Many Wyoming couples and others around the nation choose to develop prenuptial agreements before they tie the knot. These agreements are understandably based on the couples’ current job and family arrangements. However, what happens with those prenups when a couple’s situation changes? Divorce experts offer some advice on how major life events may affect marital agreements.
One couple’s prenup was written based on the husband working and the wife staying at home with any future children. In reality, after they had been married for six years, the wife had started a successful business. In fact, the business was so lucrative, the couple decided that the husband would stay home to care for their children. Since their situation had so drastically changed, they wondered if their prenup needed to be revised or if a postnuptial agreement should be developed.
It would be beneficial for any couple to review the terms of their prenups after some time has passed. In most cases, agreements are written with gender neutral terms. Therefore, it would not necessarily matter which parent was the primary caregiver to the children. However, other issues may warrant revisions to the agreement. Particularly, if a business was developed during the course of the marriage, it would be imperative to determine if the assets were considered to be joint or separate in the marital agreement.
Prenuptial or postnuptial agreements can be very useful documents if a marriage ends in divorce. Agreements made apart from the stress and emotions of a separation certainly can help avoid additional conflict. A Wyoming divorce attorney can help develop these marital agreements at any stage, whether before a couple marries or long after the wedding occurs.