Please Help !! ( NJ Dad )

[Jaxx]

Hello,

I am in the beginning stages of mediation for divorce. Me and my wife are very amicable and have basically breezed through the process thus far as far as custody and assests. NOW, when the topic of child support comes up there is a stall. We have two children, age 3 and 5 months. We both make similiar money, I am about $20 g on her salary. Now I cosulted with an attorney before the mediation and he indicated I was lookin at 800 per month which is doable for me. Now, she said her lawyer during her consultation and the mediator also told her that day care is not included in child support. I told her I was not goin to pay her 800 per month on top of day care which would be split. I know it doesent cost 800 per month , let alone 500 per month to raise both of my children. So can anyone help me out with this dilemma. I dont mind paying support, I just dont want to be dragged through the coals. If I am not happy with the amount requested then we may go the lawyer route which will be longer and definatley more expensive and then I am sure we wont be so amicable anymore. So any advise if Day care is included in child support or what not. Thanks for any help

[ocean]

Hi,
Daycare is not included in child support. Just like out of pocket medical expenses and anything else you agree with. You can always come up with your own numbers but if she goes to court with it, it will be by the numbers only and you will have to pay a pro-rated share of daycare costs. See if you can talk to her and come up with a solution until they are school age and then agree that you will go back and refigure it out. (otherwise you are out of luck).

[joni]

No, it's not included in support.  So you have two choices, 1) try to compromise the support/child care amounts with her and keep it away from the family court to decide (you'll be their slave forever) or 2) concede to court recommendations.

Even if your made the exact same wage and your Ex has physical custody, even if she made more money than you, you would still have to pay child support/child care.  Even if you had 50/50 physical custody and you make $20g more a year, you could still have to pay childsupport to bring the children up to the same standard of care at her home that they have in yours.

I will be honest with you, you're fighting a losing battle, the law is against you.  If you start to be difficult with her, you will pay more with atty fees and you probably will lose the ground you made to date with the custody and assets.  You'll sour your Ex and you'll lose everything, trust me on that.

Keep the support/child care amounts out of the court.  Work out an arrangement to assure you're paying market value for this service (we went thru the court and are paying twice market value for a child being watched by the grandmother she lives with).  Before you decide $800 is too much, find out what the market value is and mediate based on that.

PUt in a clause that you have right of first refusal to watch your children.  If you remarry, then your new wife can watch your children and poof, child care goes away.

Plan for the future, get as much visitation as you can, upwards of 50/50 if you have the time for your children.

[POC]

Jaxx,

I'm a little confused about the financial status about your case.. First, you say you make about equal income. Then, it appears as if you make about $20 g more than her. I'm assuming the "about equal" is relative, since you both make very good incomes. In otherwords, I guess there is not a whole lot of difference between $160,000 per year and $180,000. But, the difference between even $60,000 and $80,000 is still substantial, as $80,000 is still 33% more than $60,000.

Regardless of your acutal incomes, to the best of my recollection, NJ apportions about as much CS money for kids' needs at NCP homes as any other state in the country. At last glance, it took into account both fixed and variable costs at each home, although not in exact proportions to actual circumstances.

Bottom line, if your kids will spend a great amount of time with (which they should), I question the $800 / mo. figure, unless you are in the extreme upper income levels.

Now for the basis of NJ's guidelines. As you are probably already aware, NJ is an income shares state. You will find in Appendix IX-A of NJ's guidelines that the economic basis of the guidelines is the pooled method of child costs. These are called the Betson-Rothbarth tables. For interesting reading about this visit - http://www.guidelineeconomics.com/fightcase/incomeshares.htm

NJ's law provides that the guidelines should not be applied if it can be shown that it would be inappropriate in that particular case. Here are two points that can be made to the court in that regard:

1) The guidelines are based upon two-parent intact family situations. Not only are the guidelines never applied to those situations, the very situations in which the guidelines are applied were specifically excluded from any type of child costs estimates. It is like testing only White Anglo-Saxons to find a cure for Sickle-Cell Anemia.

2) The Betson-Rothbarth method bases child support upon the marginal parental consupmtion of alcohol and tobacco. Obviously, neither apply if neither your wife or you drink or smoke. But, even if both of you do, it can not be considered in the best interst of your child to restore the pre-child consumption rates of those items when the child is in the home.

How is that?

[flewwellin]

daycare is included in child support in NC i don't know about NJ so isn't health insurance.  What's going on there.  Our court order says they ex wife is responsible for both daycare and health insurance.

[POC]

Child care and health insurance are not included in NJ's guideines. These are "add on" items.

[Mediator]

I'm not familiar with NJ but in CO the answer is that CS is develeped via a strict formula that can be deviated from only in very limited situations.  Child care is calculated and child care costs are included.  The child care expense is credited to the parent who is paying for it out of pocket.  In your case if your CS is $800 this amount would be reduced by the amount of child care expense you pay for.  In addition the child care cost must be reasonable for the market you are in.

If you both have joint decision making authority than whether to have your child in child care is up to both of you.  Once it is decided to go wtih child care than it is treated as an expense.

[Mediator]

I glad you had a good experience with mediation.  Either you will both come to complete agreement on this issue and stipulate it to the court or you can stipulate to the rest of your agreement and ask the court to decide on this issue alone which will still save you much frustration and expense.

Here is a link to the NJ child support guidelines.

http://www.judiciary.state.nj.us/csguide/

[POC]

The NJ guidelines clearly state that child care is above the guidelne amount, not subtracted from. Furthermore, when the primary parent enrolls the child in the day care of her choice, due to "inability of parents to come to an agreement" the judge will subsequently rule that the non-residential parent pay his proprotionate share of the expense. In essence, as long as the primary parent is not doing something bizaare, they are pretty much free to unilaterally make the parenting decisions.