First off, I live in Texas. I was wondering if it is going to be a huge hassle to adopt my soon to be wife's son. He is 4 now and has never seen his dad nor has his dad ever paid child support or anything, although his name is on the birth certificate. I talked to a lawyer about this already and he said his biological father has no rights since they have never met and he has not paid any chils support but I wanted to ask on here.

He calls me dad, I am his father, just not biologically. I support him, he lives with me and his mother.

He also has his biological fathers last name since he was on the birth certificate.

I guess I'm trying to find out if he does actually have any rights and if we would have to contact his biological father for me to adopt him and change his last name to mine, even though he has never met his biological father nor has his biological father gave his mother a dime.

Has he been taken to court for child support yet? Also since he is on the birth certificate he will have to be contacted to give up his rights. If an attempt has been made and unsuccessful then your going to have to go by way of publishing a legal notice. It just takes longer but the adoption can still get done.

No he has not been taken to court for child support yet. He has been in and out of jail for drug charges and I'm not sure if we would be able to find him to be honest.

It is harder if you can't find him to get him to sign over his rights , and of course will cost a lot more money.

Sadly since there is no child support order, he is not behind in payments, ( which often helps them decide to sign over their rights))

But you will need an attorney, attempts to find him, according to the rule of the court, if he can not be found, legal publication of this will be done. Then court hearings on the issue