And I always tell people this idea that a prenup is in any way unromantic. Every single marriage has a prenup. It's either one that was written by the government and can be modified by the state legislature of the state in which you reside, or it's written by you and the person you allegedly like more than the other 8 billion options in the world. Now, leave it to whatever your political view — whether you're a left, right, or a raging moderate — the truth is we all, at some point in the last 15 years, have looked at the government and said, 'Yeah, they don't know what the hell they're doing over there.' So why would you say, 'I'm going to trust the rules of my relationship to a future government that I haven't had any say in yet?' I think prenups are an example of two people saying, 'Hey, this is our relationship, our rules. Let's define that rule set in a way that makes sense for the two of us.'
Welcome back to Propam Relationships in a special two-part series about love, marriage, and what it takes to make a partnership last. We're joined once again by divorce attorney and author James Sexton. Today we'll answer your questions about sharing money in a marriage, de-escalating conflict, and why fewer young people are getting married. James, good to see you again.
Good to see you, Scott. Always a pleasure.
All right, let's bust into this. Question number one comes from Food Lifestyle Inc. on Instagram: Can two people have a loving, affectionate, successful marriage if they keep their money separate? James?
Yeah, I think absolutely. I mean, I think, you know, there's all permutations out there, but I'm a big fan in most aspects of relationship of like the you, the me, and the we. And this kind of Venn diagram — I think the idea that if we don't have everything completely commingled all the time, that somehow it means there's a division in our relationship that's going to create distance between us — I don't think it's honest. And I don't think it's necessary. I think, you know, if it's happy for the two of you and it doesn't scare the horses, it's nobody's business. You know, I think if the two of you see — I think there's value in having some separation. I mean, if we have only joint accounts and only joint credit cards, okay, we've got full transparency, but that also means when I buy you a birthday present, you're going to see what it cost and where I bought it. And if I bought it the day before your birthday or a month in advance of your birthday, there's no privacy whatsoever. Maybe this is generational, and I'll get accused because I'm Gen X of old-fashioned ways of thinking. But, you know, if a woman in my life says, 'Hey, can you get this out of my bag?' I give them their bag because I was raised you don't go in a woman's bag. You bring her and give it to her and then you take it. So I think it's the same thing — like I think there should be some privacy in relationship, whether it's medical autonomy, whether it's financial autonomy, there should be some level of it. But that being said, total disconnection from the finances and having everything be it's yours and mine and there's no ours — I don't think that that's necessarily healthy. But again, I don't think it's one-size-fits-all. I think it has a lot to do with people's relationship with money individually, which has a lot to do with the way that they were raised, and it has lots of other values built into it.
I mean, I find sometimes that you need to be attracted to a partner. You need to have similar values. I think the thing that people don't spend enough time talking about before they enter a long-term relationship is each of their relationship jointly and individually to money. Who is expected to make the money here? What is your approach to spending? What are your expectations around lifestyle? Who's responsible for providing that lifestyle? And there's data that shows that financial issues are a cause of divorce. At least that's what I've seen in my personal experience, and there's some data here. I think there's no one-size-fits-all. It's entirely up to you. So if you're entering into a relationship where one person has a lot of assets and you do not, it's entirely fair to say there's pre-assets that go back to me, and if there's post-marriage, and then there's stuff we do together. And then also, I think — and granted, I've never had a prenup, so I'm, you know, what you do as I say, not as I do — but it seems to me that a prenup just makes everything much easier such that once you're in a very ugly situation. It's like I have a contract with every major business relationship I have, and 98% of the time we never refer to the contract because we don't need to, because it's going well. But you're smart enough to know that the worst time to learn how to fight is when you're in a fight. Like the best time to make a rule set is when there's an abundance of optimism and love between the two people. And I always tell people this idea that a prenup is in any way unromantic. Every single marriage has a prenup. It's either one that was written by the government and can be modified by the state legislature of the state in which you reside, or it's written by you and the person you allegedly like more than the other 8 billion options in the world. Now, leave it to whatever your political view — whether you're a left, right, or a raging moderate — the truth is we all, at some point in the last 15 years, have looked at the government and said, 'Yeah, they don't know what the hell they're doing over there.' So why would you say, 'I'm going to trust the rules of my relationship to a future government that I haven't had any say in yet?' I think prenups are an example of two people saying, 'Hey, this is our relationship, our rules. Let's define that rule set in a way that makes sense for the two of us.'
Because something you said in our last conversation, Scott, that stuck with me is this idea of all relationships are about an exchange of value. And that we've entered this moment in the world where daring to say that a relationship is an economy, you know, where like we both bring something of value. And what that might be can be totally different. Like how many apples is worth an apple? Well, that's easy. Apples to apples. But how many apples is worth a pineapple? Well, now we're having an economy. We're having a conversation about where are you, you know, in the world, like and how prevalent are apples versus pineapples. Same thing with love. Like I think it'd be okay if we said, 'Hey, I bring an abundance of resources to this relationship economically. I bring problem-solving skills to this relationship. You bring sweetness and kindness and warmth at the end of the day.' What is that worth? That's a perfect, you know, a perfectly subjective beautiful assessment. And to say, well, one of these is worth more than the other — that's a very individualized thing. There might be some people that find each of those traits to be invaluable, and there may be people that say, 'Oh, yeah, I can do that myself.' So I think it's a very personalized decision that we've just stopped talking about because the conversation feels icky, but I don't think it has to.
The data is clear, though. A 2026 Harris poll found that 53% of engaged or married Gen Z and millennials have signed a prenup. That's up from 2022 — Gen Z at 41%, millennials at 34%. Prenup requests have dramatically increased, and it's largely being driven by requests from women. And again, I think that's also a function of women have more economic security, bring more to the relationship economically. What you just said is so powerful, and that is we all have a prenup. It's just a question of whether someone you've never met — and to our, you know, hourly compensated employees who may not always have congruent incentives. You've been to the DMV. Did you walk around the DMV and go, 'Oh yeah, these people should be in charge of everything?' Like it's government employees you're trusting to write the rules of your relationship. And again, at a moment — and I do a ton of — I do five, six prenups a week. The conversation is between two people that like each other literally the most at that moment. I like you the — you're my favorite person. Like what is marriage? But the legal codification of you are my favorite person out of 8 billion options. You can't discuss with that person what value you each bring to each other. By the way, what a romantic discussion. Here's what you bring to my life. Here's the value you give to me. Here's what every day I'm so grateful for you. Here's the pieces of you that if they went away, I would feel a hole in me for the loss. That's a beautiful conversation. Here's how I feel scared. Here's what I'm afraid of. How can I protect you from everything, including a future version of me? Like how can we protect each other? And because you can't feel loved if you don't feel safe, and prenups are about feeling safe — both people feeling safe.
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Question number two also comes from Instagram. Miss V Lady asks: 'Every relationship experiences tension or arguments. What's your method to de-escalate, James?'
Wow. So, I, you know, I'm a huge fan of apologies. Like in every aspect of my life, personal and professional, I'm very quick to apologize because it doesn't cost anything. And most of the time, there is something for me to apologize for in almost any interaction. Like I think that there's — it's such a safe move. Like when I get on the phone with a lawyer, I have a lawyer on the other side of a case, and I've never had a case with this person, and they just come at me really hard, you know? They just come at me really aggressive. I'll immediately say, you know, I know this is our first case together, but just from the way you're coming at me — like if I said something in our initial communication that made you feel like I didn't respect you or that we had to be off at this kind of tone, I'm really sorry. Like I really didn't mean to do that. Immediately, they'll go, 'Oh, well, no, that's just kind of how I do things.' I'm like, 'Oh, okay. Hey, yeah, no, I won't take it personally, but I just didn't want to think like if I say a lot of stuff, I might have said something that offended you, or maybe you saw something on TikTok I said that pissed you off.' Like whatever it is, I'm really sorry. I'm a big fan of being quick to apologize. Like real apology, too. Not like, 'I'm sorry you feel that way.' Like real apology. Hey, listen, I know you seem very hurt right now. You're very upset at me right now. I know I didn't mean to hurt you, but anything I did that hurt you, I am profoundly sorry for because I know I didn't mean to. Like I think there's a lot of value in being quick to apologize and owning your share of whatever's going on there. Now, that's not to say you roll over on everything and you concede that everything's your fault, but I just think that when you start a conversation with, 'All right, listen. Anything I did that made you feel unloved or unvalued, I'm genuinely sorry for that because I know I love you and I value you. So if I got that wrong, I apologize.' How much can you escalate after that? It's really pretty hard, you know, to escalate when someone starts with an unconditional sense of, 'Whoa, whoa, whoa, I'm sorry that we're in this position right now.'
I think it's so powerful. I think as a younger man, I just thought apologizing was acquiescing and connoted weakness.
It really is powerful. And I've figured out that if someone's upset in your life that you really care about, they might be upset for the wrong reasons. It might be something else in their life. But if they're upset, you want to immediately acknowledge you're upset and you mean a lot to me, and you're smart and you know as rational as or more than most people. So if you're upset, I'm inclined to think there's something wrong and I've done something wrong and I owe you an apology. And that's to the extent that I have — to the extent that I have made you feel — because it's really always about the feeling too. Like it sounds like you feel really hurt. I know I didn't mean to hurt you, and anything I did that caused you hurt, I know I didn't mean to, and I'm really sorry. Like that's very powerful as an opening move, and then we can get into the meat. You know, we can get into the meat and potatoes.
Yeah. The nuance here is the following, and that is — it took me a while to realize. I grew up with a single mother, and the biggest source of tension in our household was a lack of money. And I quickly figured out that if she was happy, I was okay. If she was unhappy, I was not okay because there was nowhere to hide. It was just me and her. And so I grew up basically — if a dude, if a guy, a friend, whoever is not doing well, I'm like, 'How can I help?' But then I sleep like a baby that night. I'm okay. I don't want to sound unfeeling. If a woman in my life is unhappy, I freak out. It takes me back to a very ugly place. And unfortunately, one of the real problems that I realize now with my ex was that whenever she was upset, I immediately went to managing her and de-escalating and not being open and honest about what was going on in my head. And so when we got to a point where I was then finally honest with her about some of my concerns and true feelings about the relationship, it was like a ton of bricks landing on her head. So yeah, I use — I use humor to de-escalate. I absolutely — and one of the greatest things about my partnership right now, we had a fight last night. We probably fight maybe once every couple months. At one point, at one maybe two points in the middle of the fight, we both started laughing, and I thought, you know, our relationship is going to survive if we can just — laughing just helps so much.
