Our Family & Matrimonial Team at Ridley & Hall are here to guide you through the steps to protect yourself and your assets if you said ‘YES’.

Cohabitation

Noun

The state or condition of living together as husband and wife without being married.

A cohabitation agreement is a legal document between unmarried couples who are living together. It clarifies and sets out arrangements such as who is responsible for which bills, finances on a whole, property, children and even pets. This is agreed while you are living together and takes effect if you split up, become ill or die.

These agreements can be made at any point during a relationship, however, it’s always good to do it before you take that step and move in together, have children or get a joint mortgage.

Prenuptial agreement

Noun

An agreement made by a couple before they marry concerning the ownership of their respective assets should their marriage fail.

Although a prenuptial agreement is not necessarily enforceable in the UK, so long as both individuals have taken their own independent legal advice and they are fair and reasonable in what they are looking to protect before they are married.  More and more we are now seeing the Courts being guided by them.

The same applies for postnuptial agreements, once you are married look at getting a postnuptial agreement on what assets you want to protect, by taking legal advice.

Remember, you may have to pay much more in legal fees if something goes wrong and you do not have any of these agreements in place!!

So, before you say ‘YES’ please speak to the Family & Matrimonial department at Ridley & Hall on our freephone 0800 8 60 62 65 or via our free 24/7 live chat facility on our website to book an initial consultation to discuss cohabitation agreements, or pre/postnuptial agreements.

Kate Hames – Solicitor