Are Prenuptial Agreements Getting More Common?

If you tell someone who is engaged that they should consider a prenuptial agreement, they may just raise their eyes in concern and ask you if you think their marriage is doomed to fail. This is the knee-jerk reaction that a lot of people have, especially in the older generations, when prenups were not all that well accepted.

If you mention it to a young person, though, odds are they’ll be open to the idea or tell you that they already have a prenup. These documents have seen a recent spike in use by as much as 62%. They’re getting more and more common, and the younger generations — with millennials leading the way — are embracing them more often.

Why has there been this shift in thinking? Some of the reason is just that young people today know that divorce is a possibility. Remember, divorce really began to spike in the 1970s and 1980s. No-fault divorce made it easier and more common than ever. Older generations thought of divorce as a rare event that should be avoided; these people from younger generations often grew up with divorced parents. They know it’s possible, they feel like it’s common and they don’t think negatively about discussing that fact with someone they’re going to marry. This makes them more likely to use a prenup because they both simply acknowledge that divorce is a possibility in the modern era and they want to be prepared.

Those who are thinking of using a prenup, or about getting a postnuptial agreement to add on to an existing marriage, need to know exactly what legal steps to take. An experienced family law attorney can be the source of valuable guidance.