Good question Repete and I hope to get an answer on it. I'm worried on that front that because we're tied by marriage they will take the settlements to the truck instead of what she would get paid as the factor... which is why we're considering making all the funds kept to the truck separate from our own pay...but as soon as I have some answers I'll post back for future questions concerning this.

 

My suggestion would be for you to go and get a EIN and a business account at your local bank in your name.

Once that is done, you can run as a sole-proprieter of your business and you can just add your wife as a employee and pay her accordingly to HER OWN checking account. This way, the majority of the money and savings is with you and untouchable, and the only thing they will be able to do is use her income which the two of you can decide.

I would suggest calling ATBS and speaking with them. They are a great company and have helped a friend of mine in the same situation as you. I also suggest using their tax serivces as they have saved me a lot of $$$ over the years compared to the jagg-off I had doing them.

 

As long as the company pays you as an independant contractor and thru your EIN and not SS# then theu can only take into judgement what you show as your income.

 

Whatever way you go it will still be a close held corp,llc,company ect. If her income drops and your income goes up they can(more so if the ex fights)average her income as she has a vested interest in the business.

 

Thus why I said for him to file for Sole-Propritership and just have her as an employee..... should work I think.

 

Still has a vested interest through marriage before the truck was/is bought. If he had the company/truck before it would work fine as long as she was paid a comparative wage. I've had quite a few O/O's with the same problem. Mostly it depends on the state and/or the ex's attitude. If the ex has no involvment with the state(state medical,food stamps ect) then he will have to push the issue. Most courts take a dim view of hiding/reducing assets to limit child support.

 

Incorporate and get a business account, Keep everything separate from your wife. Make sure you're paid thru your company, place the money in the business account and pay your wife like she's an employee. She should have a separate account from you. Remove the joint account, Reason being everything you contribute to that account will be factored into her child support as well. So unless your ok with contributing to her support, I would remove myself from the situation.

Just an FYI. I wouldn't dare pay my self the same wage as I'm getting now, as a company driver. As an L/P you will have way more expenses.. Figure out your monthly expense to the house-hold and go from there. The extra money will always be in the business account if you need it. As stated here , your best bet would be talking to a lawyer. But I know from first hand experience, keeping everything separate is your best bet when dealing with Child support system. If they can see all the income from that truck, trust me they will eat you alive.. If i'm not mistaken the court doesn't need to know your self-employed all they need is her yearly wage. So I wouldn't tell them a thing about L/P that truck as long as she can explain her yearly salary and it doesn't look fishy then she will be good.. Keep everything under the company name and you guys will be ok.
Don't and I repeat Don't do anything with-out separating your income from that truck. If you're getting paid under your SS#, then there is no way you can claim this money as company money.. And the Judge will factor that into the child support.. Best of luck to you guys...

 

Great advice guys. Steel Horse, our company is partnered with ATBS for lease/operators and we have the option to use them as our tax/legal service.. which we're going to do. She called them today and got to talk to our advisor but we're still waiting for the attorney to call us back. We've already started looking at business checking accounts and will end up going through our current bank. My wife already has her own checking account at the same bank, we hold a joint account for bills and such, and I hold a separate account at a totally different bank... but we'll most likely close the joint account and just each pay specific bills so she shows shes paying bills. We're planning, no matter the advice, to create paystubs to show our incomes and she plans to track the money heavily... both in our personal incomes and in the "company funds" that is going to remain in the account. I think we're on the right track.. we just need a little more direction and some legal advice to finalize our path. The help here will come in hand when we finally talk to the attorney, and we greatly appreciate it.

Chris1.. if you reread my original post, we're not trying to reduce the amount paid... we're keeping it the same..we just don't want the leech to go after whats left as that is staying to the truck to help us with extra costs and to pay the truck off faster. he isn't involved with the state in that matter but he has money and time to spend .. which is why it feels shes always in court.

official response to come...

 

Ok, we consulted in ATBS both in the financial aspect and legal.. and the concensus is that unless we go full out corp there is no real way to separate the 2 since the tax return will show all of the income. However, the financial guy suggested an LLC (as was recommended above... and because its not really a sole proprietor at this point since we're married) and that they show on the P/L statements pretty well where all the money goes, including our personal pay, and if we got a good lawyer that understands business that we most likely wouldn't have a problem when court time comes... but that we'd have to consult an actual family/business attorney to be sure. So, come tomorrow we'll be setting up the LLC.

It was something to this affect... as I said, I don't understand the business stuff, this was just passed on to me by my wife but i'm sure you guys know what i'm referring to. Thank you everyone for keeping this on topic and all the sound advice. She brought up everything mentioned in this thread and some other stuff she found during research in some way and the attorney was glad we've done our research and knew what we're getting into. Hopefully this will help someone else in the future!