Cohabitation agreements are usually entered into when:
#*the relationship is expected to be a long one,#*one or both parties have a substantial amount of property going into the relationship,#*one or both parties have significant debts going into the relationship,#*one of the parties has significantly more income than the other,#*one or both parties expect to acquire property during the relationship from, for example, a business, an inheritance, a court award, a gift, or employment income,#*one or both parties are bringing a child into the relationship, or#*the parties expect that spousal support may be an issue if the relationship ends.
Cohabitation agreements are generally not appropriate when:
#*the couple are young,#*neither party has significant property or debt going into the relationship,#*neither party is bringing any children into the relationship, and no children are expected right away, and#*both parties are working out of the home and expect to continue working out of the home.
On top of these considerations, the ''[[Family Law Act]]'' also says that an agreement made before the parties have separated cannot deal with:
#*parental responsibilities and parenting time, or#*child support.
Cohabitation agreements can also be useful to set rules for how the parties will manage things during the relationship, although this type of cohabitation agreement is fairly rare. When a cohabitation agreement is needed to deal with those issues, the parties' financial positions and plans for the future may not be as important.