Does a non-working housewife have to pay child support?

[hossdave]

Hello,

My wife and I live in Texas. She has a 10-year-old son from a previous relationship whose father has primary custody. Currently she is paying him child support. However, now that we have a child together she wants to quit work and be a stay-at-home mom. My question is this: if she quits her job and has no intention of going back to work, can she get the child support agreement modified so that she no longer owes support? After all, she has no income, and 20% of $0 is still $0.

 

[antrc170]

She may be able to modify the agreement that way, but highly unlikely. The support is based not just on what is actually made, but what could be made. So your wife has already demonstrated that she can make x amount of dollars so the support will likely continue along those lines unless she can demonstrate that her earning potential is less due to something beyond her control. Having another child and quitting work is in her scope of control.

 

[Ohiogal]

Hello,

My wife and I live in Texas. She has a 10-year-old son from a previous relationship whose father has primary custody. Currently she is paying him child support. However, now that we have a child together she wants to quit work and be a stay-at-home mom. My question is this: if she quits her job and has no intention of going back to work, can she get the child support agreement modified so that she no longer owes support? After all, she has no income, and 20% of $0 is still $0.

COOL! You want your wife to be a deadbeat mom! Lovely. She is having a new child so therefore she doesn't have to support her ten year old because he is an old model and no longer needs to eat, drink, or otherwise survive and your wife doesn't feel the need to provide. Good to know she doesn't care about all of her children. What a waste of space. (Your wife, NOT the children). Bear in mind that courts will jail moms that don't pay support just as easily as dads. Arrears will accrue. Mom will lose her driver's license. She will have her assets seized. That debt will never go away.

 

[Just Blue]

Hello,

My wife and I live in Texas. She has a 10-year-old son from a previous relationship whose father has primary custody. Currently she is paying him child support. However, now that we have a child together she wants to quit work and be a stay-at-home mom. My question is this: if she quits her job and has no intention of going back to work, can she get the child support agreement modified so that she no longer owes support? After all, she has no income, and 20% of $0 is still $0.

She is free to be a SAHM. But her LEGAL and FINANCIAL DUTY/OBLIGATION to her child will still exist. If you (as a couple) decide that the benefit to your child is primary, and YOU (as step-father) decide to pay the CURRENT support order...fine. But the ORDER will be paid or your wife will fine herself in HUGE trouble. A voluntary loss of income is not a legal reason to forsake one's financial obligations to one's child.

 

[nextwife]

I wonder what you would have thought if wife had primary custody, dad and his new love had made a new child, and dad had decided he preferred to be a SAHP and not work? That dad and his wife/lover decided dad should stay home with the new baby?

Would you have thought "Oh, that's great that his new kid gets a SAHP, the child in our home no longer needs support, so it's ok for dad to become voluntarilly unemployed due to a subsequent child"? The earlier born child doesn't need support because dad would rather be a SAHP?