Looking for help from others that previously filed taxes- married filing jointly with spouse who came on a K1 visa

[y3ll0w 0]

Hey everyone,

I've seen mixed things about this so I figured I would come here and ask for help from people who have done this successfully in the past.

My husband came on a K1 visa. We were married by the end of 2013. We want to file our taxes married filing jointly. We know that to do this, we have to include an attachment on our taxes saying that he is a nonresident alien but would like to be considered as a US tax resident for tax purposes only along with some other crucial info (SSN, name, address, etc etc etc).

We also have heard that we cannot e-file.

My husband worked abroad (made a few hundred dollars).

Here are my questions:

1- Can we or can we not e-file? (I don't think we can due to the attachment)

2- If we cannot efile, do the federal and state tax returns get sent to different locations?

3- Is there a prepared letter/form that we can attach to request him to be considered a US tax resident? Or do we just create it in a program like Microsoft Word and attach it?

4- Where do we claim his income? (I know global income has to be reported even if it was not earned in the USA- He was overseas for 300 days in 2013, which is less than 330, so I don't think we can use Form 2555... but I could be wrong.)

Can we just add it in with my income?

5- Has anyone done this themselves, without a paid preparer, and if so, do you have any tips?

We went to have our taxes prepared but the accountant had no idea what to do for any of this.

THANKS FOR YOUR HELP!!!

[KayDeeCee 4,893]

~ Moved from AOS from Family Based Visas to General Immigration-Related Discussion - topic is filing taxes, not AOS process ~

[CarlosAndSveta 808]

Hey everyone,

I've seen mixed things about this so I figured I would come here and ask for help from people who have done this successfully in the past.

My husband came on a K1 visa. We were married by the end of 2013. We want to file our taxes married filing jointly. We know that to do this, we have to include an attachment on our taxes saying that he is a nonresident alien but would like to be considered as a US tax resident for tax purposes only along with some other crucial info (SSN, name, address, etc etc etc).

We also have heard that we cannot e-file.

My husband worked abroad (made a few hundred dollars).

Here are my questions:

1- Can we or can we not e-file? (I don't think we can due to the attachment)

2- If we cannot efile, do the federal and state tax returns get sent to different locations?

3- Is there a prepared letter/form that we can attach to request him to be considered a US tax resident? Or do we just create it in a program like Microsoft Word and attach it?

4- Where do we claim his income? (I know global income has to be reported even if it was not earned in the USA- He was overseas for 300 days in 2013, which is less than 330, so I don't think we can use Form 2555... but I could be wrong.)

Can we just add it in with my income?

5- Has anyone done this themselves, without a paid preparer, and if so, do you have any tips?

We went to have our taxes prepared but the accountant had no idea what to do for any of this.

THANKS FOR YOUR HELP!!!

1. You can’t e-file if you are going to elect to treat your spouse as a resident alien for 2012.

2. The Federal and State returns are filed at separate locations.

3. You will have to prepare the election yourself.

4. You will report his income in the appropriate line item. If your spouse’s income consisted solely on wages then it would be reported on the line for wages and salaries on the tax return. Your spouse qualifies to use the foreign income exclusion. The 12-month period from November 2011 to October 2012 would qualify him for the exclusion.

5. You can do this using tax preparation software like TurboTax. A member named Nich-Nick made a post either last year or the year before in which she explained step-by-step how to do the Foreign Income Exclusion on TurboTax. You should search the forums for this post or send her a pm to see if she can direct you to her post.