enforceability later on. You have to start from the beginning and think about it into the future. In order for a prenuptial agreement to be valid, you absolutely have to have independent counsel. So even if you’re going to get a mediator involved in so far as talking about the consensual terms of what will be contained in the prenuptial agreement, absolutely under every circumstance both parties have to have independent attorneys representing their interests. And both of those attorneys have to sign that document with the parties that they are representing. If there’s not independent counsel, that document automatically fails.

Request an Initial Consultation

REGISTERING A DOMESTIC PARTNERSHIP IN NEW JERSEY

The New Jersey Department of Health’s Office of Vital Statistics and Registry offers the following information about the various requirements necessary for registering a domestic partnership between couples in New Jersey. At Weinberger Divorce & Family Law Group, LLC, we also recommend you consider reviewing information on cohabitation or domestic partnership agreements as you proceed with sharing your lives as a couple together.

What are the requirements to register a Domestic Partnership?

Couples wishing to register a Domestic Partnership must be couples who are both 62 years of age or older. Couples must also meet the following requirements:

  1. Share a common residence in New Jersey or in any other jurisdiction provided that at least one of the applicants is a member of a New Jersey State-administered retirement system;
  2. Both persons are jointly responsible for each other’s common welfare as evidenced by joint financial arrangements or joint ownership of real or personal property;
  3. Both persons agree to be jointly responsible for each other’s basic living expenses during the domestic partnership;
  4. Neither applicant is in a marriage or civil union recognized by New Jersey law or a member of another domestic partnership;
  5. Neither person is related to the other by blood or affinity up to and including the fourth degree of consanguinity;
  6. Both persons have chosen to share each other’s lives in a committed relationship of mutual caring;
  7. Neither applicant has terminated another domestic partnership within the last 180 days.
    (This prohibition shall not apply when the previous partnership ended due to the death of the other partner.)

For further information, legal forms and additional requirements, pleasecontact us or check out the State of New Jersey’s printable information on Registering a Domestic Partnership in New Jersey found here: www.state.nj.us/health/forms/reg-d33.pdf‎

Safeguard your future.

Call now: (888) 888-0919