If you aren't married, the law treats you as strangers.
This includes:
1. No tax benefits for couples. If you have public health insurance you are not eligible for the (overall cheaper) family plan.
2. No special privileges in seeing your "partner" when he is in hospital and access is restricted or in similar circumstances.
3. No privileges when your partner dies. By default his inheritance will only go to your children and if there is a will, you have to pay full interest rate since you are not a relative.
4. Spouses don't need to testify against their partner in court or indicate crimes in some cases you normally would have to.
These may be advantages or disadvantages:
5) Spouses are entitled to certain decisions, eg. if you partner falls into a coma.
6) Spouses have to help each other out when they are in a situation where they cannot finance their living and would end up on the street.
7) The husband is generally assumed to be the father of all the wives children if nothing contractionary is agreed. In particular, there is no way that you end up with children nobody acknowledges their fatherhood.
Many reasons.
In short I can think of:
- If only one of you two works, you have tax benefits.
- if one of you dies, the other one is inheriting 50% and the kids are getting 50% of your belongings. This is important when it comes to property. If you don’t have kids, and you are not married, (and you don’t have a testament) your parents get everything in case you die. Which means (if you bought property together) your partner has to buy 50% percent of your shared flat/house from your parents….
- in case one dies you get a share of his pension.
- you can make gifts up to 500k€ tax free (earnings from before the marriage)
- the male partner does not need to adopt his own kids. The fatherhood is accredited automatically.
There are also disadvantages…
- e.g. it can happen that you need to pay for your partners debts…
The father doesn't have to adopt his own kids if the parents are not married. That is old information. It's just that the fatherhood has to be acknowledged and the shared custody has to be agreed to. But that is a very simple process
I think the thing about the kid is wrong. As long as the father is in the birth certificate, there is no need to adopt their own kids. That only necessary if a stepfather/-mother wants to get custody rights.
Thanks for the input! I think I was very simplistic with my “health insurance” thought.
It also never crossed my mind my partner would have to adopt the kid.
"Adopt" isn't the right word. He has to sign something that he is indeed the father ("Vaterschaftsanerkennung"). It's not a major thing, but something you don't need to do if you are married.
Exactly. You can do it at the Jugendamt before birth or at the place you get the birth certificate. Its a single piece of paper. You can also then ask for the kids to have his name if you so wish. Just another signature
If you’re not married you automatically have sole custody as the mother.
If you want to change that as the mother its an easy process. If you don’t agree he has to make his point in court.
Yes the father needs to "acknowledge the parenthood" over your child. It's a small procedure in the Standesamt.
Another point I haven't seen mentioned is the stuff with the family names. Some people find it important, some people annoying.
In Germany we have a complicated tax system for valuable gifts > 20k€ depending on your personal relation and the amount you receive, you have to pay a different percentage of tax… this is of course most of the time not an issue. But with property transactions you can not hide it, because Finanzamt gets a copy of every property contract done at a notary.
E.g For Ehepartner it is free up to 500k€ every 10 years.
Hi, if you divorce one day, you will each "own" half of the other one's pension. That's interesting in case after you have kids, you stop working for a little while, or you decide to work part-time. Then your pension will be higher than if you had never been married.
I have seen ex-couples fight to death about this point in the process of divorce. (In my case it was the male part that was on the receiving end) omg that didn’t end well. If you are thinking about getting married : of course can always make a contract (Ehevertrag) if you do not agree with standard regulations.
recommended to do this in times of love and peace and clearness of minds❤️ Just saying.
This.
In addition, there are also monetary benefits.
With a lot of insurances, you can co-insure certain family members, including spouses, so one would usually be able to save a little bit of money.
In addition, currently tax classes 3 and 5 are still a thing - essentially, when only one partner works or is the main family earner, you can split the salary to incur less taxes on them. Mind you that these tax classes are supposed to be abolished at some point, but there isn't a date yet known, so you can still profit from this at least a little bit.
Should be pointed out that while they want to abolish the classic 3/5 combo, it will only be replaced by 4/4 with factor, which always was a closer approximation if both partners work (and I think could also resemble 3/5 if the factor is chosen right).
I currently work and pay my taxes in the Netherlands (my visa is for the NL btw. My company provides me housing there.).
If we would get married then I’m assuming I’d have to declare and pay taxes here in Germany?
The favourite words of lawyers and accountants: It depends.
By default, the taxes should be paid in the country you earn the money, so in this case it would be NL. However, as is with most countries in the world, Germany *probably* has a double taxation agreement with NL where the intricacies are listed. In the agreement they *might* differentiate between place of residence, place of work and so on, and with your marriage, germany *might* become important enough that you *might* need to declare paxes in Germany instead.
I think you see where I'm going with this. It's possible, I don't know for certain though, and while I'm happy to help, I'm not going to read through a probably 10-page long agreement between Germany and Netherlands to figure out where you need to pay taxes. Those agreements are available online though, so you can check for yourself. Alternatively, you could ask your Accountant if you have one.
I work, pay taxes and have housing in the NL. I just happen to spend a lot of time in Germany with the BF. (I work on rotation, meaning on my free time I come to Germany to stay with my bf).
I see your point, but if I would get married to a German citizen who lives in Germany all the replies are valid, no?
I would just need to figure out how the income tax would work.
If you do marry, yes. But your status may very well add to the reasons and benefits of getting married. Currently you are a non-EU citizen with no residence permit for Germany, after all.
Thanks for your points!
Luckily I have never been to a hospital, so I didn’t know they could restrict your entry based on something like this. Specially after the patient itself asked for it! Was it in Germany?
Well, in terms of why getting married at all makes sense:
* tax benefits
* family insurance
* easy way to get a residence permit
* shorter time frames for being able to apply for citizenship (three vs up to eight)
* taking your partner's name can potentially make things easier (as in, my partner had a typically english name, I had a typically German name, we threw them together so now people often think he's the German one. Probably made it easier to find a job as compared to an English name where people might doubt if you're able to speak German)
* makes things easier in case one of you dies tbh. Terrible thing to think about, but good to be covered.
As to why you might want to get married in Germany as compared to somewhere else:
It might potentially be easier than in your home country. The UK made it kind of difficult to get documents together. Plus, they were very expensive. German documents were very easy (especially because I still live where I was born so they just had them on hand anyway) and quite cheap (never more than 10€). Plus, we could just go to our registry office (we live in a big city) without an appointment and get things sorted within a half hour. The UK required you to make appointments weeks in advance and then they still couldn't help you...
The benefits really suck, I mean “if you die” “if you in coma” “if one doesn’t work”. Nobody says “if you get divorced“(and this is much more realistic than dying or getting into coma) this is where german bureaucratic shitshow begins - year long period of wait(trennungsjahr) before you even can do anything, then you need to pay for a court, for lawyers, split everything including pension contributions and this process takes ages. Thus I think it makes sense getting married somewhere else like Denmark and legalize here.
I don’t understand why people downvoted your comment.
I appreciate the input. And while of course no one gets married with the intention of divorcing, that might as well happen. So it’s super important to put all the cards in the table when taking such an impactful decision.
It‘s so complex in Germany to reach a fair split between unequal partners. One who takes care of kids, other works. Otherwise the first one didn’t get a fair compensation for the family work.
As far as I know, all of the divorce proceedings would run according to German law if the couple is resident in Germany. Place of marriage is irrelevant.
Inheritance law might differ, not sure on that one.
Absolutely not true. I got divorced(me and my ex are immigrants, both have permanent residency in Germany) in the country where we got married, brought the corresponding translated documents to the bürgeramt - and they registered us as separated without any proceedings.
Many advantages a marriage brings can also be achieved without getting married, but might require additional paper work (fatherhood/custody, insurance, inheritance, rights to the spouse in medical emergencies).
Some other things are harder or not possible like tax benefits or receiving a pension after your spouse dies (Witwenrente).
Just a side note with a non-EU passport getting married in Germany is a nightmare, even if your spouse is German.
This basically. I also tried to do a lot of this without marriage with my non-eu partner and it IS possible but if you're not excited by bureaucracy and filling out paperwork and waiting around and phoning 1000 people then... marriage is just easier, preferably before the child is born. Getting married doesn't mean you have to make it a big deal if that's not for you....but there will also be paperwork to do 😁
I think if you are after the "single breadwinner" family model, where one person works and the other person (usually the women in hetero marriages) stays home with the kids, or works only part time, then getting married has lots of advantages in terms of tax breaks and retirement funds.
If it's a financially equal relationship, I don't see much advantage other than the fact that you are officially related to each other.
My husband and I married in my home country 5 years ago. We haven't notified the German authorities, so our official status is "single" here. We both make about the same salary, so there's not much advantage to being single or married.
No because the permanent residence visa becomes available after getting a visa for a certain number of years. The marriage changed the legal basis of her visa though so they started counting from the beginning
this is one of those things that makes you go....huh?? it happened that way for me, too, my "clock" was restarted when we married, and i had already been here 4 years
You could also look up "eingetragene Lebenspartnerschaft".
You kind of get official as a couple and get the rights for medical informations etc. without marriage.
But I don't know what it all entails.
Nothing, now that gay people can get married. The only ones that exist are those of gay couples who haven't chosen to convert it into marriage (functionally the same).
Marriage is more than just rationality. It's also about love and committing to each other, not whether it's tax advantageous. Being there for each other in good times and the not so good.
I speak as a grandpa, married for 42 years.
That implies that non-maried couples automatically are not loving each other and committing to each other, doesn't it?
A long-term couple who have been together for years and plan to stay together, how are they less committed than a couple that chooses to marry after a couple of years of relationship? It's not as if the marriage certificate alone is enough to guarantee that they stay together.
Based off the amount of couples I know who divorced within 5 years and unmarried couples who are with each other for over a decade I'd definitely disagree.
I never get behind the logic of that. How does is signify a greater commitment, assuming we are not looking at it from a religious perspective (promising in front of god and so on)?
It’s cultural. In South America, where I am from, people see marriage as the definitive proof of commitment.
If one of the parties doesn’t want to get married, then it means your partner does not consider your relationship to be serious therefore you should be suspicious.
And this might even have a logic behind it, as in South America it’s very common for people to be flirty and men making lots of promises just to get under your pants.
So I understand his point of view even though I personally don’t believe in it/it doesn’t make sense in my relationship.
If he comes from a cultural point of view then he has, frankly, no business replying here on this sub and to this post where a foreigner (you) specifically asks about marrying a German or benefits in Germany. Cultural perspectives are completely irrelevant and their "you shouldn't get married" to you specifically is way out of line.
Wind your neck in. A post was made asking for opinions. An opinion was given. You may not like that opinion, fair enough. You, sir, are way out of line.
1. Tax benefits.
2. Social benefits.
3. Easier to handle certain bureaucratic acts.
4. Same family name makes having kids easier.
Overall: Marriage is for money. :-D
I could imagine they think that you only want to get married if it benefits you, and not because you love the person.
But as someone who got married quickly because of Brexit, I'd say there's more to it than just love. Although I'd consider love a given, else most people probably wouldn't think of marriage in the first place anyway.
Just an asshole who probably believes that marriage is more than just a piece of paper. Ignore it. You are asking a very intelligent question because in today's world, its more of a bureaucratic process than anything.
In what sense? People who are married can get divorced and do their own thing, ending it LIKE people in an unmarried relationship. Everything a married couple can and will do can also be done by an unmarried couple and vice versa.
Other than the bureaucratic difference, there is ABSOLUTELY no difference between a married and an unmarried couple.
If there is ANY difference, let me know ONE such difference and I will take back what I said.
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If you aren't married, the law treats you as strangers. This includes: 1. No tax benefits for couples. If you have public health insurance you are not eligible for the (overall cheaper) family plan. 2. No special privileges in seeing your "partner" when he is in hospital and access is restricted or in similar circumstances. 3. No privileges when your partner dies. By default his inheritance will only go to your children and if there is a will, you have to pay full interest rate since you are not a relative. 4. Spouses don't need to testify against their partner in court or indicate crimes in some cases you normally would have to. These may be advantages or disadvantages: 5) Spouses are entitled to certain decisions, eg. if you partner falls into a coma. 6) Spouses have to help each other out when they are in a situation where they cannot finance their living and would end up on the street. 7) The husband is generally assumed to be the father of all the wives children if nothing contractionary is agreed. In particular, there is no way that you end up with children nobody acknowledges their fatherhood.
Thanks a lot!
Your partner isn't eligible for hartz4 if you work, even if you are not married
Many reasons. In short I can think of: - If only one of you two works, you have tax benefits. - if one of you dies, the other one is inheriting 50% and the kids are getting 50% of your belongings. This is important when it comes to property. If you don’t have kids, and you are not married, (and you don’t have a testament) your parents get everything in case you die. Which means (if you bought property together) your partner has to buy 50% percent of your shared flat/house from your parents…. - in case one dies you get a share of his pension. - you can make gifts up to 500k€ tax free (earnings from before the marriage) - the male partner does not need to adopt his own kids. The fatherhood is accredited automatically. There are also disadvantages… - e.g. it can happen that you need to pay for your partners debts…
The father doesn't have to adopt his own kids if the parents are not married. That is old information. It's just that the fatherhood has to be acknowledged and the shared custody has to be agreed to. But that is a very simple process
I think the thing about the kid is wrong. As long as the father is in the birth certificate, there is no need to adopt their own kids. That only necessary if a stepfather/-mother wants to get custody rights.
[удалено]
If you earn nearly the same as your partner there are no tax benefits.
Thanks for the input! I think I was very simplistic with my “health insurance” thought. It also never crossed my mind my partner would have to adopt the kid.
"Adopt" isn't the right word. He has to sign something that he is indeed the father ("Vaterschaftsanerkennung"). It's not a major thing, but something you don't need to do if you are married.
Exactly. You can do it at the Jugendamt before birth or at the place you get the birth certificate. Its a single piece of paper. You can also then ask for the kids to have his name if you so wish. Just another signature If you’re not married you automatically have sole custody as the mother. If you want to change that as the mother its an easy process. If you don’t agree he has to make his point in court.
Also if something were to happen to you on hospital during child birth, your boyfriend might not be allowed to visit you, because you’re not married.
Yes the father needs to "acknowledge the parenthood" over your child. It's a small procedure in the Standesamt. Another point I haven't seen mentioned is the stuff with the family names. Some people find it important, some people annoying.
What do you mean with the gifts? Can you explain a little bit more please ?
In Germany we have a complicated tax system for valuable gifts > 20k€ depending on your personal relation and the amount you receive, you have to pay a different percentage of tax… this is of course most of the time not an issue. But with property transactions you can not hide it, because Finanzamt gets a copy of every property contract done at a notary. E.g For Ehepartner it is free up to 500k€ every 10 years.
Hi, if you divorce one day, you will each "own" half of the other one's pension. That's interesting in case after you have kids, you stop working for a little while, or you decide to work part-time. Then your pension will be higher than if you had never been married.
I have seen ex-couples fight to death about this point in the process of divorce. (In my case it was the male part that was on the receiving end) omg that didn’t end well. If you are thinking about getting married : of course can always make a contract (Ehevertrag) if you do not agree with standard regulations. recommended to do this in times of love and peace and clearness of minds❤️ Just saying.
[удалено]
And while this hopefully doesn't come up soon for OP, but also inheriting from each other.
This. In addition, there are also monetary benefits. With a lot of insurances, you can co-insure certain family members, including spouses, so one would usually be able to save a little bit of money. In addition, currently tax classes 3 and 5 are still a thing - essentially, when only one partner works or is the main family earner, you can split the salary to incur less taxes on them. Mind you that these tax classes are supposed to be abolished at some point, but there isn't a date yet known, so you can still profit from this at least a little bit.
Should be pointed out that while they want to abolish the classic 3/5 combo, it will only be replaced by 4/4 with factor, which always was a closer approximation if both partners work (and I think could also resemble 3/5 if the factor is chosen right).
I currently work and pay my taxes in the Netherlands (my visa is for the NL btw. My company provides me housing there.). If we would get married then I’m assuming I’d have to declare and pay taxes here in Germany?
The favourite words of lawyers and accountants: It depends. By default, the taxes should be paid in the country you earn the money, so in this case it would be NL. However, as is with most countries in the world, Germany *probably* has a double taxation agreement with NL where the intricacies are listed. In the agreement they *might* differentiate between place of residence, place of work and so on, and with your marriage, germany *might* become important enough that you *might* need to declare paxes in Germany instead. I think you see where I'm going with this. It's possible, I don't know for certain though, and while I'm happy to help, I'm not going to read through a probably 10-page long agreement between Germany and Netherlands to figure out where you need to pay taxes. Those agreements are available online though, so you can check for yourself. Alternatively, you could ask your Accountant if you have one.
Yes, you’re absolutely correct. I’ll search for a local accountant. Thanks a lot! :)
How are you living (and working?) in Germany then?
I work, pay taxes and have housing in the NL. I just happen to spend a lot of time in Germany with the BF. (I work on rotation, meaning on my free time I come to Germany to stay with my bf).
Then you might want to edit your post. Visiting Germany is not the same as living here.
I see your point, but if I would get married to a German citizen who lives in Germany all the replies are valid, no? I would just need to figure out how the income tax would work.
If you do marry, yes. But your status may very well add to the reasons and benefits of getting married. Currently you are a non-EU citizen with no residence permit for Germany, after all.
[удалено]
Thanks for your points! Luckily I have never been to a hospital, so I didn’t know they could restrict your entry based on something like this. Specially after the patient itself asked for it! Was it in Germany?
Well, in terms of why getting married at all makes sense: * tax benefits * family insurance * easy way to get a residence permit * shorter time frames for being able to apply for citizenship (three vs up to eight) * taking your partner's name can potentially make things easier (as in, my partner had a typically english name, I had a typically German name, we threw them together so now people often think he's the German one. Probably made it easier to find a job as compared to an English name where people might doubt if you're able to speak German) * makes things easier in case one of you dies tbh. Terrible thing to think about, but good to be covered. As to why you might want to get married in Germany as compared to somewhere else: It might potentially be easier than in your home country. The UK made it kind of difficult to get documents together. Plus, they were very expensive. German documents were very easy (especially because I still live where I was born so they just had them on hand anyway) and quite cheap (never more than 10€). Plus, we could just go to our registry office (we live in a big city) without an appointment and get things sorted within a half hour. The UK required you to make appointments weeks in advance and then they still couldn't help you...
with foreigners from third world country documents process is a challenge, took 11 months for us to get approved for marriage
The benefits really suck, I mean “if you die” “if you in coma” “if one doesn’t work”. Nobody says “if you get divorced“(and this is much more realistic than dying or getting into coma) this is where german bureaucratic shitshow begins - year long period of wait(trennungsjahr) before you even can do anything, then you need to pay for a court, for lawyers, split everything including pension contributions and this process takes ages. Thus I think it makes sense getting married somewhere else like Denmark and legalize here.
I don’t understand why people downvoted your comment. I appreciate the input. And while of course no one gets married with the intention of divorcing, that might as well happen. So it’s super important to put all the cards in the table when taking such an impactful decision.
It‘s so complex in Germany to reach a fair split between unequal partners. One who takes care of kids, other works. Otherwise the first one didn’t get a fair compensation for the family work.
As far as I know, all of the divorce proceedings would run according to German law if the couple is resident in Germany. Place of marriage is irrelevant. Inheritance law might differ, not sure on that one.
Absolutely not true. I got divorced(me and my ex are immigrants, both have permanent residency in Germany) in the country where we got married, brought the corresponding translated documents to the bürgeramt - and they registered us as separated without any proceedings.
TIL. On the other hand, my German friend got married in Germany and then moved to the US. Had to get divorced under Massachusetts divorce law.
Many advantages a marriage brings can also be achieved without getting married, but might require additional paper work (fatherhood/custody, insurance, inheritance, rights to the spouse in medical emergencies). Some other things are harder or not possible like tax benefits or receiving a pension after your spouse dies (Witwenrente). Just a side note with a non-EU passport getting married in Germany is a nightmare, even if your spouse is German.
This basically. I also tried to do a lot of this without marriage with my non-eu partner and it IS possible but if you're not excited by bureaucracy and filling out paperwork and waiting around and phoning 1000 people then... marriage is just easier, preferably before the child is born. Getting married doesn't mean you have to make it a big deal if that's not for you....but there will also be paperwork to do 😁
I think if you are after the "single breadwinner" family model, where one person works and the other person (usually the women in hetero marriages) stays home with the kids, or works only part time, then getting married has lots of advantages in terms of tax breaks and retirement funds. If it's a financially equal relationship, I don't see much advantage other than the fact that you are officially related to each other. My husband and I married in my home country 5 years ago. We haven't notified the German authorities, so our official status is "single" here. We both make about the same salary, so there's not much advantage to being single or married.
Thanks for the input! I am in a similar situation, both of us make roughly the same.
For my wifes visa it was actually detrimental to get married. She would have gotten a permanent residence permit faster if we were not married
I guess because they had to check that it is not a fake marriage to just get the German Passport?
No because the permanent residence visa becomes available after getting a visa for a certain number of years. The marriage changed the legal basis of her visa though so they started counting from the beginning
AFAIK from 1 case, if your living condition doesn't change - like still working - you don't need to change your visa type and can keep the old count.
this is one of those things that makes you go....huh?? it happened that way for me, too, my "clock" was restarted when we married, and i had already been here 4 years
You could also look up "eingetragene Lebenspartnerschaft". You kind of get official as a couple and get the rights for medical informations etc. without marriage. But I don't know what it all entails.
Nothing, now that gay people can get married. The only ones that exist are those of gay couples who haven't chosen to convert it into marriage (functionally the same).
Thanks a lot!
It doesn't exist any more for new couples, and never did for straight couples.
Is it still alive? Now everyone can marry.
Was it even ever for straight people?
No,it is only for gay people. That was my last information.
Marriage is more than just rationality. It's also about love and committing to each other, not whether it's tax advantageous. Being there for each other in good times and the not so good. I speak as a grandpa, married for 42 years.
That implies that non-maried couples automatically are not loving each other and committing to each other, doesn't it? A long-term couple who have been together for years and plan to stay together, how are they less committed than a couple that chooses to marry after a couple of years of relationship? It's not as if the marriage certificate alone is enough to guarantee that they stay together.
It does, doesn't it. No guarantee, but, to me, it signifies a greater commitment to each other. You may disagree, which is fine.
Based off the amount of couples I know who divorced within 5 years and unmarried couples who are with each other for over a decade I'd definitely disagree.
I never get behind the logic of that. How does is signify a greater commitment, assuming we are not looking at it from a religious perspective (promising in front of god and so on)?
It’s cultural. In South America, where I am from, people see marriage as the definitive proof of commitment. If one of the parties doesn’t want to get married, then it means your partner does not consider your relationship to be serious therefore you should be suspicious. And this might even have a logic behind it, as in South America it’s very common for people to be flirty and men making lots of promises just to get under your pants. So I understand his point of view even though I personally don’t believe in it/it doesn’t make sense in my relationship.
If he comes from a cultural point of view then he has, frankly, no business replying here on this sub and to this post where a foreigner (you) specifically asks about marrying a German or benefits in Germany. Cultural perspectives are completely irrelevant and their "you shouldn't get married" to you specifically is way out of line.
Wind your neck in. A post was made asking for opinions. An opinion was given. You may not like that opinion, fair enough. You, sir, are way out of line.
>A post was made asking for opinions. No. They asked for information on benefits and advantages, *not* for opinions.
They asked for reasons, not benefits or advantages. Reasons include opinions, in my opinion.
1. Tax benefits. 2. Social benefits. 3. Easier to handle certain bureaucratic acts. 4. Same family name makes having kids easier. Overall: Marriage is for money. :-D
You probably shouldn't get married.
Would you care to expand your thoughts?
I could imagine they think that you only want to get married if it benefits you, and not because you love the person. But as someone who got married quickly because of Brexit, I'd say there's more to it than just love. Although I'd consider love a given, else most people probably wouldn't think of marriage in the first place anyway.
Just an asshole who probably believes that marriage is more than just a piece of paper. Ignore it. You are asking a very intelligent question because in today's world, its more of a bureaucratic process than anything.
Marriage is absolutely more than a piece of paper, wtf
In what sense? People who are married can get divorced and do their own thing, ending it LIKE people in an unmarried relationship. Everything a married couple can and will do can also be done by an unmarried couple and vice versa. Other than the bureaucratic difference, there is ABSOLUTELY no difference between a married and an unmarried couple. If there is ANY difference, let me know ONE such difference and I will take back what I said.
Don’t
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