living together before marriage: opinions?
 

I lived with Mr Sageofages for many years before I agreed to finally "jump the broom, become handfasted, put the ring through his nose"...aka....get married.

It worked for us, why mess with it? I think we used it as a way to work the kinks out of the relationship before we did the legal paperwork.

I am happy with how we started down our path, and thrilled to be finishing it up with him.

Our oldest daughter (28.5 years)...got married and left her husband after only 2.5 months!!! I finally paid for the divorce 3.5 years later!!! She has lived with two other men since then, and I consider both choices to be a complete mess.

Our youngest daughter married her husband the day before she graduated from HS. Heck family was coming into town anyway, why not? She was 18, not like I could stop her or anything. They "lived together" for a couple months from the time she turned 18, until their wedding 3 months later. They have been married 3.5 years now, and it has its ups and downs, but it seems to be working for them so far.

I currently live with my fiancé. I personally do recommend it. I feel I know going into the marriage what it is going to be like living with him for the rest of my life. I would rather have things worked out (who does dishes, laundry, trash, etc.) before we were married. I would rather find out his quirks now and learn to deal with them rather then wait until after we are married.

Been there, done that, and would NOT do it again unless I was engaged at the least.

I won't be doing it until there's a ring on my finger and wedding plans are underway. I know way too many women who have moved in with their boyfriends thinking it's a way to move the relationship along and all it's done was keep things in limbo. To each his own, but for me the next step in my committed relationship of two years is engagement. By this point, I've spent plenty enough time with him to know his pros and cons - you shouldn't have to live with someone to know that kind of stuff, and if you don't know it, that's probably a sign that you should not be movin' in with him/her.

Living together is not like marriage, so I've never really understood the "test" argument. Many people who live together before marriage never really make the mental leap to "married" and have a hard time adjusting to the idea that the person they're living with is now legally and financially bound to them, not just a roommate.

I live with my boyfriend and it has worked well for us. We didn't really decide to do it, it just kinda happened. If we get married, great. If we don't, great. That's not really a big deal to us. If we do get married I'm glad we lived together first b/c at least I know what I'm getting into! :)

I totally agree with this.

My friends that lived together pre-engagement either broke up with the guy (often at great financial cost), or got divorced once they did marry.

My bf and I discussed it at several points in the relationship. At the time our reasonings were that this way we wouldn't have to find random roommates and/or we'd save money over renting by ourselves. Also we'd been dating for several years and thought we could handle it. It was never a way to take our relationship to the "next" level or anything like that.

However we decided against it for several reasons, the Catholicism thing makes both of our families against it (for the most part, my mom is probably the most flexible as far as that goes) and honestly has an effect on our own opinions as well. Plus I'm the messy one in the relationship and I'm still working on getting a handle on that to where he's comfortable with it. He doesn't want to clean up after me, and I don't blame him :p

So in the end we decided not to, I'm not sure we never will, but just like we're not ready to get married yet (though I think we will be eventually) we're not ready for that step now.

Not really an opinion either way, but there you go. I did have a classmate recently try and convince me that not moving in was just me living my life based on my parents' rules... because I mentioned they were against it as well. It was sort of odd the way she did it, but she's also almost 10 years older than I am and I don't think she took that into consideration.

I think it's a huge decision, but I would never marry again without living with him first. I disagree that it's not a good test. I don't think I would have married either (two) of my ex-husbands had I lived with them first. The things that made me end up hating them would have come out if we'd lived together first, but there was no way for me to see the issues before actually living with them. I don't think you can know a person until you've lived with them. I know many people who lived with their best friend from high school when they went to college and ended up hating each other after living together. I realize a friendship is different in some ways to a marriage, but again, there are just some things you can't know until you've lived together, especially if one of you is living at home until you marry.

I agree with her disagreement. I take cars for a test drive before I buy them, too.

Professionally the problems I've learned about co-habitation seem to outweigh the benefits. Not necessarily for everyone but in many cases.

Off the top of my head the biggest is that there's a sense that it is sort of a "test" and not a commitment can lead to a couple simply breaking up instead of working on any problems. And that breaking up isn't as "simple" because you're sharing a space. Though this occurs in marriages as well, the sense of commitment tends to lead more people to work through problems and if they do divorce there's usually legal help involved.

YMMV of course.

^--This is definitely the most common argument you hear about not moving in with someone. I won't dispute it because everyone deals with conflict differently. But as someone said previously, I would rather break up with a boyfriend/fiance than get divorced. (but I do totally respect those that make a decision based on personal values, that's a whole 'nother set of factors that can't -- or shouldn't -- be argued with)

The "we know we're getting married why are we paying 2 rents and cable bills" is one of the more common arguments for those that do move in. And I think it often comes down to where you are in your relationship. That's where hubby & I were, and honestly, I did want to "kick the tires" a bit to see how our living styles/money styles, etc., all would blend. Thus I am of the mindset of the post below:

There's a big difference between before you're engaged, and after you're engaged.

A friend of mine sold her car - gave up her apartment - bought expensive furniture - bought pets - because she was under the impression that she and the guy would be together forever (they were not engaged). To make a long story short, he turned out to be the most worthless sack of shit in the history of worthless sacks of shit and dumped her. She ended up HAVING to buy a house and getting way in over her head monetarily because she couldn't find an apartment that would accomodate her dogs. I know he could have still done the same thing had they been engaged, but maybe at least then she'd have had a ring she could sell.

With my ex, we went on vacation together and stayed over at each others' houses enough that I think we knew how the other liked to live. I know he stays up till 4, he knows I leave my shoes all over the house. We both knew and understood the importance of having alone time (this is something some guys/girls just do not get) and being respectful of the other person you live with, even if you ARE exchanging bodily fluids w/ them. It's all a moot point now, of course, but it taught me a lot.

I don't think saving money is a good enough excuse to do it. You can know how someone handles his/her money without living with them.