Many Texas twosomes, especially among the millennial and older Gen Z couples, choose a life partner while skipping the marriage ceremony. Reasons vary, but include wanting to save money, avoid family conflict or religious pressure or bypass the paralyzing prospect of a future divorce.

In so doing, they are exchanging one set of well-known risks for an entirely different, lesser-known, but equally challenging, set of potential problems. At its core, the nature and extent of their property rights at the end of the relationship will hinge on the existence or nonexistence of a marriage.