When very young couples announce that they want to get married, their parents are sometimes concerned. They may tell them to wait until they are older. They may even tell the young couple that getting married at their age means their divorce odds are incredibly high, so they should wait longer so that the relationship is a bit more stable.
This is often hard for those young couples to stomach. They simply want to tie the knot, and they believe it is a good decision. Is it actually true that a person’s age when they get married can affect their divorce rates?
A complicated relationship exists between the factors
Young marriages do indeed have higher divorce rates. According to one study, divorce odds are 11% higher for every year that a couple gets married before they turn 32. So if a young couple wants to get married in their early 20s, their divorce odds certainly are higher than if they waited.
However, the same study also demonstrates that the odds of divorce go up by 5% for every year after age 32. Other studies have found that divorce rates have been going up for Baby Boomers and others in their 50s and 60s, which is known as gray divorce.
So this shows that things are a bit complicated. Waiting to get married can increase the stability of a marriage, but waiting too long can actually make a couple more likely to get divorced. This may be part of the reason behind the recent surge in gray divorce cases.
Navigating a divorce
At any age, a divorce can be complex. Couples need to understand all of their legal rights when it comes to marital property division, child custody rights and much more.
