Divorce Support Forums: cheap and decent lawyer

They can AGREE on a different amount, but that would require the mother to trust your brother to provide extras more than he's apparently willing to trust her.

Getting a lawyer involved, cheap or otherwise, might help him understand WHY he needs to pay the full amount. But it certainly won't guarantee anywhere near saving a few bucks a month on support... if the ex does not agree to the reduced support amount, then your brother is out of luck. ALL she has to do is take her case to court and she'll get the guideline amount.

And I have to ask, what is the difference between the guideline amount and the amount he WANTS to pay? If it's a few $$ a month, then it's not worht the price of a CHEAP lawyer... if it's more than that, then he's clearly not wanting to give his ex enough money to actually raise those kids... he's just wanting to give her toy money and let her fend for herself on the real costs of raising a kid...

He's better off trying to get her to agree to the lesser amount.

But what is the difference in the amounts? Are they sure they used teh formula correctly? And has he REALLY considered the extra cost of raising the kids, or is he just thinking his $$ is supposed to go for buying toys & clothing for the kids? He needs to try to get his thinking more in line with what's best for the kids, and that might very well be to trust his ex with the money.

If he can't trust her with the money that's supposed to be used to raise the kids, why in the WORLD is he trusting her with the kids, by the way?

It's too much for me to go into, thoroughly, right now, but if you look at th eformula, you'll KNOW that there's no way this covers the amount of extra that the custodial parent has to pay to raise the kid... extra food... extra room... extra clothing... extra sheets... extra gas for the car to drive the kid around... extra electric bill to run the playstation & such... extra for the cable... the extra price of a ticket or larger room EVERY time you travel... the babysitter EVERY time you have business or other thins hat the child can't accompany you on... the larger car needed to transport the kids & all their equipment... ALL the extras that the parent wouldn't get if they were living alone add up to a WHOLE lot more than just what the NCP THINKS the support should go to. The numbers in the formula barely pay for the extra clothing & food... and for a NCP to expect their support to go to pay for stuff like baseballs & toys & such.

I was a single woman, divorced for a decade, when I met my husband, who has teens. I lived in a 2 bedroom condo with my nice furniture & minimum TV & stereo, but no playstations or enhanced cable. I had one phone & a computer with just what I needed for work installed. No need for a super-computer to run gaming programs. I'd purchased a game boy for myself a few years ago to play at airports, but never figured out how to use it. I had a nice, fun lifestyle. It was easy. I kept things clean without a whole lot of cleaning time or products.

NOW I'm married. He couldn't just move into my nice little condo, we needed 2 extra bedrooms for the kids. The kids couldn't live with the minimal TV. We HAD to have extra Discovery & Disney & such... we needed a playstation & all the games associated with. We cannot cook for ourselves every night. Some nights things are so hectic that we MUST use fast food options. And I've learned names like Hollister & American Eagle, which are more expensive than what I'd get for myself... at least at that quality. I expect more from clothing if I pay that much! Oh, and my little 2 seater car that was paid off had to go away & I"m now driving an SUV.

A kid can hear from Dad that he pays $800 a month for support, and the kid will get all annoyed at Mom for not buying $800 worth of toys & clothing for them every month. This is simply NOT what support is for! That $800 goes to getting a 2 bedroom house rather than a 1 bedroom condo... it goes to paying for the A/C all summer during the day while the kid is home & Mom is working ... it goes to paying for the daycare & summer camp & the clothing that the kid grows out of teh day after it's purchased...

Whenever a NCP starts talking about how they don't trust the mother to use the support for what THEY think support should be for, it drives me CRAZY!!! They don't get it that if THEY were the CPs, THEY would have a WHOLE LOT MORE expenses than they do now, without kids in the house... and the idea that somehoe THEY can control what the support is spent on is ... well, entirely inappropriate.

Moms who get the idea that keeping the kids will be a financial advantage to them are sadly istaken. They usually end up living a much lower lifestyle than they could have lived if they'd not had the kids in the house, because the price of raising kids is a WHOLE lot more than teh price of the toys & diapers. It's been a long time since they considered it, but the smaller lifestyle is really NICE. It's just not very possible when you've got kids happening in your house.

Unless there is something really out of line about the guideline support amount, your brother needs to re-think his position on this.