Child Support Guidelines

 Are your expenditures for your children “average?” Be careful to make sure that all of your children’s expenses are included in child support. Most parents going through the divorce process are aware that New Jersey has guidelines to assist courts in determining support for children. But many do not know what exactly the guidelines are supposed to cover and whether their particular situation warrants a deviation. 

 Judges are required to calculate the child support guidelines in all cases. In cases where the combined net income of both parents is $187,200 or under, the amount under the guidelines will be applied. In cases in which the combined income is in excess of $187,200 net per year, the court is to use the guideline amount and then supplement that amount, based on a variety of factors. The guideline amount is a rebuttable presumption which means that the amount that is calculated is deemed to be the appropriate amount of child support unless a party can demonstrate that the amount is not. The Guidelines specifically tell us that the awards are based on an average of the percentage of income spent on children by a large number of families in a variety of socioeconomic situations.Continue Reading Making sure Child Support covers actual Needs

Earlier today I posted ablog entry on the unreported Appellate Division decision in Holden v, Holden decided on October 28, 2010.  In that piece, I discussed how the court based support on the father’s gross income because of his history of not paying taxes.  The case was interesting for other reasons, as well. 

In this case, the parties net income exceeded the maximum net incomes under the Child Support Guidelines.  The trial court entered a somewhat arbitrary award with regard to past and prospective child support which did not take into account the children’s actual needs.  This, in part, was brought on by the fact that the parties did not present all of the relevant information regarding the children’s needs (each had custody of one child).  The father appealed on this ground.

In reversing, the Appellate Division agreed with the father, restating the law as follows:

It is undisputed that where family income exceeds the maximum amount under the guidelines, the court has discretion to calculate child support using the maximum support under the guidelines and "combin[e] that preliminary figure with a
supplemental award subject to the provisions of N.J.S.A. 2A:34-23a . . . ." Pascale v. Pascale, 140 N.J. 583, 595 (l995).

Continue Reading When Income is Over the Limit for Guidelines, A Court Cannot Extroplate from The Guidelines

I suspect that anyone that read my last blog might think that I am against shared custody or that I believe it to be impossible.  That is not the case.  Rather, my point in that post was to address possibly bad faith requests for joint custody by those people who have historically neither spent a lot of time with the children nor did much of the actual parenting.

But shared parenting time is not an impossibility.  Supposedly, it requires parents who have the ability to communicate and cooperate.  That said, I have seen parents who cannot have a civil word with each other effectively co-parent. 

Shared parenting, by New Jersey standards, is anything between 28% (104 overnights) and 50% of the overnights with the children.  Curiously, these definitions actually stem from the child support guidelines.  When the newest iteration of the Guidelines came into being in 1997 or 1998, they had two different worksheets – a sole parenting worksheet and a shared parenting worksheet (104 overnights and over).  While non-custodial parents now got child support reductions with each overnight, the credit was greater using a shared parenting worksheet. As a result of the new guidelines, negotiations over additional overnights began, in many cases for obvious reasons.Continue Reading Shared Custody – It is a Possibility

One of the most common questions people ask when settling their divorce matter is, how do we figure out what the child support payment is going to be?  Well, as set forth in one of our recent blog posts found here, Child Support Guidelines in New Jersey control where parties combined net after tax income is less than approximately $185,000.  As also set forth in that prior entry, while a custodial parent cannot bargain away their right to child support and there generally cannot be an agreement to pay less than that set forth in the Guidelines, there may be an enforceable agreement to pay more.  Apparently, an agreement to pay more may hold true even where the number agreed upon was inadvertently higher than required.

In resolving child support, it is critical for the settling parties to set forth in the Marital Settlement Agreement the basis for how child support was reached – such as whether support was calculated pursuant to the Guidelines, as well as attach to the Agreement the Child Support Guidelines worksheet itself.  This will clarify whether the child support number set forth in the Agreement was part of an overall settlement of the parties’ parenting and financial issues or, by contrast, a unilateral or mutual mistake of the parties.

The perils of not following these basic steps can be costly, as recently addressed by the Appellate Division in Haskoor v. Haskoor.  There, the parties entered into a Marital Settlement Agreement resolving their custody and financial issues.  A weekly child support amount was included, as well as terms addressing the husband’s parenting time.  Less than 2 years after following the divorce, the wife sought to reduce the husband’s parenting time while increasing his child support obligation.  In responding, the husband indicated that it was at that time that he first realized that the "sole parenting worksheet" rather than the "shared parenting worksheet" had been used to calculate child support in the settlement agreement, thereby obligating him to pay a higher level of child support.  The husband also argued that the sole parenting worksheet applied used the wrong amount of alimony.   Continue Reading Child Support Guidelines – Attach the Worksheet

On April 13, 2009, the Appellate Division issued a decision in the case of Cadavid v. Nieto which dealt in large part with the issue of child support in high income cases. To view the full text of the case, click here. 

We have previously blogged on this topic.  To view links to those prior posts, click here , here, and here.

In the Cadivad matter, the father appealed an Order requiring him to pay almost $9000 per month in child support.  Both parties were  immigrants from Colombia. The father is the successful founder and president of eight schools that teach English as a second language located in New Jersey, New York, Florida, and Canada. He also owns interests in several commercial properties in New Jersey and Florida as well as 4 homes.  In a June 2007 loan application, the father valued his various business interests at $8 million and the fair market value of his real estate holdings at $5.2 million. The trial judge calculated the father’s annual income for purposes of child support at approximately $2 million annually.

On the other hand, the mother was a full time homemaker but had an associates degree from Bergen County Community College.

The parties had 3 children under age 10 at the time of the proceedings.Continue Reading ANOTHER INTERESTING DECISION REGARDING CHILD SUPPORT IN HIGH INCOME SITUATIONS

A long standing problem for matrimonial attorneys has been the calculation of child support in situations in which two parents have equal physical custody of children. The Court Rules tell us that when the combined net income of the two parents is $187,200 or below, the Guidelines must be utilized as a rebuttable presumption for child support. Practice tells us that the Guidelines are rarely deviated from in this income category.

 The Child Support Guidelines are predicated on the supposition that there are three types of expenditures that parents make for or on behalf of their children.. The first is fixed expenses (representing 38% of the child support amount) are those expenses incurred even when the child is not residing with the parent. Examples of this include housing-related expenses, such as mortgage or rent, utilities, household furnishings and household care items. The second is variable expenses (representing 37% of the child support amount). Variable expenses are incurred only when the child is with the parent. This category includes items such as transportation and food. Finally, controlled expenses (representing 25% of the child support amount) are those expenses which include items like clothing, personal care, entertainment and other miscellaneous items.

The Guidelines presume that each parent has fixed and variable expenses on behalf of the child. On the other hand, the Guidelines also presume that controlled expenses are ONLY incurred by the parent who is designated the “Parent of Primary Residence.”  However, in a true joint custody scenario, neither parent is the Parent Primary Residence and both have controlled expenses. The calculation of child support in these cases has been problematic for many years and there has been little consistency as to the child support awards in these cases. On April 13, 2009, a published trial court decision was handed down in which there is a specific formula to determine child support.

Continue Reading FINALLY! A child support formula for joint physical custody cases!