Mediating Prenups: A Better Path Forward for Marriage-Positive Prenuptial Agreements

GETTING MARRIED?

Thinking About Having a Prenuptial Agreement?

Wondering where to begin?

Mediating Prenups details how to begin the process by choosing mediation as the best first step in creating a marriage-friendly prenuptial agreement. In the book, the author describes the potential problems that develop when beginning with the usual attorney-led negotiations, both by initiating a damaging power imbalance as well as engaging in inflexibility that can harm the viability of a marriage. Those standard methods result in creating terms embedded in the resulting the prenup that can diminish marital contentment and resilience.

Mediating Prenups describes a better process: By working within mediation at the outset, an engaged couple can develop terms collaboratively, which benefit both future spouses (and the relationship itself) over time in their marriage. Finally, the author explains, in detail, the mediation process which she has found to be effective in helping future spouses come to an agreement regarding the financial terms of their marriage-terms that actually support the upcoming marriage when a prenuptial agreement is needed.

With a clarity and grace that comes from years of experience helping couples through the pain of divorce, and now helping couples create healthy marriages, Laurie Israel shares her insightful, optimistic, and grounded wisdom on building a strong, collaborative marriage. She details how mediation can be used to solve the financial issues inherent in marriage, including in second marriages, marriages with children of wealth, business owner marriages. The book also addresses how to think about and resolve many other financial issues encountered when marrying, whether or not there will be a prenup.

Mediating Prenups is a perfect companion to Laurie Israel's previous two books about prenuptial agreements. In this book she finds just the right balance between being a step-by-step how-to book and a deeper more philosophical dive into the concept of prenups, money and marriage, and a healthy way to think about them.

Mediating Prenups is a gem of a book. In short, concise chapters, it is a thought-provoking read for marrying clients, their advisors and equally for attorneys and mediators, who care about creating a peaceful and collaborative process for couples working on prenuptial agreements. The book contains loads of tips, both small and large, for negotiating an agreement which focuses on the long-term health of the marriage, not just an agreement to protect the financial assets or income of one or both of the parties.

Shocking, but true, as Laurie points out, when financial advisors and attorneys fail to discuss prenups with their clients using a marriage-supportive lens, it actually serves to create marital risk rather than mitigate it. The book provides solid advice for building a happy life with a new spouse, digs us out of the era of marriage-weakening prenups, and spiritedly charts a new way forward.