Why Won’t You Marry Me ?

simon-dupree

Nine years ago I retired after working hard for 33 years with a net worth of about one million .After three years of retirement my wife of 30 years met someone else and asked for a divorce that ended up with her receiving 60% of the assets and me 40%.
For three and a half of the last 6 years I have been having a relationship with a woman who was left assets from her divorce of about £100,000 and a job providing income of about £25,000 per year.
My assets mainly industrial properties and shares have risen in value to at least £1.1million and provide me with an income of about £50,000 per year.
She owns a house that I have spent the last two years doing up for her (I was in the building industry) and as she lost her first house (sold to clear a joint mortgage with her X) in the divorce I have said its best for her to own her own house and I will have nothing to do with its ownership or want no claim on it.
I own no house (my X took mine and lives in it with a new partner) but I live with my elderly mother officially as she is glad for me to look after the maintenance and her general welfare, but I have ended up only living there a few nights a week , the other others I am with my partner of three years in her house to which I contribute half the overheads and running cost of our expenses together.
I am reluctant to get married again as the laws in England are pretty draconian with a 50/50 split minimum almost immediately due to either party if a divorce should happen. Having lost a fortune in my first divorce I am reluctant to get remarried with such a disparity of assets and I understand a pre nuptial agreement is not legal in England but may be taken into consideration and that seems a gamble.
Although I thought I was fairly well committed as I have done loads to put her life back on track and I am a good reliable partner in all aspects of the relationship, after three years she wants marriage and has given me an ultimatum “marry me or goodbye” she says she loves me and I am unreasonable insofar as no one will have me unless I marry them. We are both 56 and I can see it’s to secure her future but she seems obsessive that we are married. Then I know if we split I will loose another half a million pounds possibly after a relatively short marriage. I am being asked to gamble half my net worth on a relationship at an age I will struggle to make it back again if I even wanted to. If I am not careful I can see years of hard work saving up for a reasonable retirement phase in my life disappearing into possible relationship mistakes. Not forgetting statistically one out of every two second marriages fail.
I have wondered for sometime if my potential to provide her security was the main aim of the relationship and this has actual made me more reluctant to get married.
She has had me to relate to discuss my reluctance to commit to marriage to no avail as they said we still had a relationship and it depends on our wants and views if we marry...
Am I being unreasonable in shying away from marriage?
She claims it isn’t the money she wants. Although a bigger house jointly bought has been mentioned. Her wish to retire shortly (with no money!) has also been mentioned.
But I have been really told it will be over if I will not marry her.
As I have got much attached but I am not madly in love (probably because of all this marriage pressure) to her I don’t know what to make of it all. I spent two years getting her house refurbished and we got along well in most respects. Had some lovely holidays together it just seems as though marriage is everything to her.
Any constructive views on anyone else having a view bad or good on this situation would be much appreciated

lynzpower

My feeling is that no one should get married:

a) if one does not trust the partners motives
b) if they are not completely in love with the other person.

If your partner understands your concerns about potential losses from a divorce ( they seem very clear to me, and once bitten, twice shy and all that) what is she doing to support you? what is she doing to reassure you?
What is her motive for wanting to get married? ( clearly theres some suggestion the money/financial security is part of your concern)

My motive for wanting to get married is I want my partner to be assured that he has me for life. I could take or leave marriage to be honest, i think the actions would speak for themselves when im a collecting his pension for him and helping him with his Zimmer, a piece of paper in our twilight years seriously mean nada to me. However, he wants that security to know i will be there for him. so I will do that.

saying that tho, assets mean nothing to so many people, my nanna barely had a pot to pi55 in her whole life, and was supported in her retirement by the state. She didnt care, she had her family around her, and thats what made her happy. Are you certain your partner is not the same?

pinkshoes

simon-dupree wrote: »

My assets mainly industrial properties and shares have risen in value to at least £1.1million and provide me with an income of about £50,000 per year.

You do realise that once you die, you can't spend any of this money?!?! Either you love this woman enough to blow all your hard earned cash with her, or you think she's just after your money, hence you should walk away coz you obviously don't want to be with her that much.Forget the money, and think about love and life! What do you want to do with the rest of your life?!?! Do you have kids to give the money to?! You and your new partner are too old to have kids, so it's not like you're going to pass the money down to them when you die, so the question is:"Do you love this women enough to want to spend your entire savings having fun together?" If yes, marry her. If no, leave!

newcook

to be honest I would seek professional advice from a solicitor to see what your best options are.

from what I have read on other threads similar to this, if you was to marry and she then divorced you she would get very little of your business assets. the reason your first wife received a percentage of it would have been because she supported you from day one for 30 years where as now your business was well established before meeting this other woman.

however, I may be wrong - I am only going on what I remember!

its possible that she is after more committment from you - how about suggest to her that you move in permanently and discuss the marriage in a year. you could always move back to your moms if things go pear shaped and not be out of pocket.

Idiophreak

To be honest, I'd tend to think "It's only money"...If you love someone enough to marry them, I wouldn't think that money comes into it really...

taxi97w

You are past having children, so it's not that.

Marriage is not a sign of true committment & permanent cohesion(sp?) because divorce will see that overturned, so it's not that.

Marriage was 'invented' as a contract to ensure money from flush families stayed in those families.

It's about the money I feel, sorry.

afsha

I not 100% and English law maybe different to Scottish but if the assets you have are from before the marriage then they cant be split when you get divorced. BUT the home that has been jointly owned or used as a family/matrimonial home maybe split. hope there is some family law experts about to help you. :rolleyes:

crispeater

surely if she loves you that much she wouldnt give you that kind of ultimatum in the first place?
if i truely loved someone i dont think i could kind of force them into marrying me or tell them to shuv off.


you could always get engaged and just never set a date lol but judging from the way she comes across in your post she might do it all herself and tell you on the day (if your lucky) lol

sorry not much help i know

Alikay

If you really love this lady and are pretty certain that your relationship will last (and why would ANYONE want to get married unless that was the case!) then it does seem strange that you are so concerned about the financial aspect.

If you married and the unexpected DID happen and you split, half of what you have is still a hell of a lot! You wouldn't be on the streets in just the clothes you stood up in. And if it works out, you could enjoy 30-odd years of marital bliss -how much is THAT worth?!!

Unless you are very cynical, or have issues with trust and security (hence your fixation on financial security), I suspect you are concerned that your partner isn't the right one for you: That is why you shouldn't get married, not because of property and cash!

I am a woman in my mid 40's and would be deeply hurt if my boyfriend didn't want to marry me in case I got my hands on his cash. So, yes, I'd dump you too! Many older women (and men too!) are not as "cool" with just living together as younger people, as historically cohabiting has been seen as inferior, less committed and pretty unromantic.

panicsetin

It may be that she just loves you and wants to marry you? For some people marriage is very important as it is a way of showing their love and commitment to that person.

I am in a similar position as i have been with my partner for about 10 years and really want to marry him. I dont want anything financial if we were to split - and have made that very clear (offered to do a pre-nup). I just want to be able to call him my husband... Anyway, he is very anti-marriage - for whatever reason; he claims not to really know why. And, as much as l love him, i am considering leaving as after all this time i want more security myself.... I cant explain my marriage is as important to me as it is - it just is.

margaretclare

Maybe she just doesn't feel right about not being married. This is the way that some of us were brought up. Phrases like 'living in sin' and 'living over t'brush' may still resonate in her head from way back.

My present DH was divorced twice. He took refuge with me in November 1997, I wanted us to get married soon after his second divorce came through in mid-1999. He couldn't face it. He came out with all the excuses: 'we're all right as we are, it's only a piece of paper, what difference will it make'. He even thought that marriage itself might put 'the mockers' on what was a loving, sharing, caring relationship.

Well, 2 weeks after 9/11 we visited several friends and relatives in North America. And, criss-crossing the continent, at least 3 of those friends and relatives tackled him about getting married. Vancouver, Oregon and Maryland, he had his ear bent about marrying me. He was still resisting. Late November that year, after he'd given away his stepdaughter for her 3rd marriage, he actually came round to the idea. What changed him? To this day I don't know. He just said afterwards that 'the time was right and he wanted to get married for all the right reasons'. Not reasons that had anything to do with worldly possessions, which we vowed to 'share', in our marriage service in January 2002.

I don't like all the talk about 50/50 splits, divorce etc as a reason for not getting married. If you have a reason to get married then all that is of no consequence. I agree with panicsetin, pinkshoes and Alikay above.

Like panicsetin, I can't explain why marriage is important to me, it just is. It was also important to me to be married in church - a register office wouldn't have done although legally-valid, that wasn't enough either.

Margaret