Prenup - the easiest / cheapest option

This forum was a huge help to me during my divorce a few years ago, so I thought I’d ask for your perspective again.

I’ve since met a wonderful woman, and we’re now at a point where remarriage is very much on the table. I’m incredibly fortunate to be looking forward to becoming a father again, something I never expected to experience again and feel immensely grateful for.

I trust her completely, but my children are a bit anxious about the situation. They’ve asked that I put a prenup in place to ring-fence their inheritance (them and grandchildren), from any spousal claims from her or the (yet unborn) child or other future children. For the avoidance of doubt, I’m not a millionaire and there isn’t a vast estate at stake at all. I’m aware that all of this may seem excessive, but I’m willing to go through the process if it helps reassure my children and ease their concerns.

She’s originally from abroad (Ukraine) and not a native English speaker. Her English is improving quickly, but probably not to a level where she could comfortably understand legal language. A friend has mentioned that, for a prenup to be valid, she may need her own solicitor and a professional interpreter to ensure she fully understands and agrees to it. Is that true? What would be the lowest cost option to arrange the whole thing?

The simple thing is just don’t get married again.

Ask yourself what is this woman bringing to the partnership, is she wealthy on equal terms with you? If she isn’t then be wary.

Someone once told me years ago, if you can’t afford to get divorced, don’t get married.

Of all the wonderful women in the country you have just happened upon an Ukrainian woman? Think very carefully about this. If you marry her and then discover her motivation was not love you would not be the first. Ask yourself how many British men have married Ukrainian women and then gone on to celebrate their golden wedding anniversary. And how many such marriages have ended in a divorce which has been ruinous for the husband? (And it does usually seem to be British men who marry Ukrainian women rather than British women marrying Ukrainian men).

Listen to your children. This could be a match made in heaven but it may not be and the costs are high if you get it wrong. Prenuptial agreements are hardly ever waterproof at the best of times. If this woman did not get independent legal advice and an interpreter to translate the document into Ukrainian such an agreement would be all too easy for her to set aside. Indeed, if you are contemplating having a child together it is quite likely the birth of such a child would be sufficient reason to set aside any prenuptial agreement. That child would in any case have rights of inheritance every bit as valid as any of your other children and while that child was a minor the mother would also have substantial rights by virtue of that fact alone.

If you actually press the matter and insist upon a prenuptial agreement, independent legal advice for her and translation of the document into Ukrainian to counter any argument that she did not understand it what do you think will happen? If you are met with, "Don't you love me? Don't you trust me?" that should tell you everything you need to know. Take care.

of course it is likely insane for OP to marry this woman. But from a rational perspective it is insane to marry in England in general if there is a big wealth gap and if you are a man (probably also if you are the wealthier woman to be fair). So the fact that she is Ukranian isnt important, the fact that she is probably poor is.

It doesn't matter where you get married (or divorced, come to that). The place of marriage is unimportant. What is important is whether the English courts have jurisdiction to settle financial issues following divorce. And they can acquire that jurisdiction in many ways but primarily it revolves around domicile or residence or some sort of combination of the two.

Also, there can be significance in nationality because any divorce lawyer can tell you that there are recurring (and often different) patterns of behaviour when different nationalities are involved. For instance an Ukrainian woman may be more likely to deny that she is poor by claiming assets etc in Ukraine (or wherever) which she can't get them out or realise for this, that or the other reason than, say, a Thai or Filipina would say such a thing, Obviously these are generalisations which may not apply to particular individuals but divorce lawyers often do see recurring patterns of behaviour.

interesting, do you see any patterns in terms of which nationalites/regions are the best/worst in terms of perhaps also attitude during divorce?

Yes, although you have to bear in mind that British men tend to marry only a limited range of nationalities. And it does tend to be men who do that sort of marrying. Although some British women also marry people from other countries that is much less common and often as much to do with immigration (at least so far as the would be husband is concerned) as about marriage.

In terms of financial carnage British men who marry, say, a Thai will tend to come out of it better than, say, a British man who marries an Ukrainian. One reason for this is because Thais are overwhelmingly Buddhist. That tends to give them a very different approach to life. Thais are, for instance, very respectful of the elderly for much the same reason.

Conversely for religious reasons it would be very rare for a non muslim British man to marry a muslim woman (and there are about forty majority muslim countries). That is because it is forbidden for a muslim woman to marry a non-muslim. The patterns a divorce lawyer encounters tend to span only a relatively narrow range of nationalities.

So, yes, there are patterns even though every individual does not necessarily follow a pattern. These are just generalisations.

Incidentally, one very common pitfall is buying a property in the country of the foreign spouse. In the event of divorce you can usually say goodbye to such a property. From the point of view of the British spouse doing this is hardly ever a good idea unless you are prepared from the outset to lose the money.

You see the same sort of thing in other spheres. For instance scam telephone calls often come from a disproportionally small range of countries. If you look carefully many times there are reasons for these phenomena.

On a completely unrelated subject there are often reasons for things which are not immediately obvious. For instance, the A1 is a road which runs from London to Edinburgh. Over the years I have often used it going to one court or another. Something which puzzled me for a long time was why it has so many sex shops. After all, it is a road which mainly runs for miles and miles through open countryside. Why so many sex shops?

It turns out that there are good reasons which I had never thought about but which are compelling once they are explained. They have good car parking, they are high profile and they are discreet - you're not likely to run into your neighbour inside. The shops are also fairly isolated in that they are situated away from schools and town centres and communities likely to complain. And as one operator said, 'We can never get away from the fact that we are British and everyone is frightened to death of being seen going into a local adult store, but if they are 100 miles from home they have the confidence to go in.'

This applies to much else. There are usually reasons for patterns.

Merry Christmas everyone, and thank you for the concern and kind messages.

Just to give a bit of context of how I happened to meet her, she originally stayed with me as a refugee, as part of the hosting scheme. I wanted to do something useful, and at that stage we weren't partners at all (it was not even a remote possibility from my point of view, as she's nearly 40 years younger). During a pretty rough period with my health, she looked after me in a way I honestly hadn't experienced before. It was completely selfless and caring, for no reward at all.

I should also say, I'm not exactly a man of means. I've got a small two bed flat in a Midlands town (£70K max) and a state pension due next year, so if she were a gold-digger, she's not a very good one. She's six months pregnant now, which still feels slightly surreal. My son will be much younger than my grandchildren, which is not something I ever expected to be saying.

There is another practical side to the marriage too. Ukrainians are here on temporary visas, and I couldn't imagine a situation where my child might be forced to leave and grow up in a war zone. But that's not the main reason. The simple truth is that she's the best woman I've ever met, and until now I didn’t even realise this kind of woman still existed.

Just to add, she isn't poor either. She's a qualified doctor with good savings and is currently sitting the UK NHS equivalence exams (just a few left to go, 100% pass rate so far). Once those are done, she'll be qualified to work at consultant level in oncology.

>>There is another practical side to the marriage too. Ukrainians are here on temporary visas, and I couldn't imagine a situation where my child might be forced to leave

Frankly, this a big red flag. If there is a visa issue involved in the proposed marriage then think very carefully whether the motive is love or visa. There is a huge age difference here. Even if you do not marry this woman but she moves in with you and has the child then in the event the relationship breaks down (as it might do for all sorts of reasons including age and culture) then she will be in a position to make YOU leave the flat until such time as the child ceases to be dependent. And if you marry her you would probably lose title to the flat too.

The next point you probably don't want to hear but are you sure the child is yours? If you marry this woman and then the child is born it won't matter whether the child is yours or not because even if she told you the next day that the child was not yours you would still be liable to maintain that child because he/she would be treated as a 'child of the marriage'. However, if you did not marry and discovered the child was not yours then the child would be the responsibility of the mother and the biological father (unless you still went ahead and married the mother). You almost certainly do not want to hear this but I have seen this happen before and the facts here mean it must be a real risk. This woman is much younger than you. It would not be unknown for such a woman to have a male partner of whom you are blissfully unaware. Is it likely she was celibate until she met you?

Then there is the issue of the woman's qualifications. Have you INDEPENDENTLY checked these qualifications and the body administering these exams? This may seem far fetched to you but it is something I have seen before. The qualifications then become something of a mirage which never quite materialise.

You have said two things which make this possibility more than fanciful. The first is that you have referred to a marriage affecting her immigration status. If what you say is correct one has to ask why should she could not get a visa in her own right once she qualifies to work in the NHS. The other, of course, is that one assumes Ukraine has great need of doctors which one imagines that a patriotic doctor would wish to do her bit to address.

Now, I may be totally wrong about any or all of this. After all, divorce lawyers do not see happily married couples although I am sure they do exist. All the same I would be doing you no favours if I didn't say that I have seen situations like this before so I would urge you to be very careful There are red flags here. You run the risk of your life being devastated if you get this wrong.

I understand the scepticism, but yes, she was a virgin before we got together, and she is genuinely devout in her Christian faith. I'm a bit more worldly myself, but still a believer, so that part of our lives aligns more than people might assume.

She's currently working in healthcare here at a junior level, and the NHS is partially funding her doctor equivalence exams. I assume that means her qualifications were properly checked before any support was granted. She wouldn't be of much use as a battlefield doctor anyway as she’s an Oncologist, and I’m completely confident about that,, when I was unwell my own oncologist listened to her very carefully and treated her as an equal. I'm fully in remission now I am happy to say and it is to her credit too.

At this point, switching to a work visa isn't really an option, as she's about to go on maternity leave. But thank you for the questions and the caution. I do understand where they're coming from (and I don't blame my children for being careful either)

You will actually be disinheriting your children if you marry this woman and take on the child. That is because she and the child would then automatically become dependents and their claim would outrank that of any adult children you have more less regardless of any will you may write to the contrary.

I am less convinced by professions of Christian faith than you are for three reasons. First, it is not unknown for people to profess the Christian faith for reasons unrelated to faith. Some muslim asylum seekers do it simply because they think it strengthens their claim to asylum for instance. Second, if a person is out to deceive they will use whatever deceit they think best works with the intended victim. That is how scammers work. Third, if a person does actually genuinely believe such a belief can often justify (to the believer) acts which are objectively bad. Bad people do bad things but it usually takes religion (or an ideology) to make good people do bad things.

Of course most believers just believe and try to live a good life but professing to be a Christian is by no means a guarantee of virtue.

I don't buy this virginity stuff I'm afraid. Virginity went out with the ark (and the contraceptive pill). If another man is the father then she would say that, wouldn't she?

Obviously I may be wrong and this woman may be a second Mother Theresa for all I know. Unfortunately I have seen this type of scenario so many times that I would take a lot more convincing than you and therefore I would urge you to be very careful.

Currently in the process of divorcing a young woman born in Ukraine.

Met her at 21 and I 26. Very different situation to yours but she pushed for engagement and then marriage based on tradition and my intentions towards her, which I agreed to. Honestly the sense of love I felt for her was unlike anything I'd had before and in many ways it was the best relationship I'd ever been in up until the last few years. Sadly she changed and all of the affection and devotion she showed me extinguished.

In the last three years I found her to be uncompromising, quarrelsome, and unwilling to communicate. She was also very enmeshed with family here and abroad many of whom have big opinions they like to share and all of whom have been married more than once. Instead of holidays together she has travelled back to Ukr 3 x per year.

I don't regret the relationship but I do regret the marriage. In hindsight I would have opted for a non-legal marriage abroad though she wouldn't have gone for that.

You are already deeply financially tied to this woman if she is carrying your child. As said marriage will maximise this.

I hope your experience has a better outcome than mine. I'm now of an age where the prospect of children with someone around my age is getting very unlikely. So my vision for the future has gone and I'm doing my best to pick up the pieces and carve out a new identity separate to her.