What Should a Prenup Cover When a Foreign National Marries in Florida?

Florida’s premarital agreement law has no citizenship or residency requirement. Two people who intend to marry sign an agreement in writing, and the agreement takes effect when they marry. A foreign national living in Miami on a work visa, an E-2 investor running a Florida company, and two foreign nationals marrying in Orlando all sign the same kind of Florida prenup. The general rules are on the Florida prenup guide. The sections below cover what changes when one or both of you comes from another country. A couple using a K-1 fiancé(e) visa has a timing problem of its own, covered in prenups for K-1 visa couples, and an agreement already signed abroad is covered in whether a prenup signed elsewhere is valid in Florida.

How Do You Disclose Assets Held Abroad?

Clients are often confused about how far the disclosure has to reach, and ask me, “Do I have to list the apartment and the accounts back home?” The answer is yes, if you want the agreement to hold. Florida can refuse to enforce a prenup that was unconscionable when it was signed if, before signing, the challenging spouse received no fair and reasonable disclosure of the other’s property and debts, signed no written waiver of further disclosure, and had no adequate knowledge of them. Assets abroad are where disclosure most often falls short, because they are easy to forget and hard for the other spouse to check.

A schedule we would sign off on lists the following for each person.

1. Accounts. Bank, brokerage and retirement accounts in every country, with the institution, the country and the balance.
2. Real estate. Every apartment, house and plot of land abroad, with an estimated value and any mortgage.
3. Pensions and funds. Employer pensions, provident and savings funds, and any entitlement from a state scheme where a value is available.
4. Family businesses and trusts. Shares in family companies and any interest in a trust or foundation, including interests held through relatives.
5. Debts and guarantees. Loans abroad and any personal guarantee of a family business’s debt.

Each value goes into U.S. dollars with the exchange rate and its date, and statements in another language go in with a translation. The same schedule often becomes the starting point for U.S. reporting, because a spouse who becomes a U.S. tax resident usually has to report foreign accounts every year. Foreign account reporting explains the FBAR and FATCA filings, and pre-immigration tax planning covers what to do before U.S. residency starts.

Practice pointer. Attach the schedules to the agreement and have each person initial every page. A schedule kept in a separate email is the first document a challenger says was never seen.

Which Country’s Law Governs the Prenup?

Florida lets a couple choose, in the prenup itself, the law that governs how the agreement is read, and Florida courts generally enforce that choice unless the chosen law would violate strong Florida public policy. A Florida appeals court enforced a Georgia choice-of-law clause in 2010 and explained that “The mere difference between the law of the forum and that of a foreign state does not make application of the foreign law contrary to Florida public policy.”

For the law of another country, Florida has a statute. A Florida court in a divorce may not enforce a clause choosing a foreign country’s law if that law contravenes the strong public policy of Florida or is unjust or unreasonable, and the statute defines strong public policy as policy important enough to outweigh freedom of contract. Separately, no prenup can reduce a child’s right to support, whatever law it chooses.

Choosing Florida law is usually the simpler answer for a couple who will live in Florida. Choosing the law of a home country is allowed, and it has a cost that appears only in a dispute, when each side may need an expert on that country’s law and a Florida judge has to decide what the foreign law says. Some couples also sign a marriage contract or choose a property regime at the civil registry when they marry abroad. The second agreement has to say the same thing as the Florida prenup, or a court will be asked to decide which one controls.

Practice pointer. Write the choice of law into the prenup in one sentence that covers both divorce and death, and check every other agreement the couple has signed or will sign abroad against it.

A Marriage Contract From Home Is Read for Its Words

Many couples arrive with a religious or civil marriage contract from home, such as a Mahr, a ketubah or a contract choosing a property regime. A Florida court applies Florida contract law to the secular terms of such a contract, such as a promise to pay a sum of money, and it reads the contract for what the words actually say. A contract that promises one payment does not, by itself, give up anything else Florida law provides, as the case at the bottom of this page shows. If a couple wants the contract from home to limit property division or alimony, a Florida prenup has to say so expressly.

What an E-2 Investor’s Prenup Has to Protect

An E-2 treaty investor is a national of a country that has a qualifying treaty with the United States, who has invested a substantial amount of capital in a U.S. business and comes to develop and direct it. Under the USCIS rules the investor shows that control with at least 50 percent ownership of the enterprise or operational control through a managerial position or another corporate device. The first stay is up to two years, with extensions of up to two years each, and a spouse in E-2 status is authorized to work incident to that status.

The enterprise is usually the largest asset the investor brings into the marriage, and Florida divides more of it than most people expect. Florida treats as marital the enhancement in value of a separate asset that results from either spouse’s efforts during the marriage or from marital money spent on it. An E-2 investor works in the business every day by design, so without a prenup the growth during the marriage is exposed even when the original investment is clearly separate.

1. Keep the enterprise and its growth separate. The prenup names the company and states that the shares, their growth from either spouse’s work, and reinvested profits stay separate.
2. Leave ownership and control where the visa needs them. Any clause that would give the spouse shares, a vote or a management role is checked with the immigration lawyer first, because it can collide with the ownership or control test.
3. Provide for the spouse another way. A sum payable at divorce, life insurance or a share of other assets often gives the spouse real security without touching the company.

A spouse who works in the business, which an E-2 spouse is allowed to do, is the case that most needs the growth clause, because that spouse’s own work is part of what made the company grow. Prenups for business owners covers valuation and buy-sell coordination in more detail.

How the Prenup Fits the Non-Citizen Spouse Estate Rules

Most prenups also decide what each spouse can claim when the other dies, such as the 30 percent elective share and homestead, and promise something in return, often a home, a sum of money or life insurance. When a spouse is not a U.S. citizen, federal estate and gift tax rules change how those promises should be carried out.

1. The marital deduction. A surviving spouse who is not a U.S. citizen does not receive the unlimited marital deduction unless the assets pass into a qualified domestic trust, called a QDOT. A prenup that promises the surviving spouse a large sum should be matched by an estate plan that can route it through a QDOT where the tax requires one.
2. Lifetime gifts. Gifts to a spouse who is not a U.S. citizen are capped at $194,000 a year in 2026 rather than unlimited, which matters for a prenup that promises transfers during the marriage.
3. Non-resident owners. A spouse who is neither a citizen nor domiciled in the United States has a $60,000 exemption on U.S. assets, which affects whose name the Florida home should be in.

The full rules, with the figures for each year, are on estate planning for non-US citizens and US estate tax for non-resident aliens.

One Florida rule matters for couples who lived under a community-property system before moving here. Florida has a statute that preserves community-property rights at death for personal property and Florida real estate, other than homestead and property held by the entireties, acquired while a spouse was domiciled in a jurisdiction whose law made it community property. At the first death, half of that property belongs to the surviving spouse and is not part of the deceased spouse’s estate. A prenup that waives rights at death can waive this claim too, and the statute gives specific language for doing it. Whether a prenup applies at death covers the waiver and its two witnesses.

Who Advises on the Law of Your Home Country

Kevin is a Florida attorney who drafts the Florida prenup, the waiver of rights at death and the Florida estate documents, and coordinates with the lawyers who handle the rest. A lawyer licensed in your home country advises on how that country would treat the agreement and your property there, and an immigration lawyer handles status. Kevin tells you at the first consult which questions belong to which lawyer, so you pay each one only for their part.

What It Costs

Drafting a prenup for one spouse is a flat fee from $2,450. The fee covers the first draft, up to two rounds of revisions with the other spouse’s lawyer, the financial disclosure schedules, and a signing with two witnesses and a notary. Reviewing a prenup the other side drafted is a flat fee from $750, and a postnup for a couple already married is a flat fee from $2,950. Coordinating the prenup with a QDOT or a cross-border estate plan is a flat fee quoted at consult.

Posted fees are honored for 90 days from the posted date (October 6, 2026). Advice from a lawyer in another country, certified translation, the immigration lawyer’s fees and government costs are separate, and government costs are passed through at cost. A challenge to an existing agreement and any divorce litigation are quoted per matter and never carry a flat fee.

Frequently Asked Questions

Common Situations

The E-2 investor and the U.S. citizen. A treaty investor owns all of a Miami restaurant company and is marrying a U.S. citizen. The prenup keeps the company and its growth separate, provides a sum at divorce instead of shares, and leaves management with the investor. The immigration lawyer reviews the draft before the signing.

Two foreign nationals marrying in Florida. Both spouses hold work visas and own apartments in their home countries. The prenup chooses Florida law, lists both apartments and both pension funds with their dollar values, and a lawyer in each home country confirms how the agreement would be treated there.

The family company back home. A bride expects to inherit part of her family’s company abroad. The prenup keeps the inheritance and the shares separate, and the estate plan names a QDOT for anything her husband, who is not a U.S. citizen, is to receive at her death.

Sources of Law

• Premarital agreements: Fla. Stat. §61.079(3), (4)(a)7 (choice of law governing construction), (4)(b) (child support may not be adversely affected), (5), (7)(a)3 (unconscionability with no fair and reasonable disclosure, no written waiver and no adequate knowledge). Foreign law in ch. 61 matters: Fla. Stat. §61.0401(1) (“strong public policy” defined), (2)(a) (no enforcement of a choice of foreign-country law that contravenes strong public policy or is unjust or unreasonable), (4). Marital assets: Fla. Stat. §61.075(6)(a)1.b (enhancement in value of nonmarital assets from either party’s efforts or marital funds). (2026 statutes, read 2026-10-06.)
• Rights at death: Fla. Stat. §732.702(1) to (3); §732.2065 (elective share of 30 percent); §§732.216 to 732.228, Florida Uniform Disposition of Community Property Rights at Death Act, including §732.217 (application), §732.219(1) (one-half to the surviving spouse) and (2) (waiver language). (2026 statutes.)
• E-2: USCIS, E-2 Treaty Investors (at least 50 percent ownership or operational control; maximum initial stay of two years, extensions of up to two years; spouses employment authorized incident to status). Read 2026-10-06.
• Non-citizen spouse: IRC §2056A (QDOT); §2523(i) (annual gifts to a non-citizen spouse, $194,000 in 2026); §2102(b) (non-resident exemption equivalent of $60,000). Figures as verified on the linked guides.
• Cases: McNamara v. McNamara, 40 So. 3d 78 (Fla. 5th DCA 2010) (Georgia choice-of-law clause enforced); Akileh v. Elchahal, 666 So. 2d 246 (Fla. 2d DCA 1996) (Florida contract law applies to the secular terms of a sadaq); Parbeen v. Bari, No. 4D21-431 (Fla. 4th DCA Mar. 16, 2022) (a Mahr promising a sum is not a waiver of equitable distribution or temporary support). Opinions read in full from the local CourtListener corpus. (retrieved 2026-10-06)

What a Two-Page Contract From Home Did Not Say

Most articles on this topic cite each other, and I would rather cite the court. I review account histories that nobody disclosed for years, and I see cases where the document a couple trusted most was the one written for a different legal system.

A couple married in Bangladesh in September 2015 and signed a Mahr, a traditional Islamic marriage contract, on a two-page preprinted form with the blanks filled in by typewriter. Most of the form recorded the couple’s family details, the date and the witnesses. The operative term was a promise by the husband to pay 15 lac Taka, 5 lac at the marriage and 10 lac if they divorced, which the trial court later valued at about $11,772. The couple came to live in Broward County, and in July 2019 the husband filed for divorce. The husband argued that the Mahr was the whole of what she could recover, because equitable distribution and temporary support do not exist under the religious law the contract came from. The trial court agreed, gave him title to the home after paying her share of the equity, and denied her temporary support.

The Fourth District reversed in 2022. The Mahr was enforceable, and it meant what it said and no more. The court wrote that “To overcome that presumption, the prenuptial agreement’s plain language must unambiguously express a desire to waive equitable distribution,” and nothing in the two pages mentioned property at all.

In reading that opinion with a foreign national’s file in mind, I have a few take-home points.

The first is that a Florida court reads a contract from home through Florida contract law and its plain words, whatever the tradition behind it. Practice pointer. If a couple wants a contract from home to limit property division or support, the limit goes into a Florida prenup in words a Florida judge can apply without an expert.

The second is that the husband’s view of the Mahr was sincere and still lost. Both spouses in that case agreed the contract was valid, and the fight was over what it covered. Practice pointer. List every agreement the couple has already signed, at home or anywhere else, and state in the Florida prenup how each one relates to it.

Avoid relying on a translation of a contract from home as if it were a Florida prenup. The translation tells you what the words are, and only a Florida agreement tells a Florida court what the couple meant to give up.

An honest limit belongs here. The case involved a religious contract that never mentioned property, and the court did not decide how it would treat a foreign marriage contract that did. The answer turns on the words of the contract and on the law it chose, which is the reason the choice-of-law clause above matters.

Kevin D. Klagge, Esq., admitted in Florida since 2012. The case described above is a published decision of a Florida court in other parties’ matter, not a matter this firm handled, and past results do not guarantee a similar outcome.

Updated on October 6, 2026. Reviewed by Kevin D. Klagge, Esq., Fla. Bar No. 99502. General information about Florida law, not legal, tax or immigration advice, and no attorney-client relationship is created. Foreign law questions belong to a lawyer licensed in that country. Do not send confidential information until we have agreed to represent you.