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Signing a cohabitation agreement can protect your rights, and an agreement of this nature is very similar to a prenuptial agreement in a marriage. Basically, it needs to specify what will happen to your property if you break up. 

Also like a prenuptial agreement, however, you cannot set terms regarding custody of any children you may have with your cohabitation partner or set child support. California courts are required to determine child support and custody solely on the basis of what is in the best interest of the children, and that must be determined at the time that the children’s parents stop living together.

Your agreement should outline how you plan to divide income and expenses during the period that you live together. Having this laid out in black-and-white will go a long way towards keeping your relationship smooth, and you can always revisit the agreement if there’s a serious change in circumstances, such as if one partner loses a job, gets a much better job, becomes ill, etc. 

It’s also important to lay out how you’re going to consider any new property that you acquire during the time that you live together. Will it be considered joint property or separate, and how will you make that determination? Next, if you plan to share assets and pensions, that should all be thoroughly laid out in your agreement. You also want to include in your agreement some clauses about what to do if you separate. Most importantly, it’s wise to plan out who gets to keep the home, if there is one, and how your other types of property will be divided up.

As mentioned above, you cannot set terms for child custody or child support in the event that you separate, but there are some things that you can include in your cohabitation agreement relative to your children. 

First, if you don’t have children but plan to in the future, your plan can include specific steps for how that will happen and to make sure both of you are legally considered the parents of your children. You may also want to include a clause that explains clearly how you plan to divide up childcare responsibilities during the time that you cohabitate.

Cohabitation agreements are very flexible, and this is one of their strengths. This flexibility, however, means that there’s room for you to tweak things so the agreement works very specifically for you and your partner. That’s why it’s a good idea to have an attorney help you prepare your agreement, so you can take full advantage of all the flexibility afforded by this document. 

Some things you might consider adding to your agreement, for example, could be what you’ll do if one of you chooses to give up a career in order to raise your children; how you will deal with estate planning in the event that one of you passes away; and how disputes will be resolved.

You can also set up an agreement that has clauses requiring you to revisit the agreement at certain time intervals or after certain life events to make sure that it still meets your needs and provides the protections that you’re looking for.

Cohabitation is something different from a domestic partnership. A domestic partnership has to be formally declared and filed with the California Secretary of State, and you’ll need to get notarized forms to do this. Once you do, you have many of the rights and responsibilities of a married couple when it comes to property and debt. 

Cohabitation is an informal relationship, so in the event that you separate, each individual retains all their own property unless there is a specific statement to the contrary in a cohabitation agreement. What does this mean? Consider, for example, someone who owns a home entering a romantic relationship with a partner. If they marry or if the two of them enter a formal domestic partnership, and then if the two of them live together in that home and the new partner contributes to it by helping to upkeep the property, pay property tax, etc., it becomes marital property or shared property. That means if the couple divorce or separate, the house must be divided between them. With cohabitation, this would not happen unless the cohabitation agreement specifically states that the home becomes shared property.

If you separate from your cohabitation partner, both of you keep everything that is in your name, no matter how long your relationship has lasted. The only assets that would be divided are any assets that you delineate in your cohabitation agreement as belonging to both parties or which you bought jointly, with both your names attached to the purchase.

You cannot file taxes jointly if you have a cohabitation agreement. Cohabitating partners do not share property, which is why the property does not have to be divided if they separate; but this also means that they do not share tax liability. Each partner is responsible for their own taxes.

If you do not have a cohabitation agreement in place but have been living for an extended period with another person and now need to establish that relationship in court for some reason, the California courts require certain evidence to establish a cohabitating status. Essentially, you have to prove that your finances were mixed and used together as you lived together. You can usually prove this by showing that you had the same mailing address for several years, by providing evidence of owning or renovating real estate together, or by showing evidence that you bought other property, such as a vehicle, jointly.

If you choose to have a cohabitation agreement at all, there are certain things that your agreement must include and some basic requirements it must meet as a formal legal document. For it to be valid, it must be clear that both partners understand the term and can acknowledge so, and the agreement must be in writing. The agreement must also be fair to both parties, and both parties must be getting something out of the relationship other than just sexual favors.

Because you are dealing with a legal document, it’s wise to work with a lawyer who has experience in California’s family law code and who understands these agreements, what the state will consider as it evaluates them, what’s fair to both parties, and how to ensure that your wishes will be understood and followed as you lay out the terms of your life together.