http://www.nytimes.com/2012/04/15/opinion/sunday/the-downside-of-cohabiting-before-marriage.html

It seems to me that 30-ish women have come to realize that cohabitation is not so good. I think what is going on is that women get a high value man, figure that living with him is just a pre-marriage, with the real marriage eventually coming. However, what happens is that after a few years, this high value male goes for a younger woman, and marries her, leaving his mature ex at a much reduced level of sexual market value, and a compromised pregnancy schedule. The man, OTOH, gets nice young poontang for a while until he is ready to start a family.

I'm sure women would rather have a marriage so they can get the nice financial severence package when they divorce you. As someone who is happily cohabitating, paying such a package is exactly what I'm trying to avoid. A nice side effect is that the girl doesn't have this leverage of a divorce to hold over you. The "I have a ring, now I own you" attitude.

On the other hand, the cost of living isn't cheap, so they may like the idea of sharing some bills before a possible wedding.

I think relationships have a certain shelf life. They call this the seven year itch, but it can be anywhere from four to 10 years from what I understand. Both genders may start to wonder about the excitement of a new partner. How you (and she) react to this largely determines whether or not the relationship will last. That's why it's so important that the relationship is based on more than just looks or sex. The danger is you never know how another person (in this case, the woman) is going to react.

With this in mind, if you live together for four years, then get married for three, then the seven year itch hits you... This is basically the same as being married for seven years then divorcing. So it looks like the couple that didn't cohabitate had the more successful marriage, because they were married longer. But the time that they lived together was the same.

zekko said:

I think relationships have a certain shelf life. They call this the seven year itch, but it can be anywhere from four to 10 years from what I understand.

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Get married for three, then the seven year itch hits you... This is basically the same as being married for seven years then divorcing. So it looks like the couple that didn't cohabitate had the more successful marriage, because they were married longer. But the time that they lived together was the same.

Click to expand...

Interesting theory. So the reason that folks who cohabitate get divorced more, or at least quicker, is because they've already burned some of the relationship candle by the time they officially got married.