What You'll Hear In This Episode:

- About Aaron’s areas of expertise, including divorce, custody, child support, and pre- and postnuptial agreements

- The importance of setting clear financial terms during engagement reduces marital issues

- Fairer prenups lead to happier marriages

- Discussing what couples want to achieve with the agreement instead of using the term "prenup"

- Addressing the negative connotations and stereotypes associated with prenuptial agreements

- Meeting legal requirements such as signing the prenup at least a week ahead and having an opportunity to meet with an attorney

- Using prenuptial agreements to achieve transparency in relationships

-- Negative consequences of financial surprises during a relationship, such as hidden debt

- Regular meetings to discuss finances, similar to shareholders' meetings

- Communal assets and their potential complications in divorce, such as owning a house or making mortgage payments before marriage

- The potential loss of pre-marital assets in divorce settlements

- The benefits of having joint and separate accounts or an allowance system

- The tendency for people to be more comfortable being physically naked than financially open

- Lack of transparency in finances negatively affecting other areas of a relationship

- Being open about finances showing vulnerability and strengthening the overall relationship

- Not all family law attorneys are knowledgeable about prenuptial or postnuptial agreements

- The trade-offs involved in prenuptial agreements and the importance of making an intentional choice

Key quotes:

"My wife and I have regular checkpoints, whether it's annually or quarterly or even monthly, for us to sit down and talk about the finances." — Aaron Thomas

"A couple can be married for 10, 15, 20 years, and then a divorce happens and all of a sudden the wife is like, ‘What do you mean he wants half of the house that I paid for for 20 years? What do you mean he wants half of my retirement when he sat on the couch when I was out there busting my rear end to earn this money?’ She didn’t realize that when she got married, the default rule is that everything the couple earned over the course of the marriage is considered marital property." — Aaron Thomas

"Setting clear financial terms during engagement reduces marital issues, and fair prenups lead to happier marriages." — Lisa Shield

"Without a prenup, a lot of people lose what they built up even before the marriage." — Aaron Thomas

"Most couples find it best to have, like I said, three buckets, a joint bucket and then two separate buckets so you still have autonomy over the money in your separate funds." — Aaron Thomas

"It's one of the biggest issues about relationships in general…people fall in love and they're under the illusion that whatever they're feeling in the initial stages is going to go on for the rest of the relationship." — Lisa Shield

"People today...have an easier time getting physically naked than they do getting fiscally naked." — Aaron Thomas

"What you are saying is that having a prenup isn’t just about preparing for what will happen in the case of a divorce. When you write a prenup, you're also looking at how you're going to handle your finances throughout the marriage. That's a very important distinction that you're making there." — Lisa Shield

"And I would actually say that one of the sexiest things my husband ever did was on our fifth date, he sat down and he literally said, these are my finances. He told me. And for me, I felt so taken care of because he was being completely transparent.  It spoke volumes about who he is, who he would be as a partner, and what our future would look like together. A lot of couples are afraid to talk about those things, but for me, it was sexy." — Lisa Shield

Continue On Your Journey: 

Lisa Shield | YouTube | Facebook | Instagram | Book a Call With Lisa

Email the podcast at: podcast@lisashield.com

Continue On Your Journey: 

Lisa Shield| YouTube | Facebook | Instagram | Book a Call with Lisa

Email the podcast at: podcast@lisashield.com