New Jersey may be ridiculed for "Jersey Shore's aggressive driving and talking too fast". However the state is no. 1 when it comes to "happily ever after." Read more.. http://www.divorcemag.com/articles/Divorce_News/newjerseylowestdivorce.html

1. New Jersey Has Lowest Divorce Rates
By April Lopez
New Jersey may be ridiculed for "Jersey Shore's
aggressive driving and talking too fast". However the
state is no. 1 when it comes to "happily ever after."
The Northeast, specifically New Jersey, has the
lowest divorce rates in the US, followed closely by
New York, according to a U.S. Census report.
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Church telethons and country music found in the
Bible Belt, home to Southern hospitality, may brag
about marital bliss, but it also has most divorces and more shotgun weddings.
Deborah Carr, a professor of Sociology at Rutgers University, said people may assume
that people in the Northeast divorce easily because they're less religious, but that's not
the
case.
One reason why New Jerseyans stick together is the cost of divorce. It is just too
expensive
to
head
to
splitsville.
7.2 per 1,000 men and 7.5 per 1,000 women were divorced in the Northeast. The rates
were
10.2
for
men
and
11.1
for
women
in
the
South.
According to the 2009 American Community Survey, New Jersey's rates - the lowest were
6.1
for
men
and
6
for
women.
Jean Grossman is from New Jersey and her story mirrors those statistics.
It was a classic case of culture shock when she first moved to Texas. Grossman
thought she had landed on the moon. She moved in with her husband in Dallas after
getting married. He was pursuing a business opportunity. And she thought they were
going
into
'happily
ever
after.'

2. Grossman, who has since moved to Montclair, where she's a divorce coach, said
nobody in her family had ever gotten divorced. However in 1993, almost a decade later,
she asked her husband to move out. And three years later, they divorced.
Before returning to New Jersey in 2006, Grossman started a relationship with the man
who would become her second husband. She is still living in the South.
Carr said the South sees more divorce for a couple of reasons. First, due to a lower rate
of college attendance, Southerners tend to marry young. Second, because of a trend
tied to religious beliefs, couples don't usually move in together while unwed.
Also,
they
often
frown
upon
birth
control.
In addition, couples in the South are more likely to have non marital pregnancies, which
they carry to term and which then trigger shotgun marriages. There are also more
marriages
in
the
South.
Just
above
Maine,
New
Jersey
had
the
second-lowest
marriage
rates.
While New Jersey's marriage rate is 14.8 for men and 13.3 for women, Georgia's is 22.1
and 20.4, respectively, the Census survey reported. The South's marriage rate is 20.3,
but the West is highest, at 20.7. The single state with the highest marriage rates for both
men and women is Wyoming. Alaska ranks number one, with the highest divorce rate
for
women,
at
16.2,
although
it's
not
a
Southern
state.
In Texas, all the social stuff is pretty much set up around church and the church of
choice
is
Baptist
and
Grossman
was
neither
of
those.
A native of Albany, Georgia, Suzzane Najbrt, isn't so quick to link marriage to church
membership. Najbrt said in all the young women she knows who married young, not a
single one was due to religion. Najbrt got pregnant and married at 18. She was divorced
at
20.
She
thought
it
would
be
all
tweety
birds
and
rainbows.
Bloomfield divorce blogger Joelle Caputa will feature Najbrt's story in an upcoming
book, "Trash the Dress: Stories of Celebrating Divorce in your 20s."
Najbrt, who remarried eight years after divorcing her husband, said most of her
girlfriends left their husbands. Acknowledging that living with a boyfriend was not an
acceptable choice, Najbrt said she was engaged to him anyway, but the pregnancy
sped
up
the
wedding
date.
Najbrt added that another common denominator she saw among friends who married
young
was
a
desire
to
leave
their
hometown.

3. In New Jersey, people tend to get married at an older age while the national median
age for a woman's first marriage
is 26.5 and 28.4 for men.
Matt Eventoff recently celebrated his fifth wedding anniversary with his wife Nicole.
Eventoff's parents were married in their early 20s and they are still together. Matt
appreciates the fact that he waited until he was 33. Eventoff said he was more mature
during marriage. And he was more established in his career. He felt that he was in a
position
where
he
could
give
more
of
himself.
Central New Jersey Successful Divorce Support Group, headed by Joseph DiPietro,
has more than 800 members. The group aims to help divorcees start over at any age,
said
DiPietro.
Rick Verbanas, a member, lived in Atlanta for several years before his wife filed for
divorce. To be near his two children, he moved to Somerville months later and won joint
custody.
Verbanas is now an organizer for the Central Jersey Single Parents Meetup Group. He
sees
why
New
Jerseyans
may
not
find
divorce
practical.
He said he pays $500 more monthly to rent half a house than he paid for a mortgage on
a
four-bedroom
house
in
Atlanta.
He added the thousands of dollars a month that are going into having two separate
locations versus one certainly has to play into peoples' decisions.
Family law attorneys said choosing where to file for divorce can directly relate to the
cost of living in that state.