Full Focus Limited
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Kathy Martin: 027 2800 564
Recent Focus August 2007
Estimated reading time for this issue: under 5 minutes
Please feel free to forward this on
Will your assets walk out the door when your relationship (or your child’s relationship) breaks up?
Don’t just dismiss this as not applying to you.
You might not be in a relationship now, but you’ll want to know this for the time you are – and I’ve known plenty of self-professed “single forever” people who unexpectedly (even to themselves) end up in a relationship.
Maybe you’re already married, have been for years, and intend staying that way. Fantastic … that’s good to hear given today’s divorce statistics … but maybe your assets aren’t at risk from YOUR relationship – maybe they are at risk from your children’s relationships (now that’s a thought isn’t it!).
And maybe you just know someone who really needs to hear this (in which case forward it on!)
This is something no one can afford NOT to know about. If ignored, you run the risk of losing a fair chunk of those assets you’ve spent many years (not to mention lots of hard work) building up.
So read on …
From the day a relationship gets serious, the clock is ticking.
What‘s “serious”.? Hmmm … good question! I don’t think this is particularly “black and white” as far as the law goes, but one thing is sure – if you’re living together then it’s fair to assume that the date you started co-habitating will be seen as the date it gets “serious” (if not earlier!). 
So let’s go back to that clock ... the one that starting ticking after your relationship got serious. This clock will tick happily away for 3 years and then STOP. That’s it. It’s too late then. You will have lost your golden opportunity. The chance to secure your wealth and your assets will be gone – FOREVER!
This is not an easy subject to tackle. It’s incredibly uncomfortable and emotive and generally people avoid it like the plague Let’s be honest – who wants to sort out a legal agreement on how to deal with the break-up of their relationship (or their children’s) when it’s just starting - still in that warm and fuzzy “last forever” stage. But as I mentioned above, statistics clearly show that a large proportion (one third in fact) of relationships DON’T last forever. Let’s just say for a minute, that your relationship ends up in that one third portion - unless you have a property relationship agreement in place the parting of the ways could be incredibly messy and incredibly costly. You don’t want to add financial ruin to the emotional pain of a break-up.
So how are you going to broach the subject of a property agreement - a bit daunting isn’t it? But let’s get real - as awkward as this may be, if your relationship can’t survive this, what hope will it have of dealing with the more difficult tests that will come in the years ahead. And let’s face it, life has a habit of throwing curve balls at us from time to time. And here’s the other thing – the longer you wait the harder it will become.
You can of course also choose not to tackle this. But you’d better be REALLY clear on all the possible ramifications further down the track! Whatever you decide, I recommend you DO make a conscious decision rather than having one made for you, by default, 3 years down the track.
As I said at the beginning – if it’s your son or daughter who is in “the relationship” you’d better start thinking about how many of YOUR assets could walk out the door with THEIR ex-partner!
Poor old Jack fell into another legal trap and was forced to give $75,000 to his ex-son-in-law. It might be worth taking an extra minute to read his story.
Sometimes it makes a lot of sense to use an independent consultant to assist in working through this with you. And let’s be honest – no one relishes the thought of dealing with this touchy subject – it’s just too emotionally charged to be a pleasant experience! Having an unbiased third party can take all the heat out of it. You can, in effect, reach agreement by mediation well before you need to involve a solicitor. This can be a smart move – and one that might save your emotional wellbeing ….. not to mention your financial wellbeing!
You can read about how John and Sally saved themselves a lot of money by using an independent consultant to sort out their property agreement.
Our Special Report will give you more information on this topic, and on how to tackle this tricky issue.
Do you know someone we might be able to assist? Please give them our contact details, refer them to our website, or provide us with details so we can contact them. Click here to see how we’ll handle your referrals
The previous issue of Recent Focus (How to get the best deal with your life, trauma and disability insurance) received some great feedback. We are currently in the process of helping a number of clients review their life, trauma and disability insurance. We’ll keep you posted!
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