Anonymous wrote:Living together prior to marriage is apples and oranges to marriage. No comparison according to people I know who have done both.

Personally, playing house never appealed to me. Make a commitment or go away.

I do not see any difference between the time we live together before marriage and the time after. What was different was having kids!

Also wanted to add: I think another variable is your age. When younger people move in together, there is less of an expectation of marriage. When you are in your 30s, you shouldn't be expected to move in/out with people, so when you do take the step, there should be some expectation of commitment and future plans.

Living together prior to marriage is apples and oranges to marriage. No comparison according to people I know who have done both.

Personally, playing house never appealed to me. Make a commitment or go away.

I think you have to be realistic when you move in together, and decide based on the situation. Unless the two partners are very serious, each one should be prepared to easily move out in case of a breakup.

As for what should trigger a marriage proposal, I guess you can wait until you want to have kids? In our case, it was the need for a green card, so I can't speak for myself.

(now married for 12 years with two kids. lived together for 2 years before then, did not have specific plans to marry when moving in together.)

Anonymous wrote:Isn't it kind of sad to believe that the "love of your life," aka the guy that you're going to marry, is of the sort of character who wouldn't marry you if you guys lived together first, because he got "free milk?"

I mean, if the guy is like that, wouldn't you want to find out before you marry him? No?

+1

The whole milk/cow thing is so weird.

You want to know as much as possible about the person before you marry them, so in that way it's eye opening. Living together is a step up in lifestyle so it's hard to break it off if you've increased your standard of living, if you find out the person is not that into you or vice versa. There are pros and cons.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Just curious as it came up in conversation the other day. My rather liberal mother is staunch on one rule in life - never live with someone until you are married. Her reasonings are that classic "Why buy the cow when you can get the milk for free?" idiom and that it just makes things 10x more difficult if things go south.

I understand those points of views but think it's a good idea to live with each other before marriage because understanding whether you can live well together is a BIG part of having a successful marriage. I would perhaps open up her rule to "never live with someone until you're engaged (or soon to be engaged)." Or I would say that living together (in a rental situation) before marriage is fine, but you shouldn't buy property together yet.

What are your opinions?

I am in between. DH and I moved in together about a month after we got engaged. We married 6 on the later. It was a good trial run and I feel like we really started the marriage when we moved in together. We had 6 months to figure it out and see if there were any glaring issues.

And our 24th anniversary is this year.

Anonymous wrote:Just curious as it came up in conversation the other day. My rather liberal mother is staunch on one rule in life - never live with someone until you are married. Her reasonings are that classic "Why buy the cow when you can get the milk for free?" idiom and that it just makes things 10x more difficult if things go south.

I understand those points of views but think it's a good idea to live with each other before marriage because understanding whether you can live well together is a BIG part of having a successful marriage. I would perhaps open up her rule to "never live with someone until you're engaged (or soon to be engaged)." Or I would say that living together (in a rental situation) before marriage is fine, but you shouldn't buy property together yet.

What are your opinions?

I am in between. DH and I moved in together about a month after we got engaged. We married 6 on the later. It was a good trial run and I feel like we really started the marriage when we moved in together. We had 6 months to figure it out and see if there were any glaring issues.

Isn't it kind of sad to believe that the "love of your life," aka the guy that you're going to marry, is of the sort of character who wouldn't marry you if you guys lived together first, because he got "free milk?"

I mean, if the guy is like that, wouldn't you want to find out before you marry him? No?

My DH and I bought a house together before we were married. We had been together 5 years at that point, living together for 3 years.

I'm so glad we lived together before marriage. It gave us time to really get to know one another and work out all the things that come up when you blend two lives together. We've been married 7 years now and still going strong.

My DH and I lived together for two years before we got engaged, then we were engaged for one year before we got married.

I think the big key is WHY you are living together - is it just because one lease is up and 'I might as well move in with you because it makes sense financially,' Or because you are building a life together with a long term commitment in mind.

DH and I both had parents who divorced (his mom was married and divorced THREE times.) So we both wanted to make sure we were ready to make a lifelong commitment to each other, and living together before we got engaged was a big must for us. Slow and steady style.

But both decided when it was a good time for us to get engaged, and then we wanted to get married as soon as possible afterwards. I think super long engagements are a bigger red flag than living together before marriage.

I did and would highly recommend it. Been married for lucky 13 years.

My friend got married to a Dutch guy and for religious reasons (and distance) they decided not to live together until they got married. He came here for the wedding which was beautiful. They moved back to Netherlands and in 3 months she was back to the States because the guy turned out to have a serious case of "sundowner syndrome". He was ok during the day but almost crazy at night. Had they lived together before marriage she would have known this.

Anonymous wrote:I’m also super liberal and agree 100% with your mom but not for that dumb ass reason. I’d go down a notch and say don’t live together until you’re ENGAGED. That way both parties are on the same page about the future of the relationship but if it turns out your partner is actually a nightmare to live with and you want out, it’s logistically easier than getting a divorce.

This is good advice. I lived with someone for a decade, bought an apartment together and then one day he left, just like that. It was immensely painful and fast. We were not engaged. I lived briefly with my DH before we married, knowing we were headed that way for sure.

My future FIL told us we were foolish not to start living together and start saving some cash. He was rather conservative. We lived together for 4-5 years, married for 12. Had a large down payment for a house once we were married because of living together and having 1 apt versus 2 in this area.

I’m also super liberal and agree 100% with your mom but not for that dumb ass reason. I’d go down a notch and say don’t live together until you’re ENGAGED. That way both parties are on the same page about the future of the relationship but if it turns out your partner is actually a nightmare to live with and you want out, it’s logistically easier than getting a divorce.