The spouses may enter into binding agreements concerning maintenance and other matters before or after divorce or during divorce proceedings. See e.g. Norway’s Marriage Act, Section 83. A spouse may agree to renounce his or her future right to maintenance, as long as it is not with regard to a hypothetical future divorce.

The Brønnøysund Register Centre, Norway’s central register authority, contains a Register of Marriage Settlements. That Register contains agreements between spouses regulating their assets/property in a different way than what automatically follows from marriage legislation. If, for example, spouses wish to register separation of property, they must establish a marriage settlement. If the marriage settlement is to confer protection against any creditors, it must be registered in the Register of Marriage Settlements. The same provisions apply to registered partners.

The Register of Marriage Settlements contains registered marriage settlements from 1928 up to the present. A total of 120,000 marriage settlements registered prior to 1981 have been registered in a manual index file, while registrations after 1981 can be searched in a database.

The Register of Marriage Settlements contains important information about the assets/property of spouses, and the principle that such information should be public applies to this register as well. To obtain information about a marriage settlement it is sufficient to submit the name, date of birth and address of one of the spouses. For electronic searches in the database of marriage settlements it is helpful to also provide the national identity number of one of the spouses.

Our office has worked on several U.S. – Norway prenuptial agreements, always collaborating with local counsel in all jurisdictions as appropriate.

Disclaimer: We are admitted to practice only in New York but work as appropriate with lawyers throughout all U.S. states and throughout the world.