How much to pay for temporary custody of kids?

[FloydPink]

So, wife is moving out on Friday to her mums, a small 2 bed bungalow, so the kids are going to stay with me for 2-3 months full time until she is able to move to her new house and then it's 50/50. I guess as things go, we have an ok relationship, tense of late but arguments are generally nipped in the bud before they blow up and we are getting on ok.

I am trying to work out how much she should pay over this time as I will be responsible for most care and costs, she will probably only have them one night a week. It sounds like a petty thing but we (more me I guess) am trying to be completely open and transparent on things so that if things were to get awkward, we can prove fairness etc. like getting an email from the other when we ask to take kids on holiday etc.. Am sure that if roles were reversed she would be expecting money from me but how to work it out? Just take the food (two hungry teens) they eat, what about money towards general bills (they generate loads of washing lol), what are fair things to contribute to?

Child Maintenance calc claims £544 based on her earnings but it didn't ask for mine. I do earn more than her but the mortgage and paying her off have totally wiped out most disposable income, so that our planned amounts leftover each month are roughly the same.

While they are with you for 6 nights a week, go from the CMS calculator.

In terms of clothing, all the clothes belong to your children, they are teenagers and should be allowed to have clothes wherever they want.

While you and your ex might be moving to 50:50 care, your children don't have half a life to be carved up as suits their parents. Their life is one complete entity and I hate parents who refuse to acknowledge that.

Teens have their own clothes and can be responsible for making sure they transport what they need with them, with basic undies, pjs etc. travelling less. Maybe the teens can do their own washing too (I live in hope…).

Keeping half an eye on stock levels and repatriating an excess isn’t too difficult, especially as you live so close, unless one or other party is playing silly buggers.

Show her what the calculator says and use it as a starting point to agree a figure she should pay you each month.

I am a man and I have custody of our two children. My ex wife pays me zero child maintenance and has never offered to contribute a penny!

You aren’t being petty.

This! A man would have been torn apart by now if he said he was nobbing off to his mums, refusing to have his children more than 1 day a week and wasn’t going to pay maintenance because it’s only a few months so it’s ‘petty’! I mean what the actual fuck??!!! And it 100% would have been pointed out by now that the child maintenance calculator is the legal minimum you have to pay, so he’s an arsehole if he doesn’t offer a fairly substantial amount more!

Don’t be ridiculous.

£544. Keep it simple - that’s what’s recommended.

People saying that you’re petty and just absurd!

My teens tend to buy their own clothes... so yes, echoing pp that you put the DC in charge of how they organise which clothes go where and when.

In terms of allowance/ pocket money for the teens, I guess you should work out whether that's a joint thing with both parents transferring money to the DC, or one of you.

CM is worked out on a yearly basis, not monthly.
Therefore it is the number of nights in a year.
They might be with you for 6/7 for 2 months but then it goes to 50:50 for the next ten months:
I make it 200 nights with you, 165 with your ex.
Not that much difference really and yes it is petty.
Appreciate that there are many ways of looking at it.
If your ex refused, by the time you have put in a claim and got that sorted, it would be 50:50 anyway

I think the reason for it not always being zero CM if 50:50 is because it's generally the view that children should have roughly the same standard of living in both homes. So it generally comes into play if there's a big difference of earnings.

@mewkins, oh I never knew that before. Everyone I know who has 50:50 there is no cm to pay or receive and some have parents where one earns more than the other.

In an ideal world your ex should be contributing. However you need to think about what's most appropriate. E.g. is she is still paying towards the mortgage until everything finalised? Is everything finalised yet? If you're not fully divorced, if you tell her you're going to pursue her for £500 odd a month she might decide not to move out after all and stay put until her new house is ready.

I know a lot of people said if it was a man everyone would be saying go straight to CMS but there is some leeway I think should be afforded because clearly she doesn't WANT to only have kids one overnight a week, she just can't house them yet. Also consider if you take £500 a month until she moves, do you think realistically she can afford that and will that detrimentally affect the kids in terms of what their time with her will be like.

If you can take it for a couple months, you are a much higher earner and giving you money will be detrimental to her setting up your DCs new equal home then absorb as much as possible. If you're on the bones of your ass then different story. What is your relationship like? Are you amicable enough to have a conversation about what she can realistically contribute to you in the gap?

Petty 😂
Regardless of the living situation, absent parents should be paying financial support to whoever has them. Doesn’t matter if the money goes to mum or dad or the length of time.

Id be embarrassed if I had to be asked for money to support my own children.

Personally I don't think you're being petty. You need to do what you feel is fair and right.

I presume if the situation was reversed you would be paying maintenance even in the interim period.

It might be that you agree on a lesser amount whilst you both adjust to your circumstances but in all honesty I think its only right that you still share that financial cost. I know I would absolutely (as the ex wife) want to ensure that I still contributed for my children that would be important to me as its the right thing to do.

Reg clothing, as your children are teenagers their clothes and things are their things for them to move between houses with. I'd leave that to them personally just making sure they have their own space and toiletries etc at your house.

My teen son keeps basic clothes like pyjamas, socks and underwear at each house but transports favourite clothes between his dad and my houses. We all have favourite items of clothes. Buying school uniform for each house will be easiest so there's no transportation consideration.

CMS is based on the paying parent's salary only. It would be a fair amount to ask for and definitely not petty at all.

Clothes tend to drift around. It is irritating. Once a fortnight or so we have a clothes swap. Kids go to Dad’s in school uniform on Friday but then come home in weekend clothes. This is a pain as after a month he has all the school uniform so we do regular swaps. Our dc have coloured coat hangers so I just hang stuff up and send it ready to be worn. School stuff is returned the same way. Stuff like pants/ socks/ basics just stay wherever they are laundered.

I can’t believe some of these responses. I have never in my life seen a woman called petty because she was looking for maintenance. Show her the maintenance calculator and maybe ask for £500.

Both parents are clearly high earners here. To calculate £500 odd a month, that would mean ex earns over £3500 a month after pension, so I'm guessing 45K a year? OP says they are the higher earner, and have the earnings to buy out the ex and get their own mortgage on the FMH. OP also said the ex wife got more because she was starting up again. So I'm guessing to cover that OP probably earns 60Kish or more.

The ex is already losing her home, most of her time with the kids while waiting and is having to start over. I do think there should be an element of compassion there. If she is still contributing to the kids, buying them clothes, uniform, contributing to activities etc, that is already some of what maintenance would cover. If it was long term, yes I'd say she needs to pay the full whack. But considering its short term and she is having to buy everything to furnish her new home, including the kids rooms, decorate etc, that is going to cost a lot.

Think reasonably about how much extra having the kids the extra 2.5 days a week is actually costing you OP. Will it cost you an extra £500 a month on bills/food? I'm not saying she shouldn't pay anything, just look into what is most fair in the given situation.

The double standards never surprise me anymore tbh.

If the sexes were reversed he would be called all the selfish bastards under the sun for not paying whilst saving money for deposit, furniture etc.

Did you finalise the divorce and split assets already or is it still half her house?

I'd be pragmatic at this point. It's very temporary. But if it seems worth asking, and if it's for up to 4 months maybe it is worth doing. (or if the house is still in joint names maybe she should move back in?)

The calculator, as someone else said upthread, is annual. Another possibility is to consider the summer holidays for instance - kids could be full time with her then, and it evens out across the year.

Or just let her know you ran it through cms and would she like to as well to confirm the figures. It's calculated after pension etc so you may find you both come up with slightly different figures but together can agree an appropriate contribution.

Or another idea is that you start splitting most costs now eg all sports clubs, school meals, clothing allowance, transport costs. Then the accommodation costs remain the same for you regardless but you are covering less in terms of meals. They could even eat with her more often during the week possibly? That only leaves a small amount in additional electric and water as your costs.

For me, anyway, it's significant that you both plan to be 50:50 in the near future.

If it was going to end up with you paying her maintenance then fair enough, she pays you now.

As it is, this is a short term (over the annual pattern) change to 50:50. That's why it's worth considering setting everything up for 50:50 as much as possible now and then maybe asking for a smaller contribution towards the additional costs of food, gas, electric - or even asking her to have them over for a few meals. It may work out that way anyway. I imagine they will want to see her more than once a week.

It's not so much what is petty as what will help to establish the best relations going forward. Although the kids are teens, you've got a few more years of working together. Co-parenting amicably is a LOT less stressful that the other option. The two months will by and then you have the long road ahead of you.

2/3 months assumes that things will move seamlessly with the new property. Circumstances change. Sellers pull out, landlords don’t always serve paperwork correctly, people loose their jobs. This can quickly escalate into 12 months.

im going to remember this thread the next time a dad asks how he can reduce maintenance for a month or two whilst he saves for deposit and furniture, and is called all types of selfish arseholes under the sun.

Bet it wouldn’t be so petty if the wife was posting this!

It's not relevant though This is a two month period where otherwise it's 50:50 no maintenance.

It's most similar to posts about extended holidays where parents are usually 50:50. Should the other parent contribute if the parent takes kids for the full six weeks summer holiday for example?

We were 50:50 and I worked out a nominal day rate which we paid each other for holidays.

The maintenance is a bit tricky. I don’t get maintenance from my ex we have roughly 50/50. I have more nights but he does all weekend which is a lot of parenting. If one of us was away we wouldn’t recalculate unless it was long term. It’s fair enough to ask her for the CMS amount but it’s not fair to then ask her to pay 50% of everything on top. You as the resident parent have to pay for school lunches, clothes, activities, pocket money, phone bills. I’d tot it up if I were you. You might find it is quite a lot really. I know with my children if I just had to pay £5- 600 ish a month Id be saving money in comparison to their regular cost.