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In Need of Advice...(kind of long...sorry!)

New Stepmom's picture

Hi everyone! It has been SUCH a long time since I have posted - I see lots of new names out there! Hope everyone is doing well! Life has been pretty hectic the past six months or so...work has been insanely busy and I have had zero time to keep up with what's going on here. Things are starting to calm down, at least for a second, which works out well because I have a major issue that I need advice on - I am hoping you guys can help with some reassuring words or suggestions!

When DH & BM split, it was back in 2004 - at the time, SD's were 4 and 7. In their separation agreement, DH agreed to foot the bill for day care expense and extracurriculur activities in lieu of paying a monthly set amount. He has them almost half the month (usually about 12-14 days a month). At the time, this agreement worked and to be honest, he probably paid more than what he should have. They were involved in your normal activities, nothing too extreme. Well as the girls have gotten older, they have developed a keen interest in soccer - mostly driven by their mom & her husband pushing them as hard as they possibly can. Both girls play in "select" and "travel" soccer teams and they are very, very pricey. Add on all the summer camps and soccer camps and other activites through the school year, it really adds up. So DH got fed up with the fact that BM assumes he is just an open checkbook and started refusing to pay for some of the activities. He mainly did this because he thought they were involved in enough already and needed to focus more on their school work, as well as have time at home to just be normal kids. BM was pissed that DH wasn't just giving into her every whim and got an attorney. We then got our own attorney and all decided it would be better if we determined by the state guidelines what DH was entitled to pay, let him pay that monthly to BM and she could do with it what she pleased.

Now here is the sticky part. My husband is a farmer, therefore he does not have a normal salary like most people. His tax information does not reflect a normal salary. The way farming usually works, is they take out an operating loan at the beginning of the year and live off of that loan all year. They take care of the crops, pay their employees, buy equipment and then pay personal bills. Then come autumn, when it is time to start harvesting, that is when the farmers make their money back. Once harvesting is over, they take all of their earnings and pay off that operating loan and whatever is left over is considered their annual income. Well in our state, farming has been really bad the past couple of years, so my husband's tax returns actually reflect a loss - he was in the negative. This makes it very difficult to determine what exactly he should be giving BM each month.

So last week, we got a letter from BM's attorney, stating they wanted to see 3 years worth of all checking accounts (personal & business), savings accounts, check stubs, tax returns, stocks, mutual funds, personal loans, business loans, credit card bills, car loans - anything that has DH's name on it. Our lawyer had already told us that they would probably review his main checking account (which is used to pay business & personal expenses) and count anything paid towards personal expense towards income. For example, say we have a $1000 house payment, and there were 12 payments made out of that account in the past year, that would be $12,000 worth of income and so on. So that sounded fair, but when we got the letter from BM's lawyer asking to see EVERYTHING...that just blew me away! It literally makes me sick to my stomach to think of BM and her husband sitting in a lawyer's office going through ALL of our personal information - seeing every dime we have or every bill we owe - not to mention they'll also know how much money I make since it's on our tax returns! I realize my husband's line of work puts us in this predicament, but this is a violation of our privacy to a certain degree. I think the lawyers should meet, go over the material together and then give BM a summary, but I have no idea if it will work out like that. We have a meeting with our lawyer on the 25th of this month, so we will have to hand over all of our info at that time.

I know this is a weird situation...has anyone ever had any experience dealing with a scenario like this? Have any advice for me?

Comments

TheSaneOne's picture

Your atty can respond to the dicovery request that it is overly broad and burdensome and not relevant and the other atty ould then file a Motion to Compel if they wanted to, at that point the judge decides what is relevant.

ColorMeGone2's picture

You are not a party to this action, so you can insist that YOUR personal information not be given out to the BM. Sometimes you can request that the info be given to the judge, who would then determine what counts and what doesn't. That way, YOUR privacy is protected.

♥ Georgia ♥

"Good men don't just happen. They have to be created by us women." (from ROSEANNE)

stepwitch's picture

BM's are usually like vampires, they will suck the blood right out of you. Soccer or any sport is an extra and not a need. Keep that in mind. My daughter would do everything if she could, cheerleading, piano, gymnastics, girlscouts, soccer, volleyball, ect. But this last year she could only choose one (financial reasons). Have a son guitar, boyscouts, etc. it all adds up quickly. I would if i could allow them to do it all, but damn, I just can't. Sad

Stepwitch
Thank you Disney for portraying a positive image on all stepmothers!!!!

smurfy1smile's picture

I agree with the other posts. I would not want BM to know my income and stuff like that. I am guessing DH doesn't have stocks and bonds. Credit cards info - that's a bit touchy. Plus its no ones busiess whats on your credit cards. In my state, we only have to present tax returns and W-2's but if they are self employed they have to submit statements of reciepts and expenses. I think if your imcome is on the returns you can black them out along with your social security number and other privte info on the returns.

Good luck!

Gmama's picture

my husbands stuff was a real mess to.to make a long story short.somehow the county (on his)final court order ) had him listed as a sloe owner of his business, assumed he was hiding money, and just went a head and listed him at making 80,000 a year income.
yes it made me sick to see a final support order set at $800.00 a month for one child. but yet we laughed because hes not even close to that income. he submitted W-2 for three years,ect.the thing that got everything all mixed up was ther was a missunderstanding the county asked for K-1 documents wich he submitted but really they were looking for corp. tax returns wich his atourney should of realized they are not the same documents. anyways we had to hire an atourney to appeal this mess and fix the old atourneys screw up. were still waiting to hear if the appeal is even going threw. i'm not sure if this is much help. but from here on out you might want to start putting as much of your personal financial stuff in your name only.
thats what we did.

Gmama's picture

sorry to bother you again, but i would also ask your lawyer if you HAVE to submit all this stuff? just because shes asking to see it doesn't nessarily mean she's intitled to it? i would think it would be up to the JUDGE to request this info? be careful i'm the kind of person who doesn't do things until i'm told by a hire power to do it. My DH's EX wanted to have him send HER HIS tax info. every year straight to her in the mail, and his atourney wrote down that it's being handeled threw the county and they are the only ones who can request it. of coarse they'll send that to her BUT it's them in control of everything NOT HER so ask alot of questions and even if you have to open up new accounts in your name only. the less he has the better it looks. but i'm not sure what the laws are in your state?
in MN they passed a new law that goes by both the BIO.Parents income not the step parents???

Tired2's picture

Who in the hell does she think she is? I'm in agreement that you should ask your attorney what is absolutely the minimal that you must show them and that's all they would get. Also, I'm not sure what state you are in but in NC they have a spreadsheet on the web that you can calculate support. They use both of the bio parent's income and don't count the step-parents at all. The CSE office asked for my income but I never gave it to them and nothing was ever said. In GA however they just take a certain percentage of the NCP income so the CP doesn't have to show anything.

Now, having said that....my husband was a little more than pissed at his ex one night and got on the internet searching for ways he could legally make her life as miserable as she makes his. He found a website that had all kinds of things on there. For example, you can take her to court, put her on the stand and ask her personal questions such as "When was the last time you had sex while the child was at home?" She HAS to answer this in front of the entire court room...embarrassing to say the least but perfectly legal. Please note that this will probably get you no where and you will have to represent yourself to keep it cheap BUT it can be done. I would think if more NCP did this the crazy shit from BM's would stop...or at least slow down.

Make sure you ask that she not see any financial documents that you send over as it's an invasion of your privacy....and only send the MINIMUM of documentation over to her attorney or judge.

Good luck with this....keep us posted.

New Stepmom's picture

I'm actually in NC too. When we first met with our attorney a while back, we did the whole spreadsheet thing and came to an idea of what he will have to pay. What we did is went through his main checking account and pulled out any money that was paid towards a personal expense for a total of one year and added it all up. The final figure is what we assumed was roughly his annual income and we used that in the spreadsheet. So we thought that we would have to do this same thing for BM's attorney, but as you see, they're asking for WAAAAAAY more than what we originally worked with when trying to come up with it ourselves. DH does have a lot of other accounts, but he does not have any activity on them - it's mainly just savings accounts that he has had for years. And he has stocks, but that is his retirement that he started himself...since he is self-employed, he doesn't have a regular 401K.

I think that if we end up being required to show all of this information, then the same should be required of her.

New Stepmom's picture

After reading your posts, you're all exactly right - why should we gather all the info and send it over just because they are asking for it? Much less THREE years worth! Are we entitled to see three years worth of her financial history?? I doubt it...not that I even want to...I could care less what her financial situation is - but that's the type of person she is. She is extremely jealous and because she can't afford to live like we do, she thinks she is entitled to more money. DH takes care of his kids in every way possible, especially monetarily, so as long as they're being taken care of, it doesn't matter what we have or how we can afford it, you know? I work hard for everything I own, but I think she just assumes DH pays for it all or something. Luckily, all of my checking/savings/CD, etc are only in my name, so she will never see any of that.

Arghh!!! This is so stressful! Thanks for all of your comments!