I always love folks who defend wildly dysfunctional behavior because it is "best for the child"; usually, it is a defensive prop to justify maintaining a dysfunctional line of thought in the adult's life.

As so many writers note, this woman needs a skilled family law attorney to find out precicely what her legal parameters are. That said, if he wants to be a deadbeat dad, there is not much she can do about it, and planning her fiscal life around a single income, which is what the two of them have anyway, is only prudent.

What she is doing for the child at the moment is modeling co-dependent and passive behavior which honors the inappropriate and irresponsible needs of others over the prudent management of resources. Is that the long-term message she wants to send to her kid? Sets her kid to marry the same kind of ne'r do-well that she did the first time out of the box......Moreover, in demonstrating an acceptance of wildly irresponsible behavior, she models the circumstance for her daughter to accept the same kind of behavior when the father/daughter relationship ages in place.

If the kid is old enough to talk, the kid is old enough to learn differentiated behavior. She can tell her daughter that daddy is wonderful, whimsical, and so much a child that being with him is like being with another kid, but that he is a lousy financial manager, and mommy has to do some things to protect mommy's (and the daughter's) financial security. That's the model to establish, the message to send. Her kid can learn that it is acceptable to love her goofy childlike father while not accepting his irresponsible and inappropriate behavior. Rarely are folks a "complete package";, clearly Daddy is playing fast and loose with adulthood as a remote concept, and there is no reason why this woman should allow her daughter to see it for anything other than it is. I remember deeply a phrase from ACOA - "separate with love".... meaning her daughter can truly cherish her daddy, but not buy into his crappy behavior.

I realise this is a house in San Fransisco, where houses are golden, but it is still nothing more or less than a piece of property that - in the context of this non-marriage - is a symbol for some kind of connectedness. If, legally, she can get out of it what she put in, great. If she can force the issue of his moving out and her moving in, great. If she needs to let go of the concept of owning that house, so be it. It remains a house.

In the interim, I would suggest that she toddle back to her very cogent and thoughtful therapist and process the concept of codependency and enablement further, even to the point of finding a local Co-Dependant's Anonymous program, a great "starter" 12-step program. And, while she's at it, checking in with her daughter periodically to see if the kid wants "someone to talk to" just like mommy does, would not be such a bad idea.