Preserving Wealth, My #1 Tip. Don't Get Married! (Or Maybe You Should?)

[H. Palmer]

From what I read in this thread some people are mixing up two different definitions of success and then arrive at dangerous conclusions.

One definition of success is not having to divorce. The other is becoming a fastlane business success.

The two are totally unrelated and the problems with this mix up are twofold.

1. Just because some billionaires say that it's their spouse that is the main factor behind their success, doesn't make it so.

If you really study billionaires, there are two things consistently coming up in every single billionaire's life story: 1) total commitment coming from passion and 2) working their assess of day in day out for decades in a row.

2. A divorce is never good for business, agreed. Does that mean that having a wife (or spouse) makes it more likely to reach fastlane level?

Hardly. The facts are that 99.8 percent (this is almost the exact number to a decile point) of all couples staying together all their lives will never reach the fastlane level. For argument's sake I define fastlane level here as having 10 million dollars. 99.0 percent will never reach 1 million. Around 90 percent will never reach 100,000.

The guys, and it's almost always the guys, that do reach fastlane level and are doing that from a position of marriage have a special type of woman, namely one that is compatible with their dreams and in many cases buys into the dream.

This can have different causes. The ambition was always there in the woman to have such a man or they went through hell together and supported each other to the hilt and then after that have unlimited faith in each other.

At the same time I'm seeing more and more guys reaching fastlane level without ever having been married at all. Think Zuckerberg, Tai Lopez, Tim Ferriss. Even MJ was unmarried when he built limo.com if I remember right. And way back Bill Gates didn't even have time to be married.

So if the billionaire says it's his wife that made him wealthy, understand that it was a special type of woman that was compatible to his dreams. She always was that way or she had become that way. What he also means is that the vast majority of women ARE NOT LIKE THAT.

This also means that marrying a woman or being in a marriage already does not brings you any closer to a fastlane business exit. It's only a small percentage of women that is capable of doing that. All the others have a sidewalk or slowlane mentality and will at their best not be an obstacle or help their guy in a marginal way.

 

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[RHL]

+$700 rep bank in less than 1 hour smh I'm ditching this automotive shit and writing books.

 

[Lex DeVille]

+$700 rep bank in less than 1 hour smh I'm ditching this automotive shit and writing books.

Hell yeah! Give em' what they want!

 

[H. Palmer]

Btw, thanks RHL for the great compilation of statistics!

I realize now that the chances of ever getting rid of my wife are close to zero. ( end of kidding mode).

 

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[GrensonMan]

Hell of a tip! Spend your life lonely, rich and sad as f***. Why do you even live?!

PS. Didn't even read the post nor the replies. The title itself got me furious.

If you think that marriage is a cure for loneliness or that marriage gives you a reason to live then I would be curious to know how you fare in life.

tl;dr
Get a hobby, make some friends.

 

[OzzieRob]

Here in Australia marriage is not required for a partner to take half the assets of the other partner if it can be proven that they lived together as a couple and were in a relationship for 2 years. If the defacto relationship has lasted less than 2 years and there was childen involved or the partner has contributed a substantial financial contribution then the 2 year hurdle doesn't need to be passed. It's game on to take a share of the partners assets unless a written agreement was provided while in the relationship.

 

[MorgothBauglir]

damn RHL went in.

Still not getting married though.

 

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[ddzc]

What an awesome thread, it's great seeing the viewpoints of all which differ immensely. I say, all the power to whatever works best for you, especially when it comes to entrepreneurship. I was common law in early 20s and lost everything from it at a young age, home, furniture, etc.you name it, had a few hundred in the bank after it all. I personally have a different mindset on the subject, as I previously did...I never want to get married, but that can all change in a split second.

In terms of the topic of this thread, great point if you want to preserve your wealth. Some of the guys on here have been married for decades, this shit doesn't cross their minds, as it shouldn't. If you know someone for 6 mths to a year and get married, I don't give a shit who it is, prenup, put your property, business name in your families name, etc whatever... and protect your future if anything were to happen.

 

[GlobalWealth]

Interesting post,

I know this video/post is from marriages in the USA. I'm wondering how other divorce courts handle it. How about other countries? Wondering if any of our friends here in the forum outside the USA can comment if divorce courts are as bad outside the states.

I'm personally not against marriage or women. I love females, but as someone posted above you can do basically everything without getting married. It's just a paper that binds you into a legal contract. People also change as they age.

I was looking into statistics on marriage the other night and it said that (Out of 1,000 recently divorced men in the survey) 80% of men surveyed felt rushed/pressured into marriage from there female spouse before they were ready or comfortable. Out of those 1k men that got divorced 64% of divorce's were filed by women without the men having any clue or sign of divorce.

My buddy got divorced 3 years ago & I was there for all of his divorce hearings & court dates, the judge that he got was a male and so bias. Threw countless stuff out of the window & didn't listen to anything on my friends side. He didn't have kids yet which prob the best decision of his life. His wife was pretty much a stay at home wife and could do whatever she wanted, she ended up becoming an alcoholic and getting them into tons of credit card debt. He was a hard worker & owned his own company that was making him a nice salary employed a dozen people & made him some nice profits.

Judge ruled she got to keep the cars, house & granted her 50% ownership in his business. He had to pay all her legal costs during the battle. Also had to pay alimony ($8,000/per month) for the rest of his life.

He wasn't having any of it and tried to appeal it up to the supreme court & lost.

What was his next plan you ask? Be a SLAVE for the rest of his life? NOPE

Since he didn't have any kids he decided to renounce his US citizenship & got citizenship in another country. POOF it all went away.

LADIES & GENTS,

@MJ DeMarco wrote it in his book. BE A PRODUCER not a consumer. Countries around the world will bend there rules & regulations for PRODUCERS. PRODUCERS help create jobs, products & tax dollars. CONSUMERS do not. PRODUCERS have CONTROL. As you can see with my buddies story you can take everything away from him. But you cant take away his skill to produce, production will always be in demand in a global economy.

As for my friend he's doing great now, happier then ever he lives in south east asia. Started another company and has the same lifestyle that he once had in the united states. The only difference is he pays single digits for taxes

I see his ex-wife around town a lot, plays the victim role & constantly telling ppl how much of a POS he is and telling ppl i'm still friends with him & how i'm a POS. She came up to me the other day and told me she found out he's living and south east asia. She quoted "I hope he likes living in that dump of a 3rd world country broke & homeless. He deserves it!!!" I looked at her straight in the eye and smiled then said "Yes he does".

In my friends best 5 word phrase. "Produce, Then GO WERE YOUR TREATED BEST

Best. Response. Ever

 

[GlobalWealth]

Well that's interesting that he escaped the divorce machine out of the USA.

The documentary makes a case that other countries have better laws, specifically northern europe.

If this becoming an anti-wife thread, make a mental note it wasn't me who took it there. I'm not anti woman, I'm anti lawyers and family court. From what I gather from the documentary it's not your wife/husband that will take the money, it's the lawyers.

I'm not posting it on a public forum, but yes. Northern Europe is WAY more fair.

 

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[GIlman]

Totally agree with everything @RHL said!!!

The funny thing about statistics though is that they are meant to evaluate populations, but to an individual they are meaningless. They are not a reason to get or not to get married.

For instance, if 3% of the population will get some cancer in their lifetime, that statistic means nothing (0%) to you if you never get that cancer. But if you do get that cancer, then the impact is 100% to you. In other words, to an individual statistics are black or white 0%/100%. Polarizing topics usually means that the impact of being in one group vs the other is substantial (strong positive vs strong negative) but neither group understands the position or perspective of the other.

So good marriage is a good thing, and bad marriage is a horrible horrific thing. These are the two sides of the coin. Therefore there is confirmation bias in people opinions because they will either have a good marriage that props up their life or a horrible marriage that drags them down. It's a gamble, that's the risk, yes there is a reward if it works out.

Something I want to point out in the Study of billionaires alluded to, is that there is certainly survivor bias at play. There were certainly individuals that would have been higher on the list of financial accomplishment that were not because of divorce and both the financial and emotional turmoil that divorce takes on people, especially the emotional turmoil. In other words peoples who's marriages survive are more likely to have wealth and be successful than people who's marriages failed, they are the survivors.

All of that said, I don't believe money is happiness (fun yes), I have two wonderful kids and a wonderful partner (but we aren't married at the moment). I find tremendous value and fulfillment in these things. And quite frankly all of life is risk, much of that risk we don't even understand till after the fact, but to live is to take risks and we all do it every day with everything we do.

 

[throttleforward]

I just wanted to chime in that after coming home and describing @Esquire 's presentation to my wife, we agreed that it was in our and our son's best interest to get a post-nup that fairly protected both of us and our son and got any future divorce proceedings out of the family court system and into the hands of a mediator to the greatest extent possible.

Interestingly, having this conversation with her actually makes me feel closer to her. It confirms that she is willing to forego what may be a future financial windfall because she cares about me, about our son, and about fairness.

I wanted to throw out to the group that there are options for those of us who are married.

 

[GlobalWealth]

Like @Esquire said, do it while you still like each other.

As someone who has dealt with a horrific divorce and currently with an amazing partner, I agree 100% with @Esquire from the risk mitigation view.

Dealing with it while you like each other and can both come to a reasonable agreement will alleviate future potential issues.

Hopefully you live happily ever after in which case you get exactly what you want. The only downside was a some minimal cost to set the structure in place. But like health insurance, you don't buy it hoping to get brain cancer.

The upside is that you have a more clear understanding of each other before any legal commitment. And you save you and your kids much future heartache.

I see zero downside. Only protection.

 

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[Iwokeup]

Alright, so as some people noted, there's something fishy going on here. Marriage is something that has real risks. What @Esquire and @GIlman were saying should be taken into consideration.

However, the odds of you experiencing those negatives has been exaggerated. First and foremost is a failure to understand how statistics work. Just because 50% of people get divorced (or, in reality, more like 43%), does not mean that every person has a 50/50 shot at getting divorced. Just like the statistic that "1/3 of black men have been to prison" does not mean that there is a 33% chance that the black son of two black Yale Law grads with a 3.9 GPA and 96th percentile SAT scores will end up in prison some time in their lives. Factors matter. All men (and women) are not equal.

So what are the factors known to affect divorce?

1. Age of the participants in the marriage. If you're both over 23, your odds of divorce go down, and it continues to fall as you get older.

2. Age differential between the participants. If you're close in age, the odds of divorce go down.

3. Educational attainments and divorce have a curvilinear relationship, meaning that your odds of divorce are lowest if you either have no higher education or lots of it. The rates seem highest for college dropouts (sorry, no graph this time).

4. Equal educational attainments. If you and your spouse have graduate degrees, the odds of divorce goes down again.

5. Race. as of the middle of last decade, whites are less likely to get divorced than blacks. Hispanics are less likely to get divorced than whites, and Asians, especially Asian women, are less likely to get divorced than all those groups. Remember again that this is likely a result of the conditions and values that are likely to surround each individual during childhood (wealth vs. poverty, strict nuclear family values vs. broken homes, etc.), so if you're black but from a rich, well educated family, the "average" is going to represent you very poorly.

6. Being a baller. A 1995 study found that the divorce rate for the highest income group is about 18% lower than the lowest income group. Contrary to the scaremongering in this thread, the more fastlane you are, the less likely your spouse is to leave:

7. History. If neither of you came from a broken home, your odds of getting a divorce are lower.

8. Finances and debt. If you don't fight about money (I hate self-reported metrics, but that's what we've got) and don't have debts (objective) your odds of divorce go way down.

9. Recidivism. Unbelievably, if you get divorced once, your odds of getting divorced again are higher than average. If you've never been divorced, odds go down. Estimates say that second marriages may be around 66% probability of getting divorced, third are up around 75%.

So what's all this mean? Well, if you're an 27 year old Korean with a master's degree and no debt who just got hitched to a 26 year old Korean medical doctor with no debt, and did not begin cohabiting before age 23, and both your parents are still together, and you're headed for the top income bracket (as all fastlaners should be), your odds of getting divorced are not 50%. They are, in fact, nowhere near that number. What are they actually? it can be hard to combine cross-factors and figure it out, but you can see how much just a single factor affects the rates, then guess what that would be compounded. 10% 5%? Less?

Then comes the hard part. You need to sit down seriously and ask yourself what you're doing here. The 50% divorce statistic is definitely inflated, as prior posters pointed out, but you know what isn't inflated? The failure rate of startups:

Ask @Vigilante, or if you haven't yet (for the love of God, why?) listen to his Mind Your Business Podcast: A divorce may take 50% of your stuff, but if your business crashes and burns (whether by fate or by the deceit of partners) you stand to lose everything. Yet most of us take this gamble, and lose, and get back up, and lose it again. I shared with some people at the meetup that I lost $4,000 in a period of about 24 hours when I was first starting out. And that's just a gentle rap on the knuckles compared to the absolutely savage a$$ beating people have suffered when their whole company went down in flames. Lots of us here are familiar with the feeling of surplussing yourself beyond requirement, I've taken out loans worth 50% more than my net worth before. If shit goes sideways, I have no recourse to repay it, I lose everything.

Some of you guys are too fearful.

When you see that the odds are 50% of success, if you say "I'll probably be in the half that fails, I should avoid that" you're banking on failure. That gets even worse if the actual odds of failure are 10-12% and you still say "Why bother? I'll probably still fail." Almost all of you talking with your mouths like you're trying to join the "1%," but your actions say that you're F*cking banking on being the bottom 50%, as you trip over yourselves in a frantic mob to figure out how to get your sign-up for Odesk approved after somebody waved in front of you the oh-so-tantalizing-prospect of ten dollars an hour, in what was supposed to be a last-resort move to save yourself from being broke. Are you kidding me? Did the masthead on this site change to the "Sidewalk Forum" while I wasn't looking?

I already shared this, but a couple of years ago I was reading an article in Wharton's alumni magazine with ten billionaire alumni. Seven of the ten had one common "success factor" that they named independently. Learning to code? Good education? Compounding interest?

No. Their spouse.

It stuck with me even as a teenager. I can remember closing that up, then going out to skateboard and just chewing on the thought over and over...

Wow.

It was their wife, not their Penn degrees (I was raised to think that your degree and educational institution was the be-all and end-all of your success) that they saw as crucial in the end.

You guys want to become billionaires, but you won't listen to what they have to say. You won't take risks. You see the danger and you bow out. Yeah, you can lose 50%. You can end up in prison. You can end up with $300K/yr in alimony and another $300K/yr in child support. For each of those seven billionaires whose wives were integral in their success, there might be a could-have-been-a-billionaire who lost big in a marriage. But if you want safe, what are you doing here? By picking up TMF and doing what it says, you stand a very small chance of making it big, but you stand a very big chance of loosing everything. Am I taking an imprudent risk by being married, and by not divorcing my wife now when my net worth is below $1M and we have no kids? You goddamn right I am. But I'm not an employee. I'm not the 99%. It's why I'm already expecting to retire THREE TIMES sooner than I would have if I'd stuck to my old path, and why I'm staying married. I'm an entrepreneur. I always bet on being the 1%. I always bet on being the anomaly. I always plan to be the fluke.

Taking statistically imprudent risks is what I do for a living.

Best. F*cking. Post. (Regarding this tiresome debate)...EVER

 

[Adam Secada]

I thought people might get a kick out of this. I found it on the net a couple years ago, and it still makes me laugh everytime I read it:

>Copy / Pasted Below From Source -- Supposedly from Craigslist, But who can tell where the sources from anything on the internet are anymore?

WOMAN SEEKING MAN: “What Am I Doing Wrong?”
Okay, I’m tired of beating around the bush. I’m a beautiful (spectacularly beautiful) 25 year old girl. I’m articulate and classy.

I’m not from New York. I’m looking to get married to a guy who makes at least half a million a year. I know how that sounds, but keep in mind that a million a year is middle class in New York City, so I don’t think I’m overreaching at all.

Are there any guys who make 500K or more on this board? Any wives? Could you send me some tips? I dated a business man who makes average around 200 – 250k. But, that’s where I seem to hit a roadblock. $250,000 won’t get me to Central Park West. I know a woman in my yoga class who was married to an investment banker and lives in Tribeca, and she’s not as pretty as I am, nor is she a great genius. So what is she doing right? How do I get to her level?

Here are my questions specifically:

• Where do you single rich men hang out? Give me specifics- bars, restaurants, gyms
• What are you looking for in a mate? Be honest guys, you won?t hurt my feelings
• Is there an age range I should be targeting (I’m 25)?
• Why are some of the women living lavish lifestyles on the upper east side so plain? I’ve seen really plain jane? boring types who have nothing to offer married to incredibly wealthy guys. I’ve seen drop dead gorgeous girls in singles bars in the east village. What?s the story there?
• Jobs I should look out for? Everyone knows – lawyer, investment banker, doctor. How much do those guys really make? And where do they hang out? Where do the hedge fund guys hang out?
• How you decide marriage vs. just a girlfriend? I am looking for MARRIAGE ONLY

Please hold your insults – I’m putting myself out there in an honest way. Most beautiful women are superficial; at least I’m being up front about it. I wouldn’t be searching for these kind of guys if I wasn’t able to match them – in looks, culture, sophistication, and keeping a nice home and hearth.

A Response:
MAN’S RESPONSE TO WOMAN:
I read your posting with great interest and have thought meaningfully about your dilemma. I offer the following analysis of your predicament. Firstly, I’m not wasting your time, I qualify as a guy who fits your bill; that is I make more than $500K per year. That said here’s how I see it.

Your offer, from the prospective of a guy like me, is plain and simple a crappy business deal. Here’s why. Cutting through all the B.S., what you suggest is a simple trade: you bring your looks to the party and I bring my money. Fine, simple. But here’s the rub, your looks will fade and my money will likely continue into perpetuity…in fact, it is very likely that my income increases but it is an absolute certainty that you won’t be getting any more beautiful!

So, in economic terms you are a depreciating asset and I am an earning asset. Not only are you a depreciating asset, your depreciation accelerates! Let me explain, you’re 25 now and will likely stay pretty hot for the next 5 years, but less so each year. Then the fade begins in earnest. By 35 stick a fork in you!

So in Wall Street terms, we would call you a trading position, not a buy and hold…hence the rub…marriage. It doesn’t make good business sense to “buy you” (which is what you’re asking) so I’d rather lease. In case you think I’m being cruel, I would say the following. If my money were to go away, so would you, so when your beauty fades I need an out. It’s as simple as that. So a deal that makes sense is dating, not marriage.

Separately, I was taught early in my career about efficient markets. So, I wonder why a girl as “articulate, classy and spectacularly beautiful” as you has been unable to find your sugar daddy. I find it hard to believe that if you are as gorgeous as you say you are that the $500K wasn’t found you, if not only for a tryout.

By the way, you could always find a way to make your own money and then we wouldn’t need to have this difficult conversation.

With all that said, I must say you’re going about it the right way. Classic “pump and dump.” I hope this is helpful, and if you want to enter into some sort of lease, let me know.



Source: http://goo.gl/TQkIlR

 

[Esquire]

I'm going to chime in here. Mostly because I have been through all sides of this and have some things to offer from my experiences. I am not pro or anti marriage, but here is what I have learned from experience and the nearly thousand hours of reading I did while going through the process. @Esquire correct me in any error you see since you actually have professional experience here.

First and foremost, the "error" many people make, and the reason so many people are angry or caught off guard if they get divorced is because they do not understand what marriage is. I am not saying it is a mistake to get married, that is up to each person to decide for them selves.

What I AM saying, is that you have to understand what marriage IS.

Marriage is a business contract, plain and simple. You can believe that it is about love and devotion and whatever you want, but do not ignore the fact that in the eyes of the law it is an equitable partnership agreement exactly the same as starting a business 50/50 with a general partner where you both invest 100% of your assets.

You are trading 1/2 of everything you own and all your future increases for 1/2 of everything the other person owns and all their future increases. Oh, and don't forget that you are also probably accepting 1/2 of each others debt as well, although some debts are excluded. Once you are married, you now have a business, Family INC.

This business then goes along it's way.

If sometime down the road the marriage falls apart. Basically the courts then go through and value the business, and each person gets their half of all the assets and value out of the business. Which in many cases involves one partner buying out the other partners theoretical 1/2 valuation.

The reason that there are court fights are because there are not agreements on the valuation of the business. Or, if there is no value in the business then often the fight is about distribution of the human capital of the marriage (i.e. children) and the associated financial impacts of this.

For slow-laners, this is painful..for fast-laners this can be down right catastrophic to your business and life.

You see, if you own a business, the valuation of that business will NOT be based on the value of the physical assets owned. It will be the assets plus non-tangibles including goodwill. This is the SAME as any business would be valued if it was being sold. But if you wish to keep your business, assuming that it is the source of your income, this may mean that your business is valued as a high multiple of revenue and that to KEEP your business you have to payout 1/2 of this value without actually selling it to raise the capital.

Now, this does not mean that the business can fetch this much money if you sold it on the open market, it just means it is the theoretical value that you are being held accountable to pay 1/2 of to keep the business. The only way to PROVE the value of the business is to ACTUALLY sell it on the open market since the market is the ultimate arbiter of value This can be very difficult, and many people are put in a position where the business has to be sold (often in a fire sale) because they can't possibly come up with this valuation to buy out the other persons share, and to add insult to injury the 1/2 value the business actually fetches is substantially less that was being demanded that you pay.

Here is where divorce diverges from a typical partnership, and where it is poses the greatest risk to entrepreneurs. Now that you have paid out your 1/2 share of the business, the courts will often expect you to also provide support (e.g. alimony) on the theory that your ex should be able to maintain their lifestyle without having to use their distribution from the business to do it. Basically what they are saying is that the person should be able to sell their shares in Family INC, but still receive dividends from Family, INC as if they still owned a large share of stock in it.

To put some numbers to this. Say that you earned 1 Million a year from the business, the value may be pegged at 3-4 million for the business including non-tangibles like goodwill, so you would have to come up with 1/2 of this so 1.5-2 million to buy out their half (which is post tax money). On top of that, your spousal support will be based on calculated earnings of 1 Million, so you can expect to probably be paying out somewhere around 300,000 a year in support. And on top of that maybe even child support, which is post tax.

You can see where this is leading fast....basically you may be paying out WELL in excess of 50% of your earnings for a prolonged period of time, so you can buy out the other persons 1/2 of the business that you build, to pay for their "reasonable" living expenses so that they don't have to use their savings to live, and post tax child support. You may literally end up with 15-25% of your income per year for a long time to satisfy all of these demands.

Again, I am not anti-marriage, but I think that people should at least be aware of the real risks they face in marriage, especially in situations where one spouse does not work outside of the home, etc, etc.

Approach marriage exactly the same way as you would a business partnership, because if you ever have to that is exactly how your marriage will be treated by the courts.

One other side note, I have been peripherally involved with friends who were going through breakups of financially successful businesses and I can tell you that the process was pretty much just like a divorce with all the stress, drama, games, etc...so whether in business or life, choose your partners and your business contracts and agreements carefully....if at all.

The "business partnership" analogy is fairly spot on. In community property states that is certainly the premise. That each of you are merely "agents" of the marriage ("Marriage Inc."). Civil law states are not much different.

The biggest difference between a "business" partnership and a "marital" partnership is relief and remedies.

If a business gets a judgment against you ... and you don't pay it ... the prevailing party is limited to civil contract remedies (damages, injunctions, etc.)

If an ex-spouse gets an award of alimony, support, or a property settlement ... the judge can do everything just mentioned ... AND throw you in jail.

Big difference.

The other big difference speaks to relief.

If a business partnership gets a judgment ... most folks can either discharge or restructure the debt in bankruptcy court ... or (often) immunize themselves from personal liability using corporate entities and the like.

If a marital partnership gets an award or alimony or support ... you cannot discharge the the debt in bankruptcy ... and corporate entities do you no good.

Ditto an award of the other side's attorneys fees.

So on one side of the isle you have limited liability and dischargeability ... on the other side of the isle ... is inescapable liability and the threat of incarceration.

Two totally different worlds.

Plus ... with a business partnership ... you exposure to risk is predictable.

In a domestic partnership ... your expose to risk ... is damn near unlimited ... at the arbitrary whim of a judge.

So yes ... there are some sound analogies to a business partnership to be made ... but the risks are far more catastrophic.

 

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[Esquire]

I am curious @Esquire ....I ( we ) used a mediator instead of lawyers for my divorce....And it went actually very well, in 3 sessions, everything was sorted out ( we agreed on most things, so i guess it helped ) .....Why do people dont use them often ?? ...Ohh and it was free ( a provincial service )

Emotions are often to blame. Two sides refusing to work together.

On the other side are the lawyers. More than happy to fan the flames.

The more you fight. The more you make.

Mediation is not good for their bottom line.

 

[drilonnn]

If you think that marriage is a cure for loneliness or that marriage gives you a reason to live then I would be curious to know how you fare in life.

tl;dr
Get a hobby, make some friends.

Yeah marriage(love exactly) is how you find happiness in life, kids give you happiness in life and a reason to wake up every morning.

Just because you can't find anybody to love you doesn't mean that you can advise others to not be married. There's something wrong with YOU if nobody loves you.

 

[Vigilante]

Business is stacked in favor of big

Yeah marriage(love exactly) is how you find happiness in life, kids give you happiness in life and a reason to wake up every morning.

Just because you can't find anybody to love you doesn't mean that you can advise others to not be married. There's something wrong with YOU if nobody loves you.

I agree with your sentiment to a degree, but the fact that you are not married doesn't mean nobody loves you. To each his own.

 

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[Esquire]

the odds of you experiencing those negatives has been exaggerated. First and foremost is a failure to understand how statistics work. Just because 50% of people get divorced (or, in reality, more like 43%), does not mean that every person has a 50/50 shot at getting divorced.

No ... but as @GIlman aptly noted ... if your number comes up ... you feel 100% of the effect.

I mean ... suppose I stick one bullet in a six shooter ...

Would you stick it in your mouth and pull the trigger ...?

Odds are only 16.6% your head doesn't get blown off.

You've got an 83.4% of walking away.

Are YOU going to pull that trigger ...?

Not me.

Two unmarried people can live their lives together "happily ever after" just as easy as a married couple.

Difference is ... no bullets in the chamber.

I'm not taking that risk.

A divorce may take 50% of your stuff, but if your business crashes and burns (whether by fate or by the deceit of partners) you stand to lose everything. Yet most of us take this gamble, and lose, and get back up, and lose it again. I shared with some people at the meetup that I lost $4,000 in a period of about 24 hours when I was first starting out. And that's just a gentle rap on the knuckles compared to the absolutely savage a$$ beating people have suffered when their whole company went down in flames. Lots of us here are familiar with the feeling of surplussing yourself beyond requirement, I've taken out loans worth 50% more than my net worth before. If shit goes sideways, I have no recourse to repay it, I lose everything.

Some of you guys are too fearful.

If a business creditor gets a million dollar judgment against me ... I spend $1500 on a bankruptcy petition ... and just like that ... four months later ... I am 100% debt free.

And there is a 90% chance (or so) that I walk away from my debts ... AND keep all of my stuff.

Not so bad.

Start again.

And ... as @GlobalWealth will tell ya ... there are all sorts of things you can do with corporate entities ... insurance ... and liability waivers ... to minimize your exposure to risk in business ... even if you do not go the bankruptcy route (which you can file every eight years).

But ... if your ex gets a million dollar alimony award ... or a million dollar stream of payments via lifetime alimony (or similar) ... you are terminally F*ckED.

For the rest of your life.

It never goes away.

And if you can't pay it ... but the judge "thinks" you can ... you go to jail.

Indefinitely.

Getting married is 10x more dangerous than starting a business.

Not even close.

I don't care if the odds are 50% ... 25% ... or 10% ... I am NOT sticking that gun in my mouth.

It is reckless.

There is NOTHING a married couple can do ... that Sharon and I cannot do as a couple.

Wear a ring. Change our name. Buy a house. Whatever.

We are together because we WANT to be together ... and no other reason.

The government is NOT welcome in my bedroom.

We prefer FREEDOM.

 

[socaldude]

Here is my theory on why so many marriages fail:

There is no spiritual connection.

What I mean by spiritual is a connection that is "More" than just money, looks, attraction, stuff etc.

I'm all for those things but face it life inevitably involves tragedies, disappointments and challenges.

At the end of the day, no amount of these things will save your marriage if trouble arises.

Admit it, we have all been conditioned by society and our environment to associate careers, money, attraction and sex with a successful "happily ever after" formula. And yet it never occurs to us that these things are never what truly makes a marriage survive the things that life throws at us.

 

[RHL]

Something I want to point out in the Study of billionaires alluded to, is that there is certainly survivor bias at play. There were certainly individuals that would have been higher on the list of financial accomplishment that were not because of divorce and both the financial and emotional turmoil that divorce takes on people, especially the emotional turmoil. In other words peoples who's marriages survive are more likely to have wealth and be successful than people who's marriages failed, they are the survivors.

Yes, I tried to allude to that. For example, Tiger Woods was getting there, and lost a quarter billion in the divorce (his reputation damage was probably more substantial).

But there's also survivor's bias in what we're doing. There's probably 10 guys making lattes now after their "FastPetFood.com" biz failed in 2004 before they sold for every 1 MJ who cashed out and spent his golden years (the real ones, not the ones where he was pissing in a bag and struggling to walk up steps) driving around in a topless V12 Lambo. For every one Sal, there are probably 10 people who dropped their progress threads and went back to working at the fire department until retirement.

There's also definitely confirmation bias at work in the responders here. Which of us have strong marriages and which of us have been through bad divorces clearly informs our thinking.

It's good to mitigate risk, a prenup is probably a good idea; there doesn't seem to be any data to suggest that prenups predict an elevated divorce rate, but the idea that we should be so ruled by terror that we should forgo having kids because then we'll incur financial liability seems antithetical to my whole way of life and the mindset that made me who I am.

 

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[MorgothBauglir]

The government is NOT welcome in my bedroom.

We prefer FREEDOM.

Sums up my thoughts on the topic. Good post

 

[Jamesdoesmith]

I read every single post in this thread and thought long and hard to respond to it.

I am currently 20 years old and have witnessed one of the most beautiful, lasting, substantial marriages this world has ever seen. My mom and dad have been together for 27 years. My parents are older and have very blue collar values and old school ways.

They married each other back when people NEEDED people. They need the other person like a fire needs air, and fish need water. They also had a premature son, who now has CP. A disease that made him quite the handful. My mom needed my dad. And my dad needed my mom.

After speaking with my mom, she says to be very careful. People, especially women, no longer NEED men. And for this reason men have no need to marry a woman. She states that feminism and women fighting tooth and nail to be equal have not been good to making marriage a good choice for men anymore.

now, I am also a notary, and I work somewhere were we have PO boxes. I notarize around 2 divorce related documents a week. We also open around 1 to 2 PO boxes for men getting divorces. I once opened one for a man who all of a sudden got divorced and had a few hundred K gone from his account. This shocked me. Wouldn't it be easier to know and be apart of your wifes life? how would you her husband not know that his wife is pissed with him.

This discussion is one I need no part in partaking in, as I am still very young, but how much worse is it going to get towards the time I want to look for a wife? women no longer want a husband, they are equal and strong and independent. And those are GREAT qualities. It certainly changes the fabric of society. For the better? Maybe. for the better towards marriage? I do not know. Also with all the fear involved in dating and marriage. You guys make it seem like I shouldnt Even date or walk out of my house or get a girlfriend or have someone live in my house. That is ludicrous and y'all need to not be so scared of life.

 

[Esquire]

... You guys make it seem like I shouldn't even date or walk out of my house or get a girlfriend or have someone live in my house.

No ... actually ... I think dating and having a girlfriend is GREAT idea.

Ditto living together.

I'd rather have a hot sex-crazed girlfriend ... than a Lamborghini.

No contest.

No one is critiquing the value of a good relationship.

Or "happily ever after."

What we are critiquing is ... going about it in such a way that exposes you to extreme risk.

That's all.

Exact same relationship -- minus the government.

 

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[Bila]

Overheard " This economical crisis is worse than a divorce, i lost all my money and still have my wife " ......sorry, was dying to use it somewhere.

 

[Esquire]

Well ... in all candor ... I suppose I should acknowledge that there is one (notable) exception to everything I just said.

Magnitude.

Marrying Magnitude ... is definitely Fastlane.

Now ... I know that last statement might generate a little confusion ... as there are two types of magnitude.

So for sake of clarification: I've included an example.

You want the one on the right.

 

[Vigilante]

Your visual is unforgettable.

 

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[Bila]

@Esquire is right ...so here an example for the ladies

 

[GIlman]

Yeah, but if u married "up" u should still want a prenup. Whatever u expect from others you should give yourself.


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