In the late 1990s when the Child Support Guidelines were drastically changed to account for overnight parenting as well as shared parenting, the terms Parent of Primary Residence (PPR) and Parent of Alternate Residence (PAR) were effectively born. At the time, the PAR only existed if their was some time of shared parenting (more than 28% of the time). Now, it seems, that anyone who isn’t the PPR is a PAR.
I even tried a case where the parties had settled custody and parenting time but the father refused to concede that the mother was the PPR even though the kids were with her more than 50% of the time. I literally asked her one question on direct examination – “Why do you want to be PPR? – to which she answered, “Because the kids are with me more than 50% of the time.” The judge disallowed any cross examination on the issue because it was purely mathematical as the terms come right from the Child Support Guidelines.
Even now, I see matters were people fight for the designation when the parties have a true 50-50 parenting plan. Part of it is because in theory, the PPR would get more child support, even in a 50-50 situation. That said, there is caselaw that has been around for a long time now that addresses how to calculate the guidelines to account for a true 50-50 situation.
So when a Court messes it up, it comes as a surprise. That is exactly what happened in the case of Coleman v. Coleman, an unreported (non-precedential) Appellate Division decision released on September 30, 2024.
In that case, the divorce complaint was filed after 11 years of marriage. The parties had three children together. They settled most of their case, including custody, agreeing on 50-50 custody for their two younger children and the court decided that custody of the oldest child would also be 50-50. They did not resolve child support and left it for the judge to decide.
When calculating the child support, the judge ran the guidelines with each parent as the PPR on one of the calculations. In the worksheet where dad was PPR, mom owed him $101 per week. In the worksheet where mom was PPR, dad owed her $123 per week. Instead of offsetting the two numbers to come up with the child support obligation, the Court ordered dad to pay $123 per week and said that mom “would continue to be the parent of primary residence.
In reversing, the Appellate Division provided the definitional reminder of PPR:
“PPR is defined as “[t]he parent with whom the child spends most of his or her overnight time.” Id. The primary residence is the home where the child resides for more than 50% of the overnights annually.” Id. at ¶ 14(b)(1). Importantly, the Guidelines state that “[e]ither the PPR or the PAR may be the obligor of the support order depending on income and the time spent with the child.” Id.
The Court went on to discuss the importance of the PPR designation:
“As we underscored in Benisch v. Benisch, 347 N.J. Super. 393, 396 (App. Div. 2002), “the designation of PPR and PAR is not an insignificant matter. It has tangible, monetary effects.” The shared parenting worksheets submitted to the court in this matter demonstrate this point; the child support obligation varied depending on which parent was designated as PPR.
The Court went on to discuss the two cases, Benisch and Wunch-Deffler, that explain ways to calculate support when there is a true 50-50 custodial arrangement:
“In Benisch, to correct “what otherwise would seem to be an injustice in applying the Guidelines without accounting for the . . . equal custody time between two parents[,]” we proposed either dividing the controlled expenses between the parents or designating both parents as PPR on the shared parenting worksheets and subtracting the difference. Benisch, 347 N.J. Super. at 401. Later, in Wunsch-Deffler, the court proposed a “three-step procedure” to adjust the parent’s child support obligation, accounting for “controlled expenses” paid by both parents. Wunsch-Deffler, 406 N.J. Super. at 509. “[A] shared-parenting adjustment is ‘factually sensitive'”[.] Fall & Romanowksi, Current N.J. Fam. L., Child Custody, Protection & Support § 35:2-2(b)(3) (2024); see also Lall v. Shivani, 448 N.J. Super. 38, 51 (App. Div. 2016). As we stated in Benisch, “if the court has some [other] alternative which it deems more desirable, it should not feel preempted from employing such a device” to effectuate “substantial justice between the parties.” Benisch, 347 N.J. Super. at 401.
The Appellate Division also found that the trial court erred by failing to do the analysis regarding supplementing the child support award because the parties combined new income was “over guidelines.”
So the take away of this case is that the PPR designation matters and in cases when there is no PPR, then it is likely error for the court to name one parent the PPR for child support purposes.
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