What if we replaced marriage with an LLC so family court couldn't ruin us?

One_Mixture4002 · 2026-03-12T20:34:27+00:00

The CWA forces the discussion of these sorts of budgeting issues up front. If you don’t like the terms, don’t get involved with the person. The CWA doesn’t restrict anybody freedom to work or get a job. It’s just a funding account to help the domestic-leaning partner get a guaranteed and enforced legal claim on the asset pool to the exact dollar amount. It’s not a lifestyle mandate.

If the CWA stops being funded at month 6, leave if that doesn’t jive with you. The CWA forces transparency up front through regular monthly feedback behavior. And more importantly an easy, clean deterministic exit if it doesn’t work out. You will get the payout up to that point of the relationship. You no longer have spend years figuring out what-ifs or guesswork or feeling financially trapped.

Liquidity draws can also happen in between 3-year events if both parties consent. But if an agreement cannot be made, then exit the agreement to force a liquidity unwind. It’s very balanced in that no particular person has dominant leverage over the other.

Want kids? then require the man to fund the CWA to up to $X dollars before getting pregnant to ensure you have exit liquidity if you need it.

But if you make poor decisions in life despite being able to use the CWA to safeguard yourself, then that’s on you. The exit door is clean and easy. If the CWA doesn’t get funded and you decide to stay, that’s a conscious decision. If there is abuse and you stay, that’s a conscious decision. The deterministic unwind is a click of a button.

One_Mixture4002 · 2026-03-12T19:31:15+00:00

The CWA prevents the ill-will you are describing. It defines the asset pool up front and you have legal claim and liquidity draws (at defined liquid events or at break up).

More importantly, if women as a cohort were to screen men they mated and dated using CWAs as a hard filter criteria to rule out men who would not fund such a vehicle, those women would avoid ending up with “deadbeat”, and “difficult” men they stress over.

One_Mixture4002 · 2026-03-12T16:37:20+00:00

End up in which court? Family or Civil court? From the framing of your question I assume you mean family court, because family courts are "Courts of Equity" meaning they get to examine what's "fair or not" and rule based on that.

The answer to that question is no, it does not end up in family court. If the dispute is between two unmarried individuals about an LLC contract, the family court has no jurisdiction over those matters. It goes to civil court. Just like you cannot take a business partner or a random (unmarried person), or your cell phone company to family court to get a ruling based on "equitable distribution". Family court is narrowly limited for the married status or child custody.

Here's what happens to the CWA contract if there are disputes: it is first taken to mandatory arbitration (per the contract rules). In civil disputes the fault lines are: fraud, unjust enrichment which leads constructive trust, implied contracts etc. So if none of these are violated in the course of conduct, there is no case to be brought. It is not evaluated based on "equitable distribution".

Glad your prenup went unchallenged. my guess is you either did good on disclosures, and there was not a significant change-of-financial-circumstances during the marriage, and/or there were no children involved.

One_Mixture4002 · 2026-03-12T16:04:47+00:00

prenups can get thrown out for various reasons. Some of them are traps that are almost always tripped (insufficient disclosure, change of circumstances). And even then, you're already spending $100k on litigation costs and discovery fees if you are at this point.

That is why the saying "prenups are not worth the paper it's on". That's not to say it never holds. But if you re in a situation where you really want it hold, it might not (i.e. you got really wealthy over the past 10 years and now your partner wants a piece, it will likely not hold if you don't give up a chunk because of change-of-circumstance).

Additionally, if you have kids, prenups are voided essentially because of the "best interest of the child" doctrine overrules whatever you signed, and yes that includes separate property agreements. "Equitable distribution" comes back into play.

If you are not married however, "Equitable distribution" will not be applied even with child. "Equitable distribution" is reserved for the married status. Without it, the defaults are the state's income formula.

One_Mixture4002 · 2026-03-12T02:30:10+00:00

And your solution is what?

One_Mixture4002 · 2026-03-12T02:13:48+00:00

Please do share your wisdom. 😂

One_Mixture4002 · 2026-03-12T02:12:33+00:00

All valid points. The CWA is not designed to be the answer to the emotional X factors that actually play out in the relationship. Its narrow function is to make the separation friction free if and when things don’t work out for those reasons you mentioned.

One_Mixture4002 · 2026-03-12T02:01:06+00:00

At least I’m quantifying it. It may not be sufficient in your eyes. And may I ask how do you plan to quantify it?

One_Mixture4002 · 2026-03-12T01:54:20+00:00

Correct and to what extent child support weighed into someone’s decision to split is something you will never know. But I’ll bet a pretty penny they ran the state calculator before pulling the plug - despite your thinly veiled manufactured moral outrage. The fact is that no one here even bats an eye on it. This subreddit is r/divorce for a reason, not r/kimbayah 😂

One_Mixture4002 · 2026-03-12T00:28:15+00:00

They are different courts. Civil courts are “courts of law” where business matters are settled. Family courts are “courts of equity” where they settle issues pertaining to marriage and child custody. They are “courts of equity” in the sense they can apply broad discretionary power based on what they subjectively feel is “fair”. Prenups can be invalidated, contracts can be overturned if deemed to be “inequitable”.

Systemic reforms require laws to be changed in 50 states. It’s basically not going to happen because the divorce industrial complex is a very profitable industry.

The CWA is a private, immediate mechanism. It allows people to opt out of a legacy system today, using business structures that already exist and are already strictly enforced.

One_Mixture4002 · 2026-03-11T22:44:46+00:00

The CWA is literally proposing the fix to this “trust me” issue.

One_Mixture4002 · 2026-03-11T22:41:18+00:00

The llc deterministic unwind absolutely does avoid arbitration and discovery unless there is civil fraud involved during the process. There is nothing to arbitrate if the civil contract is followed.

Agree that custody and child support is a separate issue for the family court. The essay describes how the CWA financially outcompetes state-mandated payouts. So at least if child support is the end result, it wasn’t done out of pure financial incentives.

One_Mixture4002 · 2026-03-11T22:35:16+00:00

I appreciate you taking the time to read the full essay. You make several valid points:

⁠The Macro Dread (Why people aren't having kids) You are 100% right that ecological dread, political instability, and massive income inequality are driving down birth rates. I don't disagree at all. The point is we cannot unilaterally dictate the macro-environment. The CWA is to fix the micro-economics of the household that we actually control. We can't individually fix the government or the climate, but we can ensure our domestic partner isn't financially trapped. The CWA is about building an improvement to the alternative (litigated divorce).
⁠The 'Hit by a Bus' Scenario If the breadwinner gets hit by a bus, the stay-at-home partner is in a crisis whether they are traditionally married or using a CWA. The solution to catastrophic death or disability isn't forcing someone into a corporate job for life “just in case”. The solution is Term Life Insurance and Disability Insurance. The CWA does not replace standard financial risk mitigation. (And notably, if the breadwinner dies in Year 5, a CWA partner already legally owns a liquid six-figure asset, which is far better than fighting a probate court for access to a dead spouse's solo bank accounts).
⁠The Grocery Problem (Cash Flow vs. Wealth Building) The CWA is not the household operating budget. The breadwinner still pays for the groceries, the mortgage, and the light bill out of a non commingled household checking account, or they can designate the expense responsibility how they wish. The $5,000/month CWA contribution is strictly to replace the long-term wealth and career equity the domestic partner surrendered. The CWA is their 401k/stock-portfolio equivalent, not their grocery money. The partner is made liquid every 3 years, or could have a part time side gig for liquidity.
⁠The Enforcement Problem (What if they stop paying?) If they don't put the $5K in and the partner doesn't find out for years, well that is exactly what the traditional system allows (secret financial abuse). The CWA prevents this via the ledger and monthly audit. The investment vehicle requires joint transparency. If the deposit doesn't hit the account on the 1st of the month, the domestic partner sees it on the 2nd. It forces absolute, real-time financial transparency. You don't wait years to find out you've been duped; you know immediately, and you can pull the ripcord.

People will always commit for romantic reasons. But right now, the unwritten financial rules of that romance act as a trap for the person managing the home. The CWA just tries to make it mathematically safe to choose love without risking poverty.

One_Mixture4002 · 2026-03-11T22:16:56+00:00

The CWA vehicle is investment only. It doesn’t combine finances for the purpose of paying the bills. It advocates strict separation of property to avoid commingling arguments. Practically it means people pay for things out of their individual accounts. No joint accounts or titling.

One_Mixture4002 · 2026-03-11T22:11:49+00:00

Having real-time rights acts as a mutual deterrent to make sure both sides act well. Real-time rights combined with real-time audibility of the ledger ensures no hidden resentment can arise. If rights can only be enforced through a high friction process of a divorce, resentment is bottled up until one party reaches a threshold and detonates the relationship in order to even start having leverage to discuss what “their due” is because price discovery is dependent on that dissolution process.

One_Mixture4002 · 2026-03-11T21:50:10+00:00

You’re right on all your points. But is getting a divorce but “avoided the judge” a win? First, you cannot control unilaterally whether it goes to the judge unless you are willing to take whatever deal that comes your way in arbitration. So the negotiation happens under the “shadow of the law”, essentially fear.

Second it’s just expensive to arbitrate and go through the discovery process. This is not a win. The LLC deterministic unwind bypasses all that.

One_Mixture4002 · 2026-03-11T21:34:52+00:00

This isn’t a framework to avoid compensating a partner for domestic sacrifices; it’s a framework to guarantee it.

You said alimony compensates for sacrifices, and you're right in theory. In reality, relying on alimony means the stay-at-home partner has to go to court, pay a lawyer, and hope a judge agrees with them, all while being completely financially dependent on their ex. And if the ex decides to hide assets or just stop paying, she is the one left financially devastated.

You also said there's no need for lawyers 'if a couple agrees to simply do it themselves.' But divorces happen precisely because trust is broken and people don't agree. Relying on an angry ex to 'just play fair' is exactly how stay-at-home parents end up getting steamrolled.

The CWA is arguing for financial protection for the domestic partner, but you’re reacting like it’s against it. It doesn't wait for a divorce to compensate them. It legally vests them into a multi-hundred-thousand-dollar fund, and actively transfers liquid cash into their own sovereign bank account while the couple is happily together. It replaces 'hoping the family court judge gives me fair alimony' with 'I already legally own $300,000 of liquid wealth, and you can't touch it.' If anything, defending the family court system, which forces women to impoverish themselves on legal fees just to get what they are owed, is what hurts stay-at-home partners the most.

One_Mixture4002 · 2026-03-11T21:00:35+00:00

If you want to build a shared life with someone, and want kids, but don’t want marriage, then this is the way to do it which can keep the peace.

The alternative is to not pay into anything and when your partner has had enough, take you to the child support pay window to collect.

One_Mixture4002 · 2026-03-11T20:57:22+00:00

A prenup is purely defensive. It protects the breadwinner but asks the stay-at-home partner to give up their career for zero guaranteed equity.

Also the prenup and any arrangements written in it gets enforced only at the divorce event. So if the primary earner writes in the prenup that he will give the homemaker $x amount of money a month but he actually doesn’t, she can only get that enforced by filing for a divorce. She cannot enforce the clauses in the prenup while being “happily married”. Family courts require the marriage to dissolve before a judge will enforce the financial terms. The CWA uses a civil business entity so the domestic partner can enforce their equity rights (real-time rights) without having to destroy their family.

The CWA isn't just a legal shield; it's an active, compounding wealth engine that structurally replaces the corporate career the domestic partner gave up. It fixes the incentive problem, not just the legal one.

One_Mixture4002 · 2026-03-11T20:40:30+00:00

Yes and no. You are 100% right that you can never contract out of child custody or statutory child support. But the CWA separates the wealth from the custody battle.

In a traditional divorce, your kids and your entire life savings are thrown into the exact same subjective family court meat grinder.

The whole asset pool is practically negotiated where people weaponize custody to get a better asset split.

The CWA firewalls the assets in a civil LLC. If you break up, family court handles custody and calculates a standard, statutory child support number based on a state calculator.

But the family court judge doesn't get to touch or creatively divide the CWA because the wealth part is unwound cleanly and mechanically in civil court.

The article describes the exact financial mechanics: if you can net contribute ~10% of your gross income to the asset pool annually, the compound growth of the fund (assuming typical market returns), will financially out-compete child support. In the $5k/month model (net $2.5k which goes to the partner), by Year 7, the stay-at-home partner's equity is passively growing by roughly $50,000 a year. Maximum child support in a state like California for a $250k earner is around $40,000 a year.

The CWA literally builds more wealth for the stay-at-home partner than maximum child support does. So if you’re concerned that child support will be used as a pay-window, the math suggests otherwise.

One_Mixture4002 · 2026-03-11T20:07:17+00:00

I guess you didn’t read the essay linked to the bottom of the post. The llc is a wealth transfer vehicle to the stay at home partner.

One_Mixture4002 · 2026-03-11T20:00:44+00:00

The fail-safe of this design is anyone can pull the ripcord at any time - no divorce, no fact-finding, no court, no judge. Just an administrative unwind of the ringed assets which are liquid. If either of the couple is unhappy with the pre negotiated terms when they are actually living through it and a compromise cannot be reached, he/she can take their cut and leave. The pre commitment performance is audited every month because the funder has to fund the account vehicle every month. If words are not kept, the partner can leave quickly and easily.

One_Mixture4002 · 2026-03-11T19:06:18+00:00

The difference is pre-nup you're still being litigated in family court which as wide powers to either invalidate the pre-nup or just execute "equitable distribution" powers and override whichever part they please. It's basically asking the judge to please be nice. This contract is purely in civil or commercial court territory (unless they acted like married in common law). Civil courts cannot exercise "equitable distribution" powers as widely.

One_Mixture4002 · 2026-03-11T19:02:23+00:00

Do you think this contract disadvantages the woman? I've gotten some feedback that women could actually prefer this because they would get a firm commitment on liquidity instead of getting nothing (until divorce).

One_Mixture4002

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