Ensuring the fair support for your child
In Washington, a parent is obligated to provide for the care and support of his or her child. No matter if you are the custodial parent who receives the support or the parent who pays support, our family law team will help you ensure that the child support award is fair and provides for all of their needs.
Let our attorneys be your advocates whether you are trying to establish or modify support, collect back support, or defend against collection.
What factors do courts use when calculating child support?
In Washington, child support can be established by the court or through an administrative process. Both parents can come to their own arrangement outside of court and ask for approval from a judge. All support orders must be based on the support schedule created by the Washington legislature.
Under the schedule, the support obligation a parent has will depend heavily on his or her net income, or the amount of money that remains after deducting any amounts that must be paid for taxes and other required expenses. The deductions also include Social Security and Medicare, mandatory union dues, mandatory pension contributions and state industrial insurance.
Some of the factors that play a role in the formula used for calculating child support include each parent's income, daycare expenses, health insurance, received Social Security benefits, and living arrangements. The parents pay their proportional share of the support based upon their proportionate share of their combined net income.
Here is a quick child support calculator that can give you an estimate of how much child support you can expect to be assigned in your case. There are a number of factors to consider when determining the amount of child support, and the calculator should only be used as a rough estimate.
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At Sunset Family Law, our sole focus is family law cases such as child support because we care about helping clients through the challenges of divorce and related issues so they can move on with their lives and enjoy the future that awaits them. Please reach out to schedule an initial consultation—contact us at [email protected] if you are ready to reduce the stress and anxiety of the legal process.