By Robin Roshkind, Esquire, West Palm Beach, Florida
I often get clients coming in to see me holding a faded, years old prenuptial agreement for review. They have been happily married for some time, but are no longer satisfied with the terms of the prenuptial agreement. The question I get is how to change it, fix it or make it go away entirely.
The first task is to ascertain the circumstances surrounding the execution of the prenuptial agreement in the first place. Was it signed just days or hours before the wedding? Was it signed under a threat? Was it signed with full disclosure by the parties? Did both parties have attorneys advising them or just one? The ways to challenge a prenuptial agreement include duress, misrepresentation, fraud, over reaching. If none of these conditions is present, I inform the client that the prenuptial agreement is a valid and enforceable document.
But there is a way to disintegrate it, change it, or fix it. That would require the drafting of and agreement to a post nuptial agreement. A post nuptial agreement can replace a prenuptial, with entirely new terms; it can make the prenuptial agreement null and void by agreement of the parties, allowing for operation of law to control as if there never was a prenuptial agreement in the first place; it can modify the prenuptial terms, and it can also reaffirm certain sections of the original prenuptial agreement.
Post nuptial agreements are handy tools. The one catch is if the spouse does not wish to agree to any changes. Should that be the case, you either accept that and stay married, or divorce and challenge the original document, if the facts surrounding the execution and understanding of it are so warranted. For more information about this or other divorce topics, call one of the divorce lawyers at ROBIN ROSHKIND, P.A. at 561 835 9091 or click on the Firm’s web site at http://www.familylawwpb.com for more information.
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