Wait until you’re old enough (but not too old). It’s probably no surprise that people who marry when they’re very young are more likely to divorce. For instance, an American who weds at twenty-five is 11 percent less likely to divorce than one who marries at age twenty-four, according to an analysis by University of Utah sociologist Nicholas Wolfinger. But waiting too long has a downside. Past the age of about thirty-two—even after controlling for religion, education, geographic location, and other factors—the odds of divorce increase by 5 percent per year for at least the next decade.17
