With celebrity divorces all over the news, it sometimes seems like marriage just doesn’t mean that much anymore. After all, Kim Kardashian’s marriage to Kris Humphries lasted just 72 days, Katy Perry and Russell Brand are splitting up after barely a year of marriage while Drew Barrymore is engaged for the third time, her first marriages having lasted 2 months and 5 months respectively.
While it may be easy to obtain a divorce, the consequences of marriage are very real, and long lasting. Without a marriage contract or pre-nuptial agreement, certain rights and obligations appear as soon as you both say “I do”.
Once you are married, you are potentially on the hook for spousal support, and while the length of a marriage is a factor the courts will look at, you could end up financially supporting your ex for a lot longer than you were married to them.
You’ll also have to share your assets with your ex; in Ontario, this is called equalization. The good news is that, for the most part, you only have to share the increase in your net worth since you married – so, if Kim Kardashian lived in Ontario, she wouldn’t have to share all her millions with Kris Humphries… just what she had accumulated in the 72 days they were married.
Of course, there is one big exception to this; if there is a family home, it will be split 50/50. So, if Katy Perry owned the home that she and Russell Brand lived in while they were married, Russell Brand would be entitled to half the value of the house… not just a share in the increase in the value of the house since the marriage. This is one important rule for everyone, celebrity or otherwise, who owns their own house to know if they are thinking about getting married…
