What Happens To Child Support When A Paying Spouse Dies?

You may already know that should your estate have to go through the court probate process, that the Probate court will handle matters related to your estate. One of those things are creditors. People and creditors who feel that the deceased owed them money, can make claims on the state, to get some of the money or assets in the estate, before the beneficiaries get it.

When someone says they are “debt free,” we may assume that means that when they pass, there will be no creditor claims. But what if someone owes child support? Does the child support just end, at the death of the payor parent?

For the Benefit of the Child

Remember that child support is not for the benefit of the receiving parent—it is for the benefit of the minor child. As such, California law protects the interests of the child, by requiring that unpaid child support continue from the estate of the deceased parent.

This is, of course assuming that the estate has sufficient assets or money to actually pay the unpaid child support. If it does not, the receiving parent may have to ask the court for a share of anything else that may have value that is included in the deceased’s estate, such as insurance proceeds.

How to Get Support

But the recipient parent cannot just sit back and do nothing. The parent is considered a creditor, and thus, must make creditor claims in the probate court the same way that any other creditor would do. Generally, you have at most four months to file a claim after letters of administration are issued.

The personal representative of the estate can review the claim, and verify that the amount being claimed is correct. If there is a concern that the amount owed is incorrect, then the probate court would have to determine the correct amount of unpaid support.

Past and Future Payments

The ability to make a claim for child support doesn’t just apply to back owed, or due and owing support—it also includes child support payments that may be due in the future, until the child is 18 or 19. The estate should pay the receiving parent whatever the child support obligation was, assuming the claim was made properly and timely.

Just like the payor could do if he or she were alive, the state can move to modify child support payments. But the payments do not change on their own, just because the payments are coming from the deceased’s estate.

No Child Support Order in Place

In some cases, there may not have been an existing child support order in place, before the death of one of the parents. In that case, the Probate code does allow a custodial parent to still collect an amount for support of a child, but that would be under California’s probate code, not California’s family laws.

Probate court in California can be confusing. Let us help. Call the Torrance probate will and estate attorneys at Samuel Ford Law today.

Sources:

cccba.org/article/do-child-support-orders-survive-the-death-of-the-payor/

childsupport.ca.gov/wp-content/uploads/sites/252/Policy/CSS-11-13-Case-Status-When-a-Custodial-Party-Is-Deceased_ADA.pdf