Money Rehab with Nicole Lapin - Who Gets Custody of the Instagram? The Money Trail of Influencer Divorces with Jackie Combs

Episode Date: June 19, 2025

When influencer couples break up, who gets the followers? Today Nicole is joined by celebrity divorce attorney Jackie Combs to unpack what really goes down when digital empires built on love and likes... have to be divided. Nicole and Jackie cover brand prenups, postnups, and how to legally—and financially—protect yourself when business and romance mix. Whether you’re sharing a bank account or a TikTok account, this one’s for you. Follow Jackie’s work here. Today you’ll hear about: 00:00 Money Rehab Contest 01:06 Meet Celebrity Divorce Attorney Jackie Combs 01:22 Financial Lessons from Celebrity Divorces 01:40 Navigating Brand Prenups and Postnups 02:13 Legal Nuances of Influencer Divorces 02:54 Prenups for Content Creators 03:24 Dividing Digital Empires in Divorce 04:14 Protecting Intellectual Property 08:04 How Social Media Brands Get Valued 13:29 Financial Risks and Scandals 19:42 Dividing Luxury Assets 22:11 Parental Guidance on Prenups 24:41 Forecasting Legal Costs 26:03 How to Choose the Right Lawyer 27:26 (Sadly) Unenforceable Clauses in Prenups 34:11 Final Tips The content in this episode is for entertainment purposes only and should not be considered legal or financial advice

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Starting point is 00:01:06 Voidware prohibited. One entry per person. Entries must be received by July 1st, 2025. I'm Nicole Lapin, the only financial expert. You don't need a dictionary to understand. It's time for some money rehab. You know those influencer couples whose whole brand is just their relationship. They probably caption everything, hashtag couples' goals, and maybe even have a shared handle like happily ever handlers or whatever.
Starting point is 00:01:39 If they get divorced, here's my question though. Who gets the brand deals? This question came up when influencers Kat and Mike Stickler of the handle Mike and Kat on YouTube and TikTok filed for divorce. At the time, the now exes had 4 million followers across the channels. The judge awarded Kat the TikTok and Mike the YouTube. Kat changed the TikTok handle from Mike and Kat to Kat Stickler and now has over 10 million followers. The YouTube channel, that's the one that Mike got, is now defunct. So this isn't a theoretical question, this is actually a legal question and one that my
Starting point is 00:02:14 guest today is the perfect person to answer. Today I'm talking to Jackie Combs, celebrity divorce attorney to the stars, the influencers, and the very complicated. Jackie has become the go-to lawyer when a power couple calls it quits, like Chris Appleton, who married and then quickly divorced Lucas Gage last year, Emily Radikowski, and more. Today we are pulling back the curtain on a world that most of us only get a glimpse at through tabloid headlines and TikTok tea. Celebrity divorces. That this isn't about gossip, this is about money, and most importantly, what you can learn from the financial missteps of the rich, famous, and extremely online. Today, Jackie and I talk about brand prenups, post-nups, digital empires built on love and
Starting point is 00:02:57 likes, and how they get divided when the relationship gets…unfollowed. Sorry I had to. And trust me, whether you're managing a monetized YouTube channel with your partner or just deciding whether to split rent or a mortgage, the financial lessons in this conversation are for everyone. Jackie Combs, welcome to Money Rehab. Thank you. I'm so excited to be here, Nicole. You are really the go-to divorce attorney for celebrities and creatives, and that's changed lately to include
Starting point is 00:03:31 the new influencer category. Historically, in the gossip columns, we've seen celebrity breakups, meaning between actors or actresses, but this new Hollywood is influencers, social media stars, TikTok stars. These are people whose networks are tied to algorithms and audience retention and social media followers.
Starting point is 00:03:55 What's the biggest financial mistake you see content creators make when they're looking at prenups or starting to even think about that? Not getting a prenup, right? Because content creators really need to think of themselves as businesses. They are brands and every video that they put out or every script that they write, that's all intellectual property that can be monetized, licensed and used. And so you really have to start thinking of yourself as a business and protect yourself as a business and protect yourself as a business.
Starting point is 00:04:25 And when you have a business, oftentimes as an influencer, you build that digital empire with your partner, doing joint deals, brand deals, joint content, even shared followers or joint accounts. How do you untangle all of that in a divorce? I mean, who gets the TikTok account? Totally depends. So it depends on whether the parties have a prenup,
Starting point is 00:04:50 whether they have a postnup. Then you're going to treat the brand like a business, any other business. Are they going to stay in business together or are they going to separate? And if they're going to separate, who should the business go to? Who should receive the trademarks? Who should receive the IP? And then you look at the monet should receive the trademarks? Who should receive the IP? And then you look at the monetization from those trademarks and IP, and maybe you're gonna be dividing that, those income streams,
Starting point is 00:05:12 because if they were created during marriage, or if somebody's gonna continue to work on the brand, I'm gonna refer to it as a brand, after they separate, maybe they should get a little bit more of the income that later comes in. So what's typical in a brand prenup? So if two influencers get married, how do you advise them to separate their personal brands from their marital assets? And then what's looked at as pre-marriage assets or not? So if I come into a marriage with a certain number of followers,
Starting point is 00:05:46 or not. So if I have, if I come into a marriage with a certain number of followers, do I only split what's gained after marriage? So we're not going to look at the follower count per se, because those aren't really assets. Those are your fan base. What you're going to look at is the deals that you made during marriage. So if you are going into a marriage as a influencer or as a content creator, you are definitely going to want a prenup that is going to protect your intellectual property because that's really what we're talking about. You're monetizing the IP and you want to protect your endorsement deals, let's say, that are resulting from your brand and image and the trademarks that you create.
Starting point is 00:06:28 So California, for example, is a community property state. That means presumptively all assets acquired during marriage are community property unless they derive from a separate property source. Separate property are your assets acquired prior to marriage and those assets that derive during the marriage as a result of your separate property. So using that in context, if you have a bank account with $200,000 in it prior to your prior to marriage, that's your separate property. And if it grows during marriage to 300,000, just by virtue of the market fluctuations and appreciation, that's all your separate property. Or if you own a home before marriage and then you,
Starting point is 00:07:04 you sell that home during your marriage and buy a new home, that home is presumptively your separate property if you have not contributed any additional community funds to the acquisition of the house. Now, using that in context of content creators, all the intellectual property you've created prior to marriage, all the revenue streams
Starting point is 00:07:22 that you're receiving as a result of your brand and your image and your likeness, that is all your separate property. The deals that you would then enter into during your marriage would be community property unless you have an agreement that says they aren't. So if I'm entering a marriage, let's say I have a million followers and I go to you and I say, Jackie, help me come up with a prenup that protects me in this ever evolving age of content. What would you tell me to do as far as writing clauses about videos, merch lines, you know, I don't even know, AI licensing? What are you suggesting to clients to start thinking about writing into their prenups?
Starting point is 00:08:03 I would say keep all of your intellectual properties separate. And in the event of a divorce, that basically goes to you. Now there's one thing to say during the marriage if you want to share the income that's attributable to those deals during marriage. That's one thing. But then ensuring that in the event of a divorce, all of that goes to you. And what about future profits? How do you even parse that out?
Starting point is 00:08:30 So if my account grew and I had brand deals while I was married, but now my brand deals are much more after I'm getting divorced because of that growth, are they entitled to a portion of that? Without a prenup, let's say, if you entered into the agreement during marriage, your spouse would see a portion of that. However, if you have to continue to do work in order to receive that endorsement deal by virtue of, let's say you have to show up to an event five times a year, or you have to be photographed on X number of magazines or whatever it is, a portion of that
Starting point is 00:09:09 would be your separate property because you are continuing to do work after separation. How do you even value going into a prenup discussion if you're a growing brand? Let's say I'm an influencer with a million followers, but I'm still growing. Or maybe I have a niche audience that's really, really valuable. Are there social media appraisers?
Starting point is 00:09:31 Does that even exist? Something like that where I can value it appropriately? So you would have a business appraiser and you would look, again, treat, it's more than just the social media because that's the platform that's used. What you're going to look at is the brand, the individual, the business, all the intellectual property that derives from the business, all the trademarks that are owned. You're going to look at all the different contracts that are in place that result in revenue streams and the income that's coming in.
Starting point is 00:10:03 And that's what's going to be valued. And let's say I started a social media account with my future spouse and I'm going to asking about a prenup. What protections would you suggest to put in place if, God forbid, we got divorced and we need to decide what happens to the monetized YouTube channel or whatever it is. So again, I would say if we want to share the income during marriage, that's one thing, but after separation, maybe the revenue that's derived from the content created during marriage is shared or it's separate, but ensuring that you receive the channel or these social media platforms that
Starting point is 00:10:45 you came into the marriage with or that you created during marriage to ensure that those go to you after you separate. So you have to kind of think about that in advance. Yeah. What you would want to happen to the channel. Exactly. And you also want to take a look at like, what's the trajectory of you creating content, right? Are you planning to do this for 10 years?
Starting point is 00:11:09 You planning to do this for 20 years? Is this going to turn into a different line or profession? Right? Are you going to pivot? And what does that look like? And are you going to want to share that with your spouse? Or are you going to want to keep things separate? Oof. It's so much.
Starting point is 00:11:25 I mean, are there areas of a prenup that you feel like are brand new in this social media influencer space that people aren't focusing enough on when they're thinking about prenups? Hold onto your wallets. Money Rehab will be right back. thinking about prenups? Hold onto your wallets, money rehab will be right back. And now for some more money rehab. Are there areas of a prenup that you feel like are brand new
Starting point is 00:12:07 in this social media influencer space that people aren't focusing enough on when they're thinking about prenups? Well, I think one of the things that they're probably not thinking about is privacy, right? Because so many content creators share so much of their life and they may not want to share that during the marriage, right? So you may want some separation of what you're sharing. And what I see a lot of times in prenups are there are confidentiality provisions, right? That you may not be able to monetize by writing a book about
Starting point is 00:12:39 your relationship, or you might not be able to monetize a script regarding your relationship and people don't really realize that. Or you may have provisions where you're not going to do reality television. Well, the content creator or any other individual may want to go on reality TV later down the road, and that would prevent them from doing it. Interesting. I mean, I guess that some of that can be in a post-nup too. We've always heard that post-nups are a bad sign. Like if you're thinking about a post-nup, things are already on the outs. But what are you seeing in post-nups about privacy, whether it's writing a book or going on social media or even potentially crafting what the breakup
Starting point is 00:13:24 message looks like to the public. Yeah. So in a post-nup, sometimes, and to your point, they're not bad, right? Sometimes people can't get the pre-nups done in time before the wedding, so we end up doing a post-nupcial agreement. Or sometimes there's an event in a person's marriage that necessitates a financial discussion in order to stay in the marriage.
Starting point is 00:13:45 What I mean by that is sometimes there might be infidelity or there may be a huge exit and your marriage may already be on the rocks, but you really want to stay in for the children or for whatever other reason, but you need financial separation or surety to ensure that you're going to stay in. And when that happens, you see more planning for the future, but also making sure that you feel financially secure to stay in. Are there even provisions about what you say about a potential breakup in advance?
Starting point is 00:14:18 Not really, but you may have a provision that says no negative comments, right? You're not going to talk about your partner in a derogatory way. When we do come up with joint statements, it's usually during the dissolution proceeding and the publicist is involved or both parties publicists are involved.
Starting point is 00:14:34 But you know, I don't think that they're going to predetermine that necessarily in a pre-nup or post-nup. I haven't seen one yet. There's also, you know, this X factor of a potential scandal, right? I mean, a lot of influencers' net worths are in flux because one viral scandal or moment or controversy, something like that, could affect their current, future earning potential. How do you take that into account when thinking about a prenup or a postup? So-nup or post-up, that goes in with the confidentiality provision, right?
Starting point is 00:15:08 To ensure that you're not saying anything negative. But what also you want to look at is fluctuating incomes. And that is for any professional, whether you're a content creator, entertainer, or otherwise. With that, you want to take a look at A, what the estate is going to be, whether you want to keep assets separate, whether you want to have things joint, and also look at support limitations and waivers. So I may have a client who's making $10 million a year now and wants to have a limitation on support that they may pay their spouse in the future.
Starting point is 00:15:39 And then at the time of divorce, things could be switched. So you have to take a look at, again, what the trajectory of your career is, where you're gonna be in 15 years, and ensure that you have a team in place that is making sure that you're keeping your financial nest egg. And are there financial risks of a divorce going public?
Starting point is 00:16:01 I mean, that could potentially, depending on what comes out, hurt somebody's career, their future deals. How do you protect clients from potential financial fallout of that? So it's really important for me with my clients who are public figures to keep everything out of the press. And we try not to go to court. We try to settle everything before anything is filed with the court or before having to go to court. And we will mediate, we will hire private judges, we will try to keep everything out of the public
Starting point is 00:16:31 system so that it is not publicized and so that it is not in every gossip column. And that's really important because again, going through a divorce is already difficult enough, and then doing it on a public scale where things are scrutinized and misinterpreted and create these stories that may not be true. It's really difficult in particular when there are children involved. So it's really important that when we do file anything that we know is going to be public to ensure that it's all positive. Because if your children are going to see these public filings in 10 years, they may read it and you don't want them to be upset with
Starting point is 00:17:11 mom or dad. You want it to be all positive. And at the end of the day, it's really important to maintain credibility in what you're saying and to keep things nice. Yes, totally. In theory, that sounds delightful. In practice, I mean, you've worked with some very headline grabby names. You don't have to say them. So without naming names, for sure, what's the most shocking financial clause that you've seen in a celeb prenup? Not so much shocking in a celeb prenup, but I have seen infidelity clauses, which in California are non-enforceable because they're against public policy. And what that means is basically, promotive of divorce. But then again, I've also seen the confidentiality provisions and this is typically with a lot of high net worth families who are having
Starting point is 00:18:03 their kids sign prenups where they may be in family businesses and they don't want the spouse coming into the relationship later writing a tell-all book or a memoir or going on housewives. So they want to ensure that the family and the brand is protected. And then we saw JLo and Ben benefiting their way through a bunch of crazy stuff in the headlines, a multimillion dollar real estate breakup. That was one of the big ones that was out there. What are some of the roles when it comes to shared homes post divorce, especially when the value of that asset presumably is changing? Yeah. So typically in a divorce agreement, changing. Yeah.
Starting point is 00:18:42 So typically in a divorce agreement, you're going to have mechanisms in place for the sale of the house. And what that means is that you guys are going to both agree on the listing agent, the sale price, any counter offers, reducing the sales price, if it's been listed on the market for X months and you haven't received any offers. And in the event you don't agree, you have recourse, either you're gonna go to the mediator or you can go to court to make the decision.
Starting point is 00:19:14 So if one partner is basically stalling and saying, hey, the house has been sitting for six months, we've gotten zero offers, we need to lower the listing price. And the other partner saying, nope, I don't want to do that because I want to ensure that I get X dollars out of this sale. Then there's recourse because you can go to court. Is jointly owning a property while you're not married yet ever a good idea?
Starting point is 00:19:39 Or does it always end up messy? Isn't that what JLo invented? I can't keep up. I think they ended up buying after they got married, but now the house has been on the market for like a year. And I think they just dropped the listing price by 8 million. So hopefully it sells. But owning a property- It's on sale. It's on sale. Only for $60 million. But owning a house before marriage, I don't think there's a problem with that, as long
Starting point is 00:20:11 as you have an agreement in place that defines what's going to happen if you break up. So that could look like what's referred to as a cohabitation agreement. Or you could have, let's say, an LLC operating agreement if you're going to own the property as in an LLC. Like I said, you're going to have mechanisms in case you guys break up. Okay, if we break up, within 30 days, one partner is going to move out, and then you're
Starting point is 00:20:36 going to list the property within 60 days. You're going to agree to the listing agent, or one party is going to have the first right of refusal to purchase the property at an appraised value by a joint appraiser. It's not just the property though for celebrities and uber wealthy people, real estate is just one component of an overall net worth equation obviously. So how do you think about splitting some of the other luxury assets like designer clothes, cars, art, especially when all of that has become part
Starting point is 00:21:13 of a client's brand image? Great question. So clothing or other items of personal adornment are different than let's say a car collection or an art collection where you would get that appraised. Typically clothing, unless it's on display in the Met, is going to go to the party who wears it. With respect to art or cars, you're going to have them appraised or you're going to have them appraised and then you're going
Starting point is 00:21:42 to divide them based on who wants one or you're going to have them appraised, and then you're going to divide them based on who wants one, or you're going to sell them. So let's talk strategies that apply to everyone. Jackie, whether you have 25 followers, $25 million, in your line of work, identifying what's yours, mine, and ours really is everything. I mean, those are the fundamentals for whether you have a following or not. How early should couples start talking
Starting point is 00:22:04 about financial boundaries? What is a conversation, a healthy conversation about that look like? So couples should start talking early on in their relationship. I find that more couples, and you've talked about this, are sexually intimate before they're willing
Starting point is 00:22:20 to be financially intimate. And I think there's a problem with this. I think that couples really need to know if they're financially aligned to know if they're gonna be in the relationship in the long run. And because you may not wanna go to bed with somebody if you don't agree with their spending habits, or if you knew that they were a million dollars in debt,
Starting point is 00:22:39 or if they didn't care about their credit scores, these are financial values that will impact you in your relationship. So what I would say is that couples should talk about it really early on and definitely before they move in together. And how that conversation evolves during your relationship is a little different. You may not talk about 401ks on your first date.
Starting point is 00:23:02 It's not really sexy, let's say. But you can ask, how did you treat finances when you were in college? Or how did you grow up? Different conversations where you can start seeing how your partner treats money and what their financial values are. Amen. And what about for parents? I mean, you talk about some parents who own a business, might want their kids to have a prenup so that their family business is protected. How do parents talk about prenups with their kid in a way that's not too invasive or nosy into what they actually end up doing?
Starting point is 00:23:41 So it's a really important conversation that all of us, whether your children are going to end up having a prenup or not, should have. Teaching your children about money and understanding money in relationships and how it's going to impact your relationship is imperative. And I think that individuals, if they were educated more on finances and how that impacts their relationship would make different decisions with who their partners are. And when parents have that conversation, it can be as simple as, hey, you know,
Starting point is 00:24:16 I am so happy for you and your relationship, and I am, you know, I love you so much. I just wanna make sure that your inheritance is protected. And that's okay because in California, for example, your inheritance is your separate property. So you can enter into a prenup that essentially just codifies the law. So you're just dotting your I's, crossing your T's saying, we're going to follow the law.
Starting point is 00:24:42 What I inherit or what was mine prior to marriage is mine. What we create during marriage is joint. And anything I create after marriage or in after marriage is separate. Can I make my daughter sign a prenup? Can I put that in a trust? There are some estate planning provisions that can require your daughter to sign a prenup. Interesting. And so when you say codify what the law is, basically, you know, in California, it's community property. So again, like stepping back, everybody has a prenup.
Starting point is 00:25:14 It's what the state decides. Correct. The reason that we're going through all of this is to just tailor it to what your specific situations might be. Right, and also, you know, you have to think about when you get married, are you going to move states based on your spouse's career or for any other reason? And you may not like the laws in that state.
Starting point is 00:25:36 So by protecting yourself upfront, and you're not forum shopping per se, but you're choosing to follow the law and the state that you get married or plan to have your life in. You may like that better than moving somewhere else. And how much does all this stuff cost, Jackie? Well, it depends. You mean for like a prenup or a divorce?
Starting point is 00:25:58 Or both? Oh man, all of it. Prenups can cost tens of thousands of dollars, but there are, you know, for everyday person who can't afford that, there are online platforms and digital platforms that you can use like HelloPrenup. My only recommendation is if you decide to use an online platform to get a prenup, just make sure that you consult with an attorney in your state. And what I always tell my clients is let's have the deal points determined upfront so
Starting point is 00:26:27 we can eliminate the drafting in the back and forth or the later negotiations and that will help lower costs. I think that's really smart. I also had friends that just got divorced and they hired, you'll know what this is called is it was like a divorce coach or somebody that they could talk to you and vent about before they brought in the lawyer on billable hours. Is that something you suggest? Really smart. Really smart. I think having a team, a support system in place, whether it's a therapist or a divorce coach or someone else, because the last thing you want to do
Starting point is 00:26:59 is be venting to me about your spouse at my hourly rate in lieu of talking to a therapist. I think it's smart to come up with a checklist of what you want so you're not paying for figuring that out with a professional. As you're trying to find your legal soulmate, I suppose, you're probably interviewing a lot of different lawyers. If you're going to create a prenup,, you haven't worked with a lawyer before, what are some of the types of questions that you should ask a lawyer when you're in that dating process of trying to find the right one to represent you well? That's a great question. So number one, I think it's important to know what their hourly rate is,
Starting point is 00:27:39 how they charge. Two is what their legal philosophy is because some lawyers really just like to litigate, get in there, and some like to mediate. I like to mediate. I like to try to resolve issues without going to court. I think it's more important for the client to have peace of mind and resolve their case sooner than later and without excess legal fees because the emotional toll that it takes litigating for years is really devastating, both personally and on the family. So it's really important to know the philosophy. Then it's also important to understand what the strategy is.
Starting point is 00:28:17 You know, where do you see my case? And you don't want somebody who's just gonna tell you, you know, it's all rainbows and butterflies. You want somebody who's gonna be real with you. You may not like their advice all the time, but you know that they're being honest with you. And that's really important because you want honesty in your attorney client relationship. For sure. You mentioned this before, but I wanted to double
Starting point is 00:28:40 click on it for a second that some clauses, I guess in California, or perhaps in many states are illegal. So an I wanted to double click on it for a second, where she says her husband, if something happens to her, that her husband's new partner can't get any of her money or something like that. Where is the legal line for what you could put in? Lucy Claus, that's funny. So like I said, it's not illegal per se, but it is against public policy and therefore unenforceable.
Starting point is 00:29:20 That's really where the line is, right? What's enforceable and what's not. How are you gonna contract your partner to going to a date night once a week? Like you would hope that you guys are gonna do that, irrespective of having a contract that's implying that. In the event of your death and how the money is, you know, where the money's gonna go,
Starting point is 00:29:37 you wanna ensure that it goes to your children and not a future spouse. There are provisions that you can put to protect that. Okay. So no date night. You can put it in, but it's not going to really do anything. You can put it in some symbolic way. It's going to make you feel good. Exactly. I know. Allegedly, Mark Zuckerberg and Priscilla Chan had some sort of clause about that. Who knows?
Starting point is 00:30:03 Cute. some sort of clause about that, who knows? You know, and yeah, cute, I guess. So you could put whatever you want in there, I suppose, do the dishes, but like a judge is not gonna. No, I mean, no, cause that's like indentured slavery, right? You can't, you can't, you know, uphold somebody to doing the dishes every night. Gotcha.
Starting point is 00:30:23 But are there any creative things that can be upheld that people could think about? Yeah. I mean, I think the Flusi clause, I love that, is a good thing to think about in the state planning provision. So in the event somebody passes away, how the assets are going to be treated, like for example, all the community properties bequeathed to the surviving spouse, the house that the marital home is bequeathed to the surviving spouse, maybe one spouse's separate property pays off the mortgage, there are things that you can do, or that you can ensure that there's a certain amount of life insurance
Starting point is 00:30:59 that is is left for you. And then provisions in the future for children. I mean, I went through a lot of this when I was getting married and it's not fun. No. I'm not going to lie. It's awful. How do you reframe this? Yeah. So it can be really awful and I'm sorry that that was your experience, but what I think
Starting point is 00:31:19 individuals really need to think about is prenups are not thinking about the end and planning for divorce. They are there to help set you up for financial success in your relationship. They require full transparency, full financial disclosures, which means you have to tell your partner all of your assets, all of your debts, and your income for the last couple of years. You have to exchange tax returns. You can ask for bank statements and you're really putting it all out there. With that, you are able to have these conversations in your relationship and how you want to share your assets and income during your relationship that a lot of couples don't have until it's
Starting point is 00:32:04 too late. If they had had these conversations prior to getting married, they may have made different choices. Using an example, let's say you are marrying somebody who comes from extraordinary family wealth. Well, they may just receive income or trust distributions each month, but that's their separate property. You're not building a community estate, for example, in California. And if you had a prenup, you might receive more than you would be entitled to under the law. Just to clarify, it wasn't uncomfortable because we're having these conversations.
Starting point is 00:32:42 I love these conversations. It was just kind of ick because you're thinking about your death, you're thinking about what will happen after your death, all this kind of stuff. And I think a lot of women in particular are nervous about prenups because they have this idea, which I try to debunk every chance I get, that somebody's making me sign a prenup.
Starting point is 00:33:02 Meanwhile, obviously we're making more money, have more assets going into relationships, marrying later in life, all of these types of things. How do you help women in particular reframe the idea of a prenup? Well, we're taught to have blinders on when we fall in love. I mean, that is the wedding industry, right? You're taught to be the bride, to have the big day. But what about after?
Starting point is 00:33:25 And, you know, happily ever after. And I think it's really important for women in particular to have financial agency in their relationship. That does not mean having access to an Amex. That means having an access to a bank account with cash in your name that if something happens, you know you can walk out the door. And you've talked about this financial abuse and toxic financial relationships are huge. And individuals really don't talk about
Starting point is 00:33:51 it as much, I think, with their friends. But it is a form of abuse that is so rampant and is very scary because individuals cannot leave their marriage without having any access to cash. And if you look at an example in the public, Erica Jane and Tom Girardi, and Tom Girardi was just convicted of fraud. And Erica Jane, for example, said, how could she leave? She didn't have anything other than access to an Amex, and if she left, it was going to be cut off. So it's really important that women have cash, have financial agency, know what's going on in their marriage so that the world isn't ripped up from underneath them. Absolutely. And again, keep in mind that you will have a prenup regardless of whether you have your
Starting point is 00:34:44 own or not. Correct. So this is not a harbinger of bad things to come. It's a sign that you're able to have adult conversations. And you're taking control, right? You're taking control of your financial destiny in your relationship. And I launched a platform, Love Richer, on this specific topic, really to try to help individuals and particularly women start talking about finances early on in the relationship and how to have these difficult conversations because it is so important for individuals
Starting point is 00:35:18 to have financial agency in the relationship. I love it. Thank you for doing that. Jackie, we end all of our episodes by asking guests for a tip that listeners can take straight to the bank. What's one financial red flag that people should keep an eye out for before they say, I do? Lack of financial transparency. If your partner is unwilling to share their bank account with you or tell you how much is in the bank or tell you what they own, I would not walk down that aisle. I would have a very hard conversation with them and try to understand why they feel that it's appropriate not to share the intimate details of their finances with you before you guys, you know,
Starting point is 00:35:56 set off. Like actually see it, right? Yeah. Yeah. I mean, you should have full financial disclosure before you get married. Yeah. So, you know, sit together and go through your bank accounts and lay it all out there. I know when I got my, the login for my husband's fidelity account, I felt like that was the most intimate we've ever been. Isn't it true? I would say the same, you know, oh, honey, okay, let's log in to your accounts. Okay, what's going on? It is a different level of intimacy, for sure. Money rehab is a production of Money News Network. I'm your host, Nicole Lapin.
Starting point is 00:36:33 Money rehab's executive producer is Morgan LeVoy. Our researcher is Emily Holmes. Do you need some money rehab? And let's be honest, we all do. So email us your money questions, money rehab at money news network.com to potentially have your questions answered on the show or even have a one on one intervention with me and follow us on Instagram at money news and tik tok at money news network for exclusive video
Starting point is 00:36:55 content. And lastly, thank you. Seriously, thank you. Thank you for listening and for investing in yourself, which is the most important investment you can make.

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