If you have children from a previous marriage and you plan to remarry, you should take steps to protect them, especially if those children are young. It’s not realistic to expect a new spouse to have the same loyalties to those children as your former spouse, the children’s mother or father.
When some people remarry they put all of their assets in joint name with the new spouse or they make wills leaving everything to that spouse. There may be a verbal agreement that the new spouse will take care of the children if anything should happen but that puts the children from the first marriage at-risk.
Instead, a formal prenuptial agreement should be entered into before the remarriage. A valid prenup can protect the property of all the parties involved.
A prenup should list both parties’ assets, as of the date of the remarriage. These assets should be kept separate so the original owners can claim their individual assets, in case of a subsequent divorce, or direct how they’ll be transferred, as part of an estate plan. In order for a prenup to be recognized by a court, both sides should have independent counsel and the agreement should not be one-sided.
