Transcript of the above video: 

Kind of a little bit of a joke in the title from Wizard of Oz: Lions and tigers and bears, oh my! But Marriage, Prenuptial Agreements and Wills. Now these are things that each individually on their own, people sort of seem to not make that big of a deal of although some people get uncomfortable when they think about making their Will. With regard to marriage though, that's generally associated with good thoughts, weddings, that kind of thing. Meanwhile, Prenuptial Agreements, kind of a mixed bag. Folks sometimes don't even want to think about a prenup; sometimes folks do want to have a prenup; sometimes one person that is looking to get into a marriage wants to have a prenup and the other party doesn't necessarily think that's what's necessary, or it didn't even dawn on them thing that might be a good thing to have. There are some couples who say, "hey we don't need that, we are sort of starting from scratch and we are happy to sort of go along together." 

The point I'm trying to make in this video, especially for older folks and I'm aiming this at probably what is our key demographic which is basically older foreign men here in Thailand who come to Thailand, they might meet a nice Thai lady or a lady from some other part of the world that happens to be here in Thailand, and they are looking to get married. The point of the video is - especially if you are older or retired, which again our key demographic is oftentimes retirees who were talking to here in the office - a Will and a Prenup may not necessarily be in your mind when you are thinking about getting married. I am not saying that they necessarily should be, maybe not necessarily a prenup. I'm not a person that says you have to have one. I know there are a lot of lawyers out there that will say, "oh in any case, you always need to do a Prenup.” My personal situation, I didn't feel I needed one when I got married. I know a lot of people that didn't get one when they got married. I also know other people that were in a different set of circumstances when they got married and they said, "yeah I need to have that type of documentation." 

Here in Thailand, one, you need to understand the formalities associated with Prenuptial or Premarital Agreements are different than in the USA. That's a big thing to keep in mind. Secondly it may or may not be necessary depending on your circumstances. Again, assets and things like that being what they are, you may or may not need one. Finally, the point I'm trying to make also with this video more comes down to Wills. All of this really comes under the penumbra or rubric if you will of estate planning be it marital estate planning, personal estate planning, whatever; it's estate planning is what it is at the end of the day. 

And when I say estate planning, getting married for example, if you already have a Will, a pre-existing Will. I've actually seen this come up where someone does have a Will and they may have a pre-existing spouse named in that Will; they may even have forgotten about the Will in certain circumstances. Or they may have what are called non-probate instruments which stipulate a beneficiary that may not be their new spouse. In those circumstances, and generally speaking as well, it is not a bad idea to be thinking about estate planning, thinking about Will drafting in the event or concurrently if you will with getting married. I'm not necessarily saying at the exact moment you get married here in Thailand you are going to go ahead and execute a Will; that's not what I am saying. What I am saying though is it is not a bad idea to be thinking about these things all together if you feel like your own personal estate is such that it requires a deep level of planning in order to protect one's own interest or in order to maintain certain testamentary interest. So again, assets that would accrue to the benefit of one's heirs in the event of one's death, notwithstanding the fact that they got married. Again, getting married can be viewed as an intervening act with regard to one's estate if you will, one's ongoing estate. It can change how the estate would be probated for example in the event of one's death. 

So again, the thing to take away from this video is although I am not saying in every case you need to be like hyper paranoid about Prenuptial Agreements and Wills if you're getting married, and who really does want to think about that when they are with their loved one, they're happy, they're having a wedding, all of that good stuff. I get it. I'm not one of those lawyers that's telling you to be paranoid so as to drive up a bunch of fees, but I do think it's worth having in the back of one's mind what a marriage entails and looking at one’s situation and saying, "do I need a prenup, do I think I might need a prenup or am I in a situation where no, prenup I am not really worried about but maybe I should be looking to planning out my estate now that I am taking on a spouse. Again, all of these things are things to think about, and they have specific legal nuances here in the Kingdom of Thailand.