hi everyone i am a wisconsin
lawyer and today i'm going to talk to you about how to avoid child support my name is kyle kaufman i am a lawyer at
hkklawoffices.com in this video i'm going to answer the question of how do i avoid child
support i get that question a lot as an attorney who deals with divorces and child support cases
and it really comes down to four things i call those the four c's okay so let's go through those
the first c is to consult it's free consult with a lawyer someone like me to go in and get more
educated on what child support is and how it might impact you both as the pay or the person who's
going to pay it and the payee the person who might receive it you might have some knowledge already
on those issues but you really want to go in and learn from a lawyer and listen to what that lawyer
has to say about what child support is how a court might arrive at determining that and get some
basic facts about how child support is calculated all right now with that basis of knowledge right
there you'll be able to go back and enter into the next c okay the next c i call communication
right communicate with your soon-to-be ex if you're going through a divorce or if you're
already split up and you're reviewing support or you're never married to that person but
you have a child together we call those post-judgment child support review actions
okay you want to communicate with that person and communication is not just talking right
sometimes it's just listening asking questions so you'd want to go to the other parent and say
well what do you think about this scenario what should we do financially for the best interest of
our child or children and a lot of people make the mistake of making their proposal first and getting
it out there and sometimes your proposal is might be better than what the other person actually
wants or thinks is reasonable so ask and listen to what the other parent has to say now when you
open up that line of communication it's also going to give the other parent a feeling that they
have some say in this process and that you are actually listening to them and listening to what
their needs are specifically as to how it impacts their ability to financially support the child
in their home and in your home so ask listen then respond and then talk about your position
on those things now communication these days has changed right it's evolved people are talking
less and less in person or on the phone and a lot of these communications we're seeing these days
are in text messages or emails which sometimes is not the best way to do it you're gonna have
to do something uncomfortable and actually get on the telephone or in person with that other
parent and communicate about some of these ideas trust me your chances at avoiding child support
will be much better if you're communicating with the other parent the third c guys right we've got
consult with an attorney we've got communicate with the other parent the third one is create be
creative all right you have to create some options other than just a court imposed order of here's
x amount of dollars that you're going to pay every month to support your children how can you
be creative in that process of communication right you've listened you asked questions listened
responded you're having some now discourse and some some back and forth about what your child
actually needs so you want to be creative well how can i not be forced to pay child support
but still provide for health insurance dental insurance vision insurance how can i pay for the
child's activities the tax dependency exemption and child tax credit transportation travel
expenses there are all sorts of different ways that you may be able to come up with options so
you're not just paying child support but you are financially supporting your child and it satisfies
the needs of the child or children and the other parent and the fourth one is certainty okay you
have to control as much as you can your outcome and what that means is if you cannot arrive at
an agreement with the other parent your audience changes and now it goes to a court you're less
certain to have the outcome that you want if you're turning it over to a judge to decide those
issues for you so think about that certainty and what you want for an outcome and maybe it's
that you pay some portion of child support and you're contributing to these variable expenses
school costs and extracurricular activities and insurance that we discussed before but you're
controlling your outcome in something that you can live with and that the other parent can live
with and that meets the needs of your children