Since 2004, the New Hampshire family courts lacked authority to order a parent to pay for college expenses, with the exception of enforcing orders and agreements made prior to 2004. As it was written then, RSA 461-A:14 (V) provided that “no child support order shall require a parent to contribute to an adult child’s college expenses

The Facts

Husband and Wife divorce after forty-two years of marriage in 2005. The divorce decree divides the property and requires the Husband to pay $25,000 per year for ten years. However, the decree provided that alimony would stop if the Wife cohabitated with “an unrelated adult male.”

In 2010, the Wife moved from her