Hi Lex35,
First off I think you need to talk to the housing authority with regarding getting his name off the house, and even a solicitor, I’m not an expert but that’s what I’m guessing. If you can prove that you’ve been paying the mortgage by yourself this would help your case, I’m not familiar with the affordable housing system but are you entitled to claim TRS? If so are you? If not this can be backdated.
I think you’ll find it hard to prove he gets paid some money into his hand to be honest, you’ll find his dad’s books will show no discrepancies. Also I would say the car is not in his name, if it still is in his name you’ll find when he gets wind that you’re taking him to court for maintenance he will put it in someone else’s name.
I’m not sure why you mention him renting an apartment, he has to live somewhere too, doesn’t he?
Your ex’s father’s house has nothing to do with you, your ex and your child, again not sure why you mentioned this, a judge wont want to know anything about his dad’s affairs, and just to look at it from a wider angle, I’m not sure if his dad ever see’s the child but if you were to stop visitations and your ex’s dad applied for grandparents access, his assets be they money, cars, houses etc do not come into it, i.e. a judge will not take that into account, that’s my experience..
At the moment your ex has no rights to his child, but the courts will decide what visitations he will get, your ex will then probably seek joint guardianship of the child, one of the implications of this is that say for example you want to take the child on a foreign holiday you will need his permission to do so, and the same for him, if a judge gives him guardianship he will need your permission if he wants to take the child abroard.
Since you’ve no records of him paying you any money over the years it’ll be hard for a judge to determine what money is to be backdated, but he will decide on a figure. I’m sure the figure you tell the judge will be different than the one your ex will give? How come you haven’t taken him to court yet? As one of the posters already mentioned you might expect any amount from 50 to I think a max (I’m open to correction) of 150 a week.
The judge can backdate to when the child was born (I’m open to correction on this) , and will more than likely put a ridiculous deadline on when this money has to be paid or else your ex will get locked up for a few days, maybe this will put a smile on your face?
The judge will probably decide that your ex will pay for 50% of the child’s school expenses, doctors bills etc, I’m not sure if this can be backdated though.
Do you get single parents allowance? How much is that (I have no idea)?
Can you claim crèche allowance? Again I have no idea how much that is.
You might find that depending on how much maintenance the judge decides that your ex may in fact give up work altogether as it won’t be worth his while to work, especially if he can get paid into his hand from his dad, its not unheard of, in this case you may find that you wont get the money you were expecting.
Basically this is could develop into a very bitter situation, you feel hard done by financially and he’ll feel hard done by the courts (if he does get jail time for not meeting the deadline for the backdated money, it has happened) all the while the child is growing up in the middle of this….
BountyHunter.