Choosing to live together before marriage is a tough decision to make. While it makes sense to try it out before the wedding, moving in together comes with several challenges. Even though you aren’t married, you are dealing with many of the same issues that married couples face.
Before moving in together, you should consider the pros and cons of living together before marriage. Once you move in together, it is not easy to separate later. Sometimes, relatives are not open to the idea. But, many couples who do live together before marriage find it rewarding.
If living together is something you and your partner decide to do, it can be helpful to create a shared list of pros and cons of living together before marriage. Doing so can help you figure out whether or not it’s the best choice for your relationship. It can also help you work on communication from the start.
Statistics on Cohabitation
Cohabitation, living together before marriage, is on the rise. According to the US Census, fewer people between the ages of 18-24 are living with a spouse. Instead, they are living with a partner. In the 1960s, only 0.1 percent of couples lived together before marriage. In 2018, 9.4 percent of young couples lived together before marriage.
In the 1960s, 39.2 percent of couples who lived together were married. In 2018, that number was down to 7.3 percent. The percentage of married couples living together is nearly the same as those who are not.
The pros and cons of living together before marriage are apparent to couples between the ages of 25 and 34. In the 1960s, 81.5 percent of couples living together were married. In 2018, that number is 40.3 percent. At the same time, unwed couples living together jumped from 0.2 percent to 14.8 percent.
Cohabitation was rare, and marriage was commonplace. Of the younger group, more unmarried couples live together than married couples. And, of the older group, the number of married couples has dropped by half, while the number of unmarried couples living together has grown. The trend is clear.
Pros of Living Together Before Marriage
With the growth of unmarried couples living together, it is clear that couples see the advantages. There are several reasons why it is helpful for people to live together before marriage.
Learn About Your Partner
A common reason that couples choose to live together is learning about each other. Living together lets you see what your partner is like all day and all night. You see everything: good, bad, and unexpected. The benefits of doing this are numerous because you might decide after a few months that you were not meant to be together forever.
When you are living together, you can leave without worrying about divorce. You can leave. Or, if it all goes well, you know that you are meant to be. This makes it easier for young couples to recognize that marriage is the next step.
You get to see all of your partner’s bad habits and good habits. You don’t see those when you are dating. You only see those things when you wake up each day with your partner. There will be some irritating habits, but by living together, you’ll find if you can work through it.
Sharing Responsibilities
When you live together, you learn how to share responsibilities. When couples do not live together until they are married, they are often surprised by how they split duties in the home. But, living together first, you get to figure it out first. You get to see each other’s quirks and how you manage chores.
When you have a trial run before marriage, you can see if you both can make it work. If you can’t agree on doing the dishes or cleaning the toilet, how are you going to agree on major decisions?
Hopefully, you will learn how to support each other in the home rather than fight each other on cooking and laundry. Seeing how a partner takes care of the home can be eye-opening both positively and negatively.
It’s Exciting
Living together is exciting. When one partner asks the other to move in, it’s like receiving a proposal. You know you are loved when someone asks you to move in together. The feeling is special, and it can last for a long time.
The excitement can help make irritating habits less irritating. Partners that are experiencing excitement also have an easier time communicating about the living arrangement. They do chores together because it is still fun. They help each other with cooking, laundry, and yard work. Reality seeps in, but the excitement can make living together easy and fun.
Building a Home Together
When you live with someone, you get to learn about their styles and tastes. When couples get married first, they often rely on the wedding registry, which only shows what you both like that’s in the stores. Living together, you get to incorporate your style on your dime. It means more that way.
You get to go shopping together to fill the home because you are both living there equally. Shopping for a wedding registry is more of a dream list that other people fulfill. When you are filling a house together without the help of wedding guests, you learn more about each other. Your relationship grows, and your style evolves together.
Building a home together is a lesson in compromise. You might not want to have a black leather couch, but your partner might not like the crystal chandelier that you wish to install in the bathroom. Somehow, you will make it work as you craft a home that you both find familiar and comfortable. You learn that it’s not about what’s in the house, but who is in the home.
You Build Comfort
As you and your partner spend time together, you develop a sense of comfort with each other. You feel loved and accepted, and so does your partner. Living together should strengthen your relationship. There will be ups and downs. But, if you love each other and enjoy each other’s company, you will work through the troubles and continue to grow together.
You will know when you have comfort with your partner as soon as you feel like your house together is a real home.
Sharing Finances
When you live on your own, you are responsible for your financial situation. As soon as you move into a place with your significant other, you get to share finances. You both save money as you combine rent, utilities, and food expenses. You might also be able to share the cost of transportation.
When you live together and share expenses, you might be able to save money for larger goals: that new house or elaborate honeymoon. Your savings could be for long-term planning or unexpected expenses.
Living together and sharing finances is also better for the environment. When you live separately, you pay for two sets of utilities. As you move in, you drop the utility use down to one location. This doesn’t have a massive impact on the environment, but the little bit that you are no longer using does help in a small way.
Trial Run Before Marriage
For some couples, the idea of living together is a practice run before the wedding. Before you decide to commit to spending the rest of your life with someone, living together can prove whether the choice is going to work. By living together, you get to see if you are compatible. And, you get to walk away without the challenges of divorce if you aren’t.
When people wait until marriage to live together, they often feel substantial pressure. Newlyweds might think that they have to get along from the moment they cross the threshold together. But, when you live together first, you get to test the waters and make sure that you can work through challenges. Marriage is not the only reason why people can live together.
Romantic Life Together
When you are in love, you want to spend all of your time together. If you are not living together, then you have to spend your nights apart. Moving in together remedies the problem. You can spend all of your time together without having to say good-bye at the end of the date.
While living together, you get to enjoy your sex life together. You can sleep where you want and do what you want before you close your eyes for the night. Couples are often sexually active before marriage, so living together and sleeping together shouldn’t be problematic.
Keep Your Benefits
If you are in a relationship later in life, you’ve probably held a job and built up retirement, savings, or benefits. Once you get married, all that you have built becomes shared with your new partner. However, if you choose to live together rather than get married, you get to keep your savings, retirement, and benefits.
This might seem cruel or unfair, but if you’ve worked your entire life, you should be able to reap the benefits. Giving half of what you earned to someone who hasn’t been around until recently doesn‘t seem fair to you. If you have children from a previous relationship, then you should investigate what happens to their inheritances if you get remarried.
These might not be the romantic or sexy reasons to live together before getting married, but they sure are important.
Easier to Walk Away
If you live together before you get married, you can find out if you are compatible. Living together will show off all of your flaws. If you find that you cannot live together before getting married, then you will not want to live together after you get married. So, in reality, living together before marriage can save you plenty of headaches, heartaches, and money.
To make an exit easy, consider what you move into the living space. If you only move in your essentials, then you will have an easier time getting out of the apartment.
Cons of Living Together Before Marriage
As with anything that involves a commitment, it is helpful to look at both sides. There are pros and cons of living together before marriage. The disadvantages might encourage you to wait before you move in together.
You Might Not Like Your Partner
Living with your partner before marriage might break the deal. If you find habits annoying, you might find that you do not like living together. Some might see living together and learning you are not compatible as a pro, because you get out of getting married. Others will see it as a disadvantage because living together destroyed the relationship.
The big question is whether or not you would have gotten along if you were married first? For some couples, the ring can make a difference. But the numbers are dropping.
Money Issues Can Break the Deal
Money can be a deal-breaker with any relationship. When you share a place with your future spouse, you have to start working on financial issues immediately. If you make strikingly different salaries, money could be a significant issue. Then, if you break up, the lack of a legal document makes it difficult to decide who gets what.
If you stay in your own home, you do not have to worry about breaking up and divvying up your stuff. Not being prepared to talk about money can create more problems for couples. As soon as you move in together, you are sharing expenses, whether you like it or not. Deciding who pays what can create problems, especially if the costs change each month as utilities do.
Relationship Roles
Another issue that creates problems when couples move in before the wedding is deciding what roles they will take. When you live together before marriage, you need to define your roles. But, this can be problematic for people who do not understand how relationship roles change. It can take couples time to decide what their roles will be.
When the roles include money, the struggles get even more profound. Couples who cannot decide what their roles will be before marriage will have trouble after they get married, too. Relationships end over arguments about money and relationship roles, which can be a con for couples who fight about this before the wedding.
Styles Might Not Mesh
Decorating the home might seem like a minor problem, but some couples learn that their styles are entirely incompatible. You also might find that you cannot compromise. No one wants to fight about the way that the house looks, but it happens. And, it can occur when couples live together before marriage.
Often, one partner moves into the other’s home when they live together before marriage. This means that one partner has already decorated. The other wants to add some personal items, but they don’t fit stylistically. This could create a big divide in the relationship.
But, when couples wait to move in together, they can style the home together. Moving in together and designing the home together should be an enjoyable experience, not one that causes a breakup.
Loss of Mystery
Some couples decide not to move in together before marriage because they want some mystery. There is a sense of excitement for newlyweds who have not lived together before marriage. By moving in together, that mystery is gone as both partners learn about each other’s good, bad, irritating, and unforgettable traits.
For some couples, living together can excite or dull the relationship. Some couples enjoy living together so much that they cancel the wedding. You might also find that the relationship gets boring, which could end it unexpectedly. If you cannot keep it spicy before getting married, how are you going to do it after the wedding?
The mystery disappears quickly after moving in. Some couples can handle it, and others become argumentative. When you live together, you are together all the time. You cannot escape to a different home, and it can become frustrating for some people. And the result can be the end of the relationship.
Adulting is not easy. Stressors can make you feel like you are part of an old married couple. That isn’t necessarily the most fun way to live. When you don’t feel like a fun young couple, you might not want to grow old with your partner.
No Privacy
Once you move in with a partner, you lose your privacy. When you share a bedroom, you cannot escape to the bedroom. You share a bathroom, kitchen cabinets, closets, everything. And, it can be challenging for some partners to figure out how they are going to find their own space.
If you’ve always had your bedroom, moving in with someone and sharing space can be a shock. You must recognize how different it can be moving in with someone. While married couples expect that they lose some privacy, unmarried couples might not be ready for it.
Problems With Family Ethics and Expectations
As a couple, you might like living together. But your family and friends might not. When families have strict religious backgrounds, cohabitation might create tension. For some families, having sex before getting married is also a problem, so living together includes two massive problems.
When families have issues with cohabitation and sex before getting married, there can be problems with wedding planning. Family members tend to be good at bringing up painful subjects and making people feel terrible for their actions. Sometimes parents take away the funding for the wedding, putting couples into awkward financial positions.
Traditional family values include the vows that couples say to each other at the wedding. Families like to hear those words because it gives meaning to the relationship. When couples move in before marriage, those vows aren’t said, and the couple does not make the wedding promise.
The Pressure Builds
When people live together before marriage, they start to feel pressure to move to marriage. Family and friends can increase the pressure, too. Unfortunately, couples who live together often break up because of the push to get married. Not every couple needs to get married, but cultural norms make it seem like it must happen.
Couples who cannot work together to squelch the struggle usually do not last. If one partner wants to get married and the other doesn’t, the relationship is doomed, too. Couples should take time to talk about their relationship and where it is headed. If partners are not satisfied with the destination, then it might be time to end the journey.
This type of painful decision doesn’t happen when partners wait to move in together until after they get married.
Giving Up Single Life
Being single is joyful for many people. Moving in together can completely wreck some people’s grooves. Giving up a single life too soon can create problems for couples. Living with a partner, you lose the ability to what you want and when.
When you move in together, you have to make decisions together. You have to plan your schedule around each other. This can be problematic for a person who still wants to be spontaneous and alone.
Easier to Walk Away
One of the similar pros and cons of living together before marriage is the fact that you can walk away without suffering from legal divorce issues. It might be a pro for some couples, but many find it to be a con. When it is easier to walk away from a relationship, the relationship doesn’t mean much.
Couples who move in together before getting married do it as a way to try out the relationship before the final commitment. If the relationship ends, then it wasn’t perfect to begin with, and that can be a painful realization. Yes, it’s good to figure this out in advance. But, it is also wrong, because the partners will be hurting after the breakup.
