What Should a Woman Ask For in a Prenup in Florida?

1. What Should a Woman Ask For in a Prenup?

A Florida prenup (a premarital agreement) is a contract, and the spouse who earns less has the strongest reason to negotiate it. Without one, Florida divides what the marriage builds starting from equal, and a surviving spouse takes 30 percent of the elective estate plus homestead rights in the house. A prenup replaces those rules with whatever the two of you sign, so the list below is what to ask for in their place.

1. A payment or schedule that grows with the years of marriage. Section 2 covers it.
2. Protection if you leave work or cut back. Retirement contributions in your name and a clear clause on the home. Section 3 covers it.
3. Alimony kept or shaped, not waived by default. Section 4 covers it.
4. Provisions for you if your spouse dies. Life insurance, a trust or the right to stay in the home. Section 5 covers it.
5. Written financial disclosure with values. Section 6 covers it.
6. Your own lawyer and enough time. Sections 7 and 8 cover them.

2. Should the Prenup Pay More the Longer We Are Married?

The prenup should pay more with each year, and the reason is arithmetic. Each year out of the workforce costs a year of earnings, a year of retirement contributions and a year of promotion, and the cost grows. A flat sum that is the same at year one and year twenty pays the least when the loss is largest.

The March and April 2026 Florida Bar Journal article by Jeffrey Baskies and Phillip Arencibia lists three alternatives to a bare waiver, a fixed sum, a percentage of the net estate computed from a pro forma estate tax return, and a schedule that grows with the length of the marriage. For example, a schedule might pay $100,000 at three years, $300,000 at ten and $700,000 at twenty. The numbers are illustrations and not a recommendation, and the point is that the payment moves with the marriage.

The default rule gives the schedule something to beat. In a divorce Florida starts from an equal division of marital assets, so a prenup that waives everything replaces half with zero. A schedule is a way to ask for a figure that sits between the two.

3. What if I Leave Work to Stay Home With the Kids?

A common question I hear is, “I am going to stay home with the children, so what should my prenup say about that?” Start with the title clause. A broad release of claims plus a clause saying that property in one spouse’s name stays that spouse’s will take earnings and everything bought with them, even where no clause mentions earnings. If the house, the brokerage account and the business are all in your spouse’s name, equal division reaches none of them under that clause.

The wording of the clause on growth decides what the home is worth to you. In Doig, a wife shared a home titled in her husband’s name, and the prenup said neither spouse would claim an interest in the other’s separate property “if it increases in value during the marriage.” The Second District read the clause as covering passive appreciation only, and the wife received half of the increase caused by marital labor and funds. The Florida Supreme Court reached the opposite result in Hahamovitch, where the agreement said each spouse owned what was acquired in his or her own name and the wife released claims to it, and the release reached assets titled in her husband’s name even though marital effort had made them grow. Two clauses of a few words each produced two results.

Ask for four things in writing, which are retirement contributions each year to an account in your name, joint title to the home after a set number of years, a clause that shares growth caused by marital effort or marital funds, and a payment on the schedule in section 2. A prenup waiver of a spouse’s survivor rights in an employer retirement plan is not valid for the plan, because the signer was not yet a spouse, so the plan’s own consent form is signed after the wedding. Prenups and retirement accounts covers that step.

4. Should I Waive Alimony in a Prenup?

Waive it only in exchange for something with a number on it. Florida allows a prenup to establish, modify, waive or eliminate spousal support. The alimony statute lists four forms, temporary, bridge-the-gap, rehabilitative and durational, and permanent alimony is not one of them. A prenup that says nothing about alimony leaves the statute in place, and a Florida court held in Cladis that an agreement dividing property left alimony open.

Three limits are worth knowing. Temporary support and attorney’s fees while a divorce is pending cannot be waived, and an each-side-pays-its-own-lawyer clause cannot be enforced against a spouse in need (Khan, Lord). If a waiver would leave you eligible for public assistance at the time of the divorce, a court may order support to the extent needed to avoid that. And wording matters. In Hahamovitch, the Fourth District held that a general waiver of alimony “except as otherwise provided” did not bar modification of the alimony the agreement set. In Snedaker, a specific waiver of “all rights to receive any further alimony” did.

The options sit on a range. Keep alimony as the statute provides. Set a floor that rises with the years of marriage. Trade it for a fixed payment. Or waive it with a payment and a house in return. A waiver with nothing in return gives up the claim that protects the spouse who left work.

5. What Should a Prenup Say About My Rights if My Spouse Dies?

The prenup decides this part, and Florida lets it be decided with no disclosure at all. A surviving spouse has the 30 percent elective share, homestead as a life estate or an undivided half, a family allowance of up to $18,000 and exempt property including furniture to $20,000 and two cars. Florida law lets a prenup waive all of them if the waiver is signed before two witnesses. A waiver of “all rights” reaches every one unless the prenup says otherwise.

The Baskies and Arencibia article criticizes agreements that follow pages of divorce terms with a one-article full waiver of death rights for a spouse who needs protection, and says the practice may even be malpractice. The alternatives are the three in section 2, and four common ones are a fixed sum at death, a life insurance policy on your spouse’s life payable to you, a trust that pays you for life and the right to stay in the home for a set number of years.

Put the promise in the prenup. A prenup can be amended or revoked only by a written agreement signed by both spouses, and in Wilson the Fourth District held that one spouse’s later trust could not loosen the elective-share waiver. A comforting sentence in a will does not protect you.

6. What Financial Disclosure Should I Ask For?

Ask for a schedule with values, in writing. Florida requires no disclosure for the death-rights waiver in a prenup, and for the divorce side the statute makes an unconscionable prenup unenforceable only where you were also given no fair disclosure, did not waive it in writing, and had no adequate knowledge of the other side’s finances. The Florida Supreme Court put the older test in Del Vecchio as “a general and approximate knowledge” of the other spouse’s property.

The schedule gives you that knowledge. In Hjortaas, a prenup was drafted on April 28 and signed April 30, the day before the wedding, with no financial exhibits. The husband’s net worth was almost $2 million, and the wife was to leave with $48,000. The wife had lived with him and seen his properties, and the court held that she still had no way to turn what she saw into a value. The agreement failed. In Waton, a husband’s interest in an insurance agency was listed as “Exact value unknown” with a note on gross commissions, and the prenup held after 18 years, because a gross-commissions note went with it.

Do not sign a waiver of further disclosure until the schedule is complete. Under the statute that waiver is a separate bar to the disclosure defense, so signing it early gives up the protection the schedule was supposed to provide.

7. Do I Need My Own Lawyer for a Prenup?

Florida does not require one. The cases say that lack of a lawyer is not, by itself, a ground to set a prenup aside (Casto, Cladis, Bakos). The practical reason to hire one is that nobody else will read the draft for you. In Casto, a husband insisted that his wife find a “pro forma” lawyer, and the Florida Supreme Court added that incompetent legal advice is not a basis to undo an agreement, so the choice of lawyer is yours to make carefully.

One lawyer cannot advise both of you on a clause where your interests differ. Hire yours before the draft arrives, so your first reading is with someone who works for you. Your lawyer sends the disclosure request, explains the death-side waiver and negotiates the schedule in section 2.

8. How Much Time Do I Need Before Signing?

Ask for the first draft months before the wedding and the final draft at least 30 days before. Florida courts have gone both ways on timing. Gordon held that ten days was enough time to read a prenup and see a lawyer. Flaherty set aside a prenup whose final draft arrived at 11:30 p.m. the night before a Las Vegas wedding, after the wife’s lawyer had advised against signing. Bakos found a prenup voidable where the dentist told the hygienist, within 24 hours of the wedding, that it was sign or no marriage.

Negotiation is the strongest evidence. In Francavilla, a wife seven months pregnant signed less than an hour before a courthouse wedding, and the prenup held, because the terms had been negotiated for months. The court said to look at the entire negotiation and not only the end. A statement that there will be no wedding without a prenup is not duress by itself (Eager, Doig). The record you build early is what shows the signing was free.

9. What Can a Florida Court Refuse to Enforce?

The statute lists three grounds. A prenup is not enforceable if the spouse resisting it proves that it was not signed voluntarily, that it came from fraud, duress, coercion or overreaching, or that it was unconscionable when signed and the disclosure conditions in section 6 were not met. Whether it was unconscionable is decided by the court as a matter of law. In the Florida opinions I reviewed, none applies this subsection to a prenup signed after October 1, 2007, so the older Casto cases are the guidance.

Fairness is measured at the signing. In Del Vecchio, the Florida Supreme Court wrote, “The element of fairness should, of course, be measured as of the time of the execution of the agreement.” One-sided is also not enough. In Waton, the Fourth District wrote that “even though an agreement is one-sided and unfair, that alone does not make it the result of overreaching.” An agreement that is unreasonable but freely entered into is enforceable, which is the reason to negotiate before the signature and not argue after it.

10. What Does a Prenup Review Cost?

A review of the prenup the other side drafted is a flat fee from $750, and a prenup drafted for you is a flat fee from $2,450. The fees are posted October 6, 2026 and honored for 90 days from that date. Government costs, if any, are additional and passed through at cost. What each fee covers is on the prenup page, and what a Florida prenup costs explains the numbers.

We represent only the spouse who hires us, never both of you. The No-Cost Phone Consult creates no attorney-client relationship, so do not send the draft or confidential details until we have agreed to represent you.

Related guides cover prenup review, what makes a prenup invalid, second-marriage prenups, how a prenup works at death and what to know when a spouse asks for a postnup. The hub is Florida prenuptial agreements.

Frequently Asked Questions

Common Situations

The spouse planning to stay home after the first child. The draft keeps each person’s earnings and titled property separate, and everything is in the other spouse’s name. The request is a schedule that grows with the years of marriage and retirement contributions in the at-home spouse’s name.

The second marriage at fifty. One spouse owns the home and wants it to pass to adult children. The other spouse can ask for the right to stay in the home for a set period and a life insurance policy, in place of a waiver with nothing in return.

The spouse asked to waive all support. The incomes differ by a factor of three, and the draft waives alimony and the elective share. The first request is a disclosure schedule with values, and the second is a fixed payment for each year of marriage.

Sources of Law

• Fla. Stat. §61.079(3), (4)(a), (6) and (7) (premarital agreements; contents; amendment only by a signed writing; enforcement and unconscionability). Fla. Stat. §61.08(1)(a) (forms of alimony). Fla. Stat. §61.075 (equitable distribution). Fla. Stat. §732.702 (waiver of spousal rights; no disclosure required before marriage). §§732.2065, 732.401, 732.402, 732.403.
• Del Vecchio v. Del Vecchio, 143 So. 2d 17 (Fla. 1962). Casto v. Casto, 508 So. 2d 330 (Fla. 1987). Hahamovitch v. Hahamovitch, 174 So. 3d 983 (Fla. 2015), approving 133 So. 3d 1008 (Fla. 4th DCA 2014). Doig v. Doig, 787 So. 2d 100 (Fla. 2d DCA 2001). Cladis v. Cladis, 512 So. 2d 271 (Fla. 4th DCA 1987).
• Hjortaas v. McCabe, 656 So. 2d 168 (Fla. 2d DCA 1995). Waton v. Waton, 887 So. 2d 419 (Fla. 4th DCA 2004). Gordon v. Gordon, 25 So. 3d 615 (Fla. 4th DCA 2009). Flaherty v. Flaherty, 128 So. 3d 920 (Fla. 2d DCA 2013). Bakos v. Bakos, 950 So. 2d 1257 (Fla. 2d DCA 2007). Francavilla v. Francavilla, 969 So. 2d 522 (Fla. 4th DCA 2007). Eager v. Eager, 696 So. 2d 1235 (Fla. 3d DCA 1997).
• Khan v. Khan, 79 So. 3d 99 (Fla. 4th DCA 2012). Lord v. Lord, 993 So. 2d 562 (Fla. 4th DCA 2008). Wilson v. Wilson, No. 4D18-3691 (Fla. 4th DCA Aug. 14, 2019). Herrera v. Herrera, 895 So. 2d 1171 (Fla. 3d DCA 2005). Snedaker v. Snedaker, 660 So. 2d 1070 (Fla. 4th DCA 1995).
• Jeffrey A. Baskies and Phillip J. Arencibia, “Post-Death Planning in Marital Agreements,” Fla. Bar J., Vol. 100, No. 2 (Mar./Apr. 2026). Braver, Santilli, Little and Sease, Pennsylvania Family Lawyer, Vol. 44, Issue 1 (Spring 2022) (a prenup waiver is not an ERISA spousal waiver).
• Statutes and opinions retrieved 2026-10-07.

What a Prenup Paid After Eight Years at Home

I have come across a Third District case in which a nurse met an emergency room doctor at Baptist Hospital. The two became engaged in 1993 and signed a prenup on February 11, 1994, while she was pregnant with their first child. The wedding followed eight days later. The nurse stayed home with their three children, and the couple separated on April 15, 2002.

She asked the court to rescind or reform the prenup and said she had signed it under duress. The trial court found that she signed freely, knowingly and voluntarily. Each spouse received $305,041 in equitable distribution. The court divided the $100,000 increase in value of his premarital home equally, because the husband had spent $90,000 of marital funds paying off the mortgage and had built a den addition. The trial court also ordered rehabilitative alimony of $1,000 a month for twelve months under the terms of the prenup. The appeals court affirmed that her duress claim lacked support, and it reversed the order giving her use of his home until the youngest child reached the age of majority.

I have a few take-home points.

The first is that her own lawyer negotiated the agreement, and the court pointed to that when it rejected the duress claim. A lawyer who is part of the negotiation is the record, and her lawyer later testified about how she was retained, the working drafts and the process.

The second is that the alimony term in the agreement was the number that governed eight years later. Twelve months at $1,000 followed eight years of caring for three children, and the court upheld the agreement.

The third is that the home was his and stayed his. The court could divide the increase in its value, and it could not give her the house itself, because a premarital asset is not divided without an agreement.

Practice pointer. Before signing, run the alimony and growth terms at year eight with real numbers and ask what they produce on the day of a divorce. A term that looks fair at a wedding can pay very little after years at home.

Avoid accepting a fixed short alimony period without a schedule tied to the years of marriage.

The honest limit is that the opinion reports the alimony term and not the rest of the bargain, and it does not say what the nurse asked for or what the doctor would have accepted. Whether a different term was available is unknown, and the case predicts nothing about another marriage.

Kevin D. Klagge, Esq., admitted in Florida since 2012. The case above is a published opinion in other parties’ matter, not a matter this firm handled, and it predicts nothing about yours.

Updated on October 7, 2026. Reviewed by Kevin D. Klagge, Esq., Fla. Bar No. 99502. General information about Florida law, not legal advice, and no attorney-client relationship is created. Each spouse should have independent counsel. Do not send the draft or any confidential information until we have agreed to represent you.