PrenupsAI

LA · evidence preparation

Louisiana prenup checklist.

Use these prompts to collect the agreement, schedules, timeline, and outside records needed for an evidence-based first review.

Package la-2026-07-23.3 · checked 2026-07-23 · editorially verified.
15issues checked
13with state records
2visible gaps
2026-07-23effective-through label

State-specific manual editorial

Louisiana treats the document as a matrimonial agreement within its civil-law regime and requires an authentic act or an act under private signature duly acknowledged.

Louisiana's public-policy and regime rules differ from a generic uniform-act analysis, and mid-marriage changes can raise separate court-approval questions.

183 authored words · 15 source-linked review modules below

Questions people actually ask

Louisiana review, without pretending the facts are settled.

Each answer is tied to source IDs in the current state package. Open the citations and check for later authority before relying on a proposition.

What form must a Louisiana matrimonial agreement take?

Civil Code article 2331 requires an authentic act or an act under private signature duly acknowledged.

  • La. Civ. Code art. 2331 · A matrimonial agreement made before or during marriage must be an authentic act or an act under private signature duly acknowledged by the spouses.

What does a matrimonial agreement control?

Articles 2328 and 2329 define and limit agreements establishing a matrimonial regime, subject to Louisiana public policy.

  • La. Civ. Code art. 2328 · A matrimonial agreement establishes a separation-of-property regime or modifies or terminates the legal regime, while unexcluded provisions of the legal regime remain effective.

Are mid-marriage changes treated the same way?

The cited Louisiana material identifies court-approval requirements for certain matrimonial-regime changes during marriage.

  • La. Civ. Code art. 2329 · Spouses may agree before or during marriage on matters not prohibited by public policy, but a during-marriage modification or termination generally requires a joint petition and findings that it serves their best interests and that they understand the governing rules.

Worked issue-spotting examples

How document facts become research questions.

These examples do not predict an outcome. They show the boundary between a fact pattern, a source-backed issue, and the legal judgment still required.

The privately signed document

The parties sign privately without clear acknowledgment language. Louisiana's article 2331 formality makes the execution method a threshold issue.

Question to carry forward: Does the document qualify as an authentic act or a duly acknowledged private act?

  • La. Civ. Code art. 2331 · A matrimonial agreement made before or during marriage must be an authentic act or an act under private signature duly acknowledged by the spouses.

The regime change after marriage

The spouses later agree to change their property regime. Louisiana's mid-marriage framework can require more than simply signing an amendment.

Question to carry forward: Is judicial approval required, and were the civil-law prerequisites satisfied?

  • La. Civ. Code art. 2328 · A matrimonial agreement establishes a separation-of-property regime or modifies or terminates the legal regime, while unexcluded provisions of the legal regime remain effective.
  • La. Civ. Code art. 2329 · Spouses may agree before or during marriage on matters not prohibited by public policy, but a during-marriage modification or termination generally requires a joint petition and findings that it serves their best interests and that they understand the governing rules.
01

Signing formalities

Confirm the complete agreement and every incorporated schedule use the required form and signatures.

  • La. Civ. Code art. 2331 · A matrimonial agreement made before or during marriage must be an authentic act or an act under private signature duly acknowledged by the spouses.
  • Acurio v. Acurio, 2016-C-1395 (La. May 3, 2017), 224 So. 3d 935 · A private-signature premarital agreement must be duly acknowledged before marriage; later acknowledgment does not cure the missing pre-marriage form without satisfying the during-marriage regime-change rules.
02

Acknowledgment

Check whether the agreement or a related instrument uses an acknowledgment, notarization, witness, or recording formality.

  • La. Civ. Code art. 1833 · An authentic act requires execution before an authorized notary or officer in the presence of two witnesses and signatures by each executing party, each witness, and each notary, subject to the article's separate-execution rules.
  • La. Civ. Code art. 1836 · A party may duly acknowledge a private signature by recognizing it before a court, notary, or other authorized officer in the presence of two witnesses, or in another legally authorized manner.
03

Effective date

Identify the event and date on which the agreement says it becomes effective.

04

Permitted subjects

Map each material clause to a subject the cited authorities address and flag terms requiring separate authority.

  • La. Civ. Code art. 2328 · A matrimonial agreement establishes a separation-of-property regime or modifies or terminates the legal regime, while unexcluded provisions of the legal regime remain effective.
05

Property

Reconcile property labels with title, income, appreciation, debt, and disposition terms.

  • La. Civ. Code art. 2332 · A matrimonial agreement affects third persons as to immovables when filed in the conveyance records where the property is situated and as to movables when filed where the spouses are domiciled.
  • Crow v. Crow, 56,445-CA (La. App. 2 Cir. Nov. 19, 2025) · Crow affirmed enforcement after finding insufficient proof of error and explained that joint tax filing or acquiring property during marriage did not automatically convert the agreed separate-property regime.
06

Spousal support

Identify every support waiver, cap, formula, review event, and enforcement-time safeguard.

07

Children and support

Flag any term that attempts to predetermine child support, custody, or another child-related decision.

  • La. Civ. Code art. 131 · In divorce proceedings the court must award custody according to the child's best interest, so a premarital custody allocation cannot bind the future court.
  • La. R.S. 9:315.1 · The child-support guidelines presumptively supply the proper amount; a deviation requires court review, statutory grounds, reasons, and attention to the child's best interest.
08

Amendment and revocation

Confirm every claimed amendment or revocation is complete and follows the applicable form.

  • La. Civ. Code art. 2329 · A during-marriage agreement that modifies or terminates a matrimonial regime generally requires a joint petition and court findings on best interests and understanding of the governing principles and rules.
09

Voluntariness

Build a factual timeline of drafts, negotiations, pressure, capacity, language access, and signing.

  • La. Civ. Code art. 2329 · Spouses may agree before or during marriage on matters not prohibited by public policy, but a during-marriage modification or termination generally requires a joint petition and findings that it serves their best interests and that they understand the governing rules.
  • La. Civ. Code art. 1948 · Consent to a contract may be vitiated by error, fraud, or duress, and those conventional-obligation grounds apply to matrimonial agreements alongside their special form rules.
  • La. Civ. Code art. 1959 · Duress vitiates consent when it causes reasonable fear of unjust and considerable injury to person, property, or reputation, considering the party's age, health, disposition, and other personal circumstances.
  • McAlpine v. McAlpine, 94-C-1594 (La. Sept. 5, 1996), 679 So. 2d 85 · A support-waiving antenuptial agreement remains subject to the same rescission grounds as other contracts, and McAlpine upheld the agreement after rejecting undue duress on its record.
10

Financial disclosure

Compare the agreement and schedules against assets, debts, income, business interests, trusts, and any waiver.

11

Independent counsel

Record who advised each party, when advice occurred, and which draft was reviewed.

12

Timing

Measure the time between first draft, material revisions, legal review, wedding, and signing.

  • La. Civ. Code art. 1962 · A threat to do a lawful act or exercise a right generally is not duress, although an act lawful only in appearance may qualify.
  • Burtner v. Burtner, 2019-0175 (La. App. 1 Cir. Oct. 1, 2019) · Burtner affirmed enforcement of an authentic-act agreement signed three days before the wedding on credibility findings that rejected fraud and duress; Louisiana has no fixed numerical waiting period.
13

Public assistance

Identify support terms that could interact with public-benefit eligibility at enforcement.

No separate source record is catalogued for this topic. That is a research-coverage statement, not a claim that no applicable law exists.

14

Void marriage

Identify whether the agreement addresses a marriage later determined to be void.

No separate source record is catalogued for this topic. That is a research-coverage statement, not a claim that no applicable law exists.

15

Other limitations

Identify severability, limitations, public-policy, choice-of-law, and other enforcement boundaries.

  • La. Civ. Code art. 2330 · Spouses may not alter the marital portion or established succession order and may not limit, as to third persons, specified powers that one spouse has under the legal regime over community obligations and property.
  • La. Civ. Code art. 7 · Parties cannot derogate by juridical act from laws enacted to protect the public interest; a contrary act is absolutely null.

Matrix and list placement describes the records in PrenupsAI's current evidence packages. It does not rank legal strictness, predict enforceability, or mean that an unlisted state has no applicable rule. Open the cited sources to inspect the underlying authority.

Method, not a verdict

How to turn fifteen prompts into a defensible review file.

331 words of shared evidence methodology accompany the state-specific editorial and authority records above.

Use the checklist as an evidence map

Work from the complete agreement outward. Preserve the best available signed copy, every incorporated schedule, and any amendment or revocation before answering individual questions. For each checklist row, distinguish three things: what the document says, what an outside record can prove, and what the cited authority addresses. Those categories overlap, but they are not interchangeable. A recital may identify the parties’ stated understanding without proving delivery; a bank statement may prove an account existed without deciding its legal classification; a statute may identify a standard without resolving disputed facts.

Mark an item complete only when the underlying record is identified, not merely because the agreement contains reassuring language. If a source is absent, record the gap and route it for research. Do not convert ‘not separately catalogued’ into ‘no law exists.’ That discipline is what makes the checklist useful across both dense statutory packages and states whose rules depend more heavily on cases or adjacent bodies of law.

Keep a source-and-version trail

Record the package version and effective-through date shown above, the date each authority was opened, and whether a later-authority search was performed. Save exact clause quotes with page or section references. When facts change—through relocation, marriage, amendment, property transfer, separation, death, or litigation—create a new review snapshot rather than overwriting the old one. The resulting trail lets another reviewer understand which document, facts, and legal source set supported each observation.

A checklist can identify missing evidence and research questions; it cannot certify validity, predict enforcement, select governing law, or replace a time-sensitive professional judgment. Use narrow language such as ‘the reviewed file does not contain the referenced schedule’ instead of ‘no disclosure occurred.’ That difference is not defensive filler. It is the basic quality control that keeps evidence reporting accurate.

End each review with a dated list of unresolved facts, assigned follow-up work, and the authority that made each question material. A visible open item is safer than an unsupported green check.