Filing Income Taxes

[Darkchild80 0]

If everything goes well, my fiance and I plan to marry beginning of December. I was reading info on filing taxes while married to a non-resident. I was a bit confused! He won't have any income at the time so is it better to file married-joint or married separately. I did not understand the best way to file taxes with a non-resident spouse.

[cguytx 0]

If everything goes well, my fiance and I plan to marry beginning of December. I was reading info on filing taxes while married to a non-resident. I was a bit confused! He won't have any income at the time so is it better to file married-joint or married separately. I did not understand the best way to file taxes with a non-resident spouse.

My CPA has advised that I will be filing Married seperate this year. Best to check with a tax professional on that one.

[Jersey Girl 2]

I'm no expert, so take this with a grain of salt, but it's probably best you each file separately, in your respective countries, for 2006. There's nothing to gain by filing jointly, and even if there were, the cross-border tax accountants who handle this are very expensive.

He will be on the hook for Canadian taxes until he moves. So if he plans to marry and move in December, he needs to do an exit return so Revenue Canada doesn't consider him taxable after he leaves. Don't mingle your taxes until you're sure he's no longer taxable in Canada.

[William33 110]

Darkchild80,

You should check the IRS rules or with a tax professional.

I thought it was a requirement to have been married for 6 months or more, of the given tax year to qualify for joint tax returns. Not really sure though.

[AUSC 0]

If everything goes well, my fiance and I plan to marry beginning of December. I was reading info on filing taxes while married to a non-resident. I was a bit confused! He won't have any income at the time so is it better to file married-joint or married separately. I did not understand the best way to file taxes with a non-resident spouse.

If you are a citizen or a permanent resident of United States, and married to a foreign national living outside the US, you can get an ITIN number for your spouse and file taxes jointly. In fact, you can apply for an ITIN number at the time of filing your taxes. You need to fill out the following W-7 and file it along with your return.

http://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-pdf/fw7.pdf

You will be applying ITIN based on the following criteria: (from the instructions)

e. Spouse of U.S. citizen/resident alien. This category includes:

● A nonresident alien electing to file a U.S. tax return jointly with a spouse who is a U.S. citizen or resident.

If he does not have any income and if you file jointly, there will be tax advantages -- your standard deductions are now higher than that of a "single" tax payer.

I would file jointly -- a way to establish husband/wife relationship that USCIS so desperately wants to see.

[aussiewench 9]

I would file jointly -- a way to establish husband/wife relationship that USCIS so desperately wants to see.

I concur

[William33 110]

aussiewench,

Is this practice "acceptable" to IRS rules? I would love to hear "yes" to that, as my Wife will have a SSN in two weeks, yet will have only 80 days in the US in this tax year.

Anyone with further thoughts or source info?

I would file jointly -- a way to establish husband/wife relationship that USCIS so desperately wants to see.

I concur

[rebeccajo 14]

You can file a joint return even if you get married on Dec. 31.

Edited October 27, 2006 by rebeccajo

[aussiewench 9]

aussiewench,

Is this practice "acceptable" to IRS rules? I would love to hear "yes" to that, as my Wife will have a SSN in two weeks, yet will have only 80 days in the US in this tax year.

Anyone with further thoughts or source info?

I would file jointly -- a way to establish husband/wife relationship that USCIS so desperately wants to see.

I concur

I'm not up on all the tax issues, but many file married filing seperately when the spouse is still not in the US. And as AUSC pointed out, it does make great evidence of a bona fide marriage when it comes to the interview. That is the extent of my knowledge on this. If you send Gimmygirl a PM she may be able to answer you as she is pretty cluey with tax issues. She did have a pinned thread on this in the old site but unfortunately now it is not accessible.

*note to self to see what the Capt'n can do about that*

[Yodrak 7]

Darkchild,

If you are married before the end of the year it will probably be to your benefit to file married joint. Your husband will have to report any income he earned in his home country during the year, but only the amount in excess of US$80,000 (last year's figure, this year may be higher) will be taxable. Thus, only your income will be taxed and it will be taxed at a lower rate.

Yodrak

If everything goes well, my fiance and I plan to marry beginning of December. I was reading info on filing taxes while married to a non-resident. I was a bit confused! He won't have any income at the time so is it better to file married-joint or married separately. I did not understand the best way to file taxes with a non-resident spouse.

Hey all,

When we're talking taxes ** relationship and file in the way that will cost you the least money. USCIS will understand, there's no immigration requirement that says you have to increase your tax payment for your spouse to obtain an immigration benefit.

In many cases, however, the least tax obligation will result from filing Married-Joint. I filed Married-Joint while Rodjanaa was still in Thailand waiting for my petition to be approved and it saved me several thousand dollars.

Yodrak

aussiewench,

Is this practice "acceptable" to IRS rules? I would love to hear "yes" to that, as my Wife will have a SSN in two weeks, yet will have only 80 days in the US in this tax year.

Anyone with further thoughts or source info?

I would file jointly -- a way to establish husband/wife relationship that USCIS so desperately wants to see.

I concur

Edited October 27, 2006 by Yodrak

[William33 110]

Yodrak,

What would this site be without your input? Second class.

Good stuff as usual.

Hey all,

When we're talking taxes ** relationship and file in the way that will cost you the least money. USCIS will understand, there's no immigration requirement that says you have to increase your tax payment for your spouse to obtain an immigration benefit.

In many cases, however, the least tax obligation will result from filing Married-Joint. I filed Married-Joint while Rodjanaa was still in Thailand waiting for my petition to be approved and it saved me several thousand dollars.

Yodrak

aussiewench,

Is this practice "acceptable" to IRS rules? I would love to hear "yes" to that, as my Wife will have a SSN in two weeks, yet will have only 80 days in the US in this tax year.

Anyone with further thoughts or source info?

[meauxna 15]

If everything goes well, my fiance and I plan to marry beginning of December. I was reading info on filing taxes while married to a non-resident. I was a bit confused! He won't have any income at the time so is it better to file married-joint or married separately. I did not understand the best way to file taxes with a non-resident spouse.

But, he *will* be a resident spouse.

The IRS has a different definition of 'resident' than does the CIS. The irs.gov website is also actually very useful, unlike er, well.

Yodrak and I totally agree on this: file the way that makes the most financial sense! Just bear in mind that if you are married as of 12/31/XX you MUST file married for that year. Now, Jointly or Separately, that is up to you all.

That goes for you with spouses outside the US; they can even be tax resident for the year without setting foot in the US.

[Kathryn41 3,205]

Your Canadian spouse will need to file a tax return in Canada. He can pick up a really useful guide on how to file as an emigrant in the Canada Revenue site of the Government of Canada. Basically, he will record the date he physically left Canada and if he doesn't have any other income for the rest of the year outside of Canada, he can file his Canadian taxes and claim maximum federal and provincial benefits. The guide will advise him exactly how to do it so as to notify CRA that he has emigrated from Canada. JHe should make sure to advise CRA of his new address asap so that they can send him the tax forms in the mail to his new US address.

You can file married, jointly and then claim both incomes as income and then claim a foreign tax credit for the taxes paid in Canada on his Canadian income so you are not double taxed. He will need to convert his Canadian income and tax paid into US dollars and he will need to prepare his Canadian return in sufficient time so that you can file by the April 15 deadline - the Canadian tax deadline is April 30. You may also want to prepare both forms well in advance to see which filing process is going to be most advantageous to you: married filing jointly, or married filing separately.

We did this and found it it was to our benefit to file married, jointly. I received a nice tax rebate from Canada, and we were able to claim all except for about $13 of my Canadian tax as a foreign tax credit. The married exemptions for spouse, etc. meant my husband had a larger deduction so he too saved and got a good rebate.

It would be well worth your while to purchase one of the big tax guides that are for sale in most bookstores for around $20. They usually have chapters on foreign residents paying taxes. Just be advised, you may be required to file a paper return and not efile since the foreign tax credit cannot be claimed by efile ( unless it has changed in the last 2 years).

Be prepared to do a lot of reading but you can probably do this by yourself. My husband and I did although it was certainly not an enjoyable experience for either of us due to the distinct differences in the very basic fundamentals of how each country taxes. We had a lot of 'frustrated' discussions each of us trying to see why the other found something difficult to understand:-). He was dubious about the married filing jointly working to our advantage but once we did the math, we found out it did even with my Canadian income included.

Good luck.

Edited October 27, 2006 by Kathryn41

[Jersey Girl 2]

If you need a good cross-border tax preparer, I can recommend David Levine at http://www.keatsconnelly.com. He helped me file an amended return this year. It was originally submitted by http://www.serbinski.com, and could have cost me an extra $65,000 in tax. (Where's the emoticon for fainting?)

This stuff isn't easy and even the experts don't always agree, as in my case. Be ready to pay $600 per return, U.S. and Canadian.

My only question about filing jointly is this: if your husband had no income, will he look like your dependent even though you don't claim him as one? Could this have an impact on getting his permanent visa later?

[William33 110]

Jersey Girl,

65K in additional tax?

If you need a good cross-border tax preparer, I can recommend David Levine at http://www.keatsconnelly.com. He helped me file an amended return this year. It was originally submitted by http://www.serbinski.com, and could have cost me an extra $65,000 in tax. (Where's the emoticon for fainting?)

This stuff isn't easy and even the experts don't always agree, as in my case. Be ready to pay $600 per return, U.S. and Canadian.

My only question about filing jointly is this: if your husband had no income, will he look like your dependent even though you don't claim him as one? Could this have an impact on getting his permanent visa later?