Should Gerry & Theresa Get A Prenup Before Their Golden Bachelor Wedding?

By all metrics, Gerry Turner and Theresa Nist’s Golden Bachelor journey is a fairy tale. Their swift, passionate romance began with love at first sight (they had the season’s first one-on-one date!) and will now be celebrated with a televised wedding on Jan. 4, followed by a honeymoon in Italy.

But even the sweetest love story is subject to criticism from Bachelor Nation. Many viewers have taken to social media to encourage the couple to get a prenuptial agreement, or prenup. They’re specifically calling for Theresa to take that step, with several fans citing a Hollywood Reporter story that made allegations about Gerry’s past dating life and work history. It raises the question: Should Gerry and Theresa get a prenup?

Short answer? Yes! But not because of the reports or fans’ perceived “red flags.”

Julia Rodgers is a family law attorney and CEO of HelloPrenup, an online platform that helps couples learn about — and create — prenups. Rodgers recommends a prenup for every couple, but she tells Bustle it’s an especially important consideration for second marriages since, like in Gerry and Theresa’s case, children, grandchildren, and various assets are often involved.

Establishing a prenup can help “preserve familial comfort and relationships,” Rodgers says. “Theresa’s kids are going to want to know her assets are protected. Gerry’s kids are going to want to know his assets are protected.” For example, this might mean keeping premarital property separate, as 75% of HelloPrenup users choose to do.

Getting a prenup also requires financial disclosure, Rodgers says. Knowing what’s in your bank accounts and the value of your assets is key to determining what kind of lifestyle you’ll have during your marriage. That can help a couple establish a “roadmap” for navigating future expenses — even if they never get divorced.

“People say money and love shouldn’t mix — they do,” she says. “Because what is in that bank account is going to determine how you live. This is less impactful when you’re younger and you have [more] earning capacity. But when you’re getting married at an older age, you’re already retired. So what’s in those accounts is going to impact how you live.”

Below, Rodgers breaks down what a potential prenup might mean for the first Golden couple.

Gerry’s from Indiana, Theresa’s from New Jersey, they’re reportedly getting married in California, and they’re moving to South Carolina. So there’s a lot of geography happening! Does it matter where you sign a prenup?

Yes, it does matter. Standard practice is that you should choose the state for your prenup that you plan to reside in — so they should probably contract under South Carolina law. If they were to get divorced down the line and the prenup would have to be enforced, then South Carolina would apply that state’s divorce law to the prenup. That being said, technically, couples could contract in any state they want. But they’re leaving room for some ambiguity if they do.

Have you noticed that certain age groups are more or less willing to get prenups?

Prenups are very common among millennials and Gen Zers. First of all, they are [often] children of divorce, right? And they’re typically getting married later in life. When you get married later in life, you probably have some assets to protect. Maybe you’ve started a business; your salary has increased; you have some school debt; you bought a home — so you have a significant amount of assets to lose.

I think the same is true in a second marriage. In most cases, second marriages are due to a divorce. So there’s this kind of underlying respect and mutual understanding that a prenup is really meant to protect both of them.

For someone like Gerry and Theresa, who both lost their spouses, would that affect how they approach the prenup conversation?

It might change what’s in the prenup. You can put something called a death clause in a prenup, [which] can specify that assets are apportioned in a certain way. They’re getting married later in life — they’re probably thinking about estate planning. So, I think a prenup in that age range can be done in conjunction with estate planning documents in a way that feels really holistic and comfortable.

You touched on this earlier — but a prenup doesn’t only help in the case of divorce, right? It can just help you navigate finances in marriage.

That’s right. A prenup allows you to have the conversations you should be having [anyway], which means you’re likely to have a longer, happier marriage. You’re leading with transparency. So there’s no confusion when, [for example], you marry someone who owns a bunch of real estate, and then they sell it, and you say, “Well, where’s the money? Aren’t you going to buy us a house with that?” No, you want to know going in [whether] that’s separate money. If you’re going to buy a house together, this is how you’re going to do it.

This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.