Child support and joint physical custody
So I was wondering if any of you have any experience with this.....right now we love 2.5hrs away from SS's which means we get the EOW and two non consecutive weeks in the summer. BM is also gracious enough to allow for extra time every now and then.
We will have the opportunity to move with a half hour away from the boys within the next year ( job related for SO) and our hope is to go back to court for more time, hopefully 50/50 physical custody. We understand it will be a fight and more than likely will not be awarded 50/50 but hopefully will get more time regardless.
In the even that we do get 50/50, can we request a change in CS due to the fact that we now pay for 1/2 thier living expenses in our home? We will be buying a bigger home so they have their own room, and we would have at least 1/2 as many overnights throughout the year as BM.
Currently BM "works" (VERY part time) and FDH pays a good bit of CS and pays for their medical insurance. He would continue to cover their medical, and til the time we would move BM should be done with school and working a real job.....well, she would have the capability however I don't expect her to actually go to work full time when she doesn't "have to" considering all her bills plus some are paid by CS, food stamps and her step dad.
Any advice would be appreciated. Thanks!
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In our state, child support
In our state, child support is calculated from both household incomes and noncustodial parents get credits for overnights. So if the amount of overnight stays increase then your DH may very well get a credit for that. Not really sure how much it will decrease it though. In my state it doesn't decrease it a whole lot, but any amount helps.
I would add too, that he will
I would add too, that he will get a credit for paying their insurance, if he isn't already. Some judges will say that since you have 50/50 no child support awarded to either party. However, some judges will still make the parent making the most money pay child support to the other party.
Based on the calculators
Based on the calculators available that I used if she goes back to work making anything over $10/hr (which what she is going to school for it would be very likely she would make more than that, if she goes back to work) his support would drop like $100. He will still be making more than her, and he does receive a credit for the insurance.
Also she claims the kids every year on income tax....but of course that's a separate issue we would have to bring up if we were awarded joint.
I'm not against him paying support, I just don't feel it's fair for him to have to pay so much if we have the kids 1/2 the time but of course nothing in step land is fair. Lol.
Exactly. If I were to go back
Exactly. If I were to go back to court, if I was in this situation anyway, I would go for 50/50. If that didn't work I would go for joint legal and joint physical custody and try to get as many overnights as possible. I would also petition to the court to have the right to claim the kids on income tax every other year. Hell if ya'll have them a lot, are paying support, are paying insurance it's only right that you get to claim some of that money at the end of the year.
When my husband didn't have custody (he does now) he would get SD Friday after school and take her back to school Monday morning. He would then get her every Wednesday after school until Thursday morning. He would get her every other 2 weeks the whole Summer and they would split holidays throughout the year. We also paid insurance for my SD. In the end we got credit for all the overnights and the insurance and he still ended up paying $500 a month even though they pretty much made the same amount of money. If he didn't have the overnights on Wednesdays the amount of support would of been $550 I believe. So like I said, it doesn't decrease the amount a whole lot but anything helps.
My DH has 50/50 and still
My DH has 50/50 and still pays child support and 50% of dr bills and we split school expenses
I can tell you too that our
I can tell you too that our court jurisdiction is completely biased because after my DH got custody, BM was SUPPOSE to have the same custody that my DH had, that I explained above. When my DH got custody and they calculated the support for her to pay, she was only ordered to pay my DH $215 a month yet when he was paying in the exact same circumstance he was to pay $500. They used the exact same income they inputted on the previous child support order my DH was paying.
The only thing that changed
The only thing that changed in the custody order after he got custody was that instead of him being able to claim the child every other year, he is now able to claim her every year.
FDH doesn't want to claim all
FDH doesn't want to claim all the boys. He would simply like to be able to claim one, of three. Just so he doesn't end up paying in. He got lucky last year and ended up somehow with a $50 refund (lol). BM is money hungry but masks it as "what's best for the kids". She doesn't pay any daycare expenses....or household bills....but I'm sure you all know that story.
Idk. I just don't understand how a woman could expect for a man to take care of her....but then I look at where she comes from and it all makes sense. Her mother doesn't and has never worked....step dad pays for it all....and they all, including step sons, expect it.
That's what we have talked
That's what we have talked about, an EOW from Friday after school-Monday morning where we take them. Then a wed night to Friday before the weekend that isn't ours. I see that as fair. That's the arrangement I had with BD6s dad many years ago until he decided he couldn't be bothered anymore....at that time when he was following the agreement and had her 1/2 the time I didn't push CS......but I'm not like every other BM and her dad is a POS drug user now so the scenario doesn't really apply. Lol.
Sometimes BM seems to welcome her time away from the kids then other times she is very clingy, calling, texting ect and picking fights with FDH about time. She's all over the place and we never really know how she's gonna react to anything.
We whole heatedly expect for her to fight the 50/50 physical soley because of the $ and because then she can't go telling everyone what a dead beat he is( but he's not, we never give up time, just rearrange days if needed to suit his work schedule or her plans), he already has joint legal.
She will likely bring up a whole bunch of factors stating it's not in the boys best interest blah blah blah but nothing will change for them aside from being with their father more often, how is that not in their best interest? They can be with dad instead of basically living with gma and stepgdad. (She rarely ever has the kids even on her time).
I've told him that since he
I've told him that since he does provide more that 1/2 of their support (considering the fact that she gets more from his CA than she does with her 8-10 hrs a week job) that he can claim them without her signing off on it. The burden then falls on her to prove she makes more than what he pays in CS. Which she doesn't.
That is a good point that honestly I did not take into consideration, if financially we would be able to still pay support and run our home having 5 kids and two adults in it. We don't want to take the boys from their mother, but FDH does want to be able to raise his children also, be. Part of them growing up. They are 5-9. My two are 6&12.
Thank you for the pa specific info. I didn't know it wasn't just equal when you had 50-50 custody. I think that's completely ridiculous that if we had them half the time and she had them half the time that he would only get a 20% reduction.
I guess FDH and I will have to discuss it more at length with this new info. But then there's the problem of how do I approach that without sounding like "we can't afford to have more time with your kids because you'll still be paying support".....especially since my kids are home 100% of the time and I don't rwceive any support for them.
Not only is FDH supportig his ex's home but he's also contributing for my girls as well. (I work and bring in more than he does after he pays out his support and medical) it would be nice if my bios fathers were held accountable and then CS would even itself out in the end.
Oh in a perfect world I guess.