$99
The agreement, both disclosure schedules and the process checklist. Locked once you finalise it, which suits a document that two people sign at a fixed point in time rather than revise casually.
Start my agreementEstate document
What is separate,and what is ours
A written answer to a question most couples never quite finish discussing. Signed before the wedding or afterwards, while you are both calm and honest, rather than at a point when neither of you is either.
About 25 minutesBefore or after the weddingIndependent review advised
What it does
A conversation with a document attached
A marital agreement writes down what each of you brought into the marriage, what you intend to treat as shared, and how you would want that handled if the marriage ended or if one of you died. Signed before the wedding it is a prenuptial agreement. Signed afterwards it is a postnuptial one, and postnuptial agreements are far more common than most people realise.
The reason to write one is rarely mistrust. It is that in the absence of an agreement, a set of default rules decides these questions, and those rules vary sharply between community property states and common law states. A business you started six years before you met, an inheritance from your grandmother, a house one of you owned outright, the debt one of you brought along: default rules treat all of that in a particular way, and it may not be the way either of you assumed.
It also connects directly to what the rest of your plan says. Marital property rules shape what you are actually free to leave in a will, and a spousal elective share can sit on top of your instructions. Where a plan and a marital agreement contradict each other, the contradiction is usually discovered by the family rather than by the couple.
What this document cannot do
- It cannot determine child custody, which a court decides on the child’s interests at the time
- Provisions on child support are generally unenforceable and are not included
- It cannot take effect if it was signed under pressure or without time to consider it
- It cannot rest on an incomplete picture, since full disclosure of assets and debts by both parties is fundamental
- It does not replace a will or a trust, and it is not a substitute for either
- It cannot be signed by one person, which is the one difference from every other document here
Whether an agreement holds up depends heavily on how it was made rather than only on what it says. That is why this is the document we most often tell people to put in front of an attorney, and why the platform says so during the interview rather than afterwards.
What is included
The schedules, the terms, and the paperwork around them
Generated from both sets of answers against the requirements of the state you live in, including whether that state is a community property state, and issued with the process checklist that decides whether the document means anything.
01
Full disclosure schedules for both parties
A complete statement of what each of you owns and owes, attached to the agreement. This is the foundation of the whole document. An agreement resting on an incomplete schedule is the most common way one falls apart.
02
Separate property, identified
What each of you brought in and intend to keep as your own: property owned before the marriage, gifts, inheritances, and anything you agree to treat as separate.
03
Marital property, and how it accrues
What you intend to hold jointly, including how income, growth and property acquired during the marriage are treated. In a community property state this is the section that does the most work.
04
Treatment of a business interest
How a company one of you owns or founded is treated, including growth in its value during the marriage. The single most common reason a couple writes one of these.
05
Debts, each and shared
Which obligations belong to whom. Student loans, a business line of credit, a debt one of you brought in. Left unsaid, this is where couples are most surprised by their own state’s default rules.
06
Spousal support terms
Whether support is addressed, waived or set out, within what your state permits. Some states limit what can be agreed here, and the document is generated accordingly rather than promising more than it can.
07
How it interacts with your estate plan
The provisions that let this agreement and your will or trust say the same thing, including how it addresses a spousal elective share. This is the clause that stops two of your own documents contradicting each other.
08
A process checklist for both of you
Notary and witnessing requirements, the recommended interval between review and signing, and where independent counsel for each party is expected in your state. On this document, process is the substance.
Who needs this
Fewer people than the internet suggests, and more than admit it
Most couples do not need one. Where there is a business, a large asymmetry, children from an earlier relationship or an inheritance in the picture, it earns its place quickly.
One of you owns a business
A company founded before the marriage still grows during it, and how that growth is treated is rarely obvious. This is the most common reason couples write an agreement, and the one where the cost of not having written one is highest.
Either of you has children from an earlier relationship
Providing for a new spouse and for children from a previous marriage is a genuine balancing act. An agreement and an estate plan written together are how couples resolve it deliberately rather than leaving it to default rules.
There is an inheritance, or one expected
Inherited property is often intended to stay in one family line. Whether it does can depend on how it was held and mixed with joint money, which is exactly what this document addresses.
You are already married and something changed
A business that took off, an inheritance that arrived, a debt that got serious, or simply a conversation you have both been circling. A postnuptial agreement is the same document signed later, and there is nothing unusual about writing one.
If your finances are straightforward and you both entered the marriage in similar positions, your state’s default rules may already reflect what you would have agreed. The platform will say so rather than selling you a document you do not need.
Part of your bigger plan
The document that has to agree with your will
This is the one place where two documents you sign yourself can contradict each other. A will that leaves the house to your children and an agreement that treats the house as marital property are describing two different outcomes, and nobody notices until it matters.
Because your agreement and your estate documents are generated from the same profile, the platform compares them. If your will names an asset your agreement treats as separate property belonging to your spouse, that mismatch becomes a recommendation with points attached rather than a problem for your family to discover.
It also affects the advice you get elsewhere. Marital property rules shape what you are free to leave and what a spousal elective share might claim, so signing an agreement changes what Legacy Lens™ recommends about your will and your trust, not just what it records about this document.
What a signed agreement is worth
0
Before
0
After
Estate Readiness leans on your LQ™ Score harder than any other pillar. For households where a business or a blended family is in the picture, resolving what is separate and what is shared removes the single largest ambiguity in the plan.
Points shown are illustrative. Your own movement depends on your circumstances and what you already had in place.
Pricing
One time, and what a plan does alongside it
$49
Per year. Complete does not include this agreement. What it does cover is everything the agreement has to line up with: your will, your trust, both powers of attorney, and the checks that keep them consistent with each other.
Compare plansBudget for a review as well as the document.
For a flat $250, Smart Review™ puts a verified legal professional on the finished agreement. On this document more than any other it is worth it, because several states expect each party to have had independent counsel. Legacy Buddy provides document creation tools, not legal advice.
Questions
About marital agreements, specifically
Twenty five minutes
One honest conversation, written down while it is still calm.
Start the agreement together, and have it reviewed before either of you signs.
Free forever. No card. You pay only when you want documents.