child support ?

soontobecapek · August 2009

can you collect child support after a child is 18? basically my 2 sisters mom ditched out 17 years ago... she moved to several different states and changed her name a few times... We finally tracked her down, and she has never paid anything for the girls, taking these kids in caused a lot of financial stress. Problem is 1 of the girls turned 18 in June and the other will be 18 in May.... the younger one will never move out and my mom will have to care for her the rest of her life.... She was addicted to crack (which was hard enough) which caused her to have severe learning delays (she was finally PTd at 12) and she has coloboma that goes back to the optic nerve... so she is basically blind (1 eye, very poor in the other) and can never live on her own... a lady at work says my mom should go for it.... but before getting any legal bills can you do that? I couldn't even imagine what child support on 2 kids for 18 years would be....but i do think my mother deserves something... especially since my sister doesn't qualify for disability (my parents make $5 too much per month but have a ton of bills for this girl and the other who had cancer)

I know this sounds like MUD, unfortunately it isn't

Erika6504 · August 2009

Yeah, I'm pretty sure that you can. Their mom wouldn't owe anything for the kids after they turned 18 (well, possibly the younger one due to on-going medical care) but you can collect for the arrears on the child support.

Wow!

momofolivia · August 2009

does this lady even have any money worth going after? i.e. are the legal bills worth the amount of money that they might receive?

soontobecapek · August 2009

momofolivia:
does this lady even have any money worth going after? i.e. are the legal bills worth the amount of money that they might receive?

she makes 75k a year (not including her husband), so yea, 25% of 75K times 18 (i dont know how much she made each year but this she says she has been doing the last 8 years) is plenty to pay for legal bills