I know the general answer to this question is that married persons must file as married, but I have a special situation. We got married this year, but live in separate states as we are finishing our training. We have lived separately for the entire year, and have 2 different apartments. Does this allow us to qualify for single status? We do not qualify for head of household because we do not have dependents. The reason we'd like to file as single is that we have a significant amount of loans, and its our understanding that if you file as married, you can only make one deduction in the amount of 2500, whereas if you file as single, we can each deduct 2500. We each have a lot of itemized expenses.
2007-12-12 16:47:58 · 5 answers · asked by Anonymous in Business & Finance ➔ Taxes ➔ United States
You have to file as married legally. You are right that this will cut down on the amount of student loan interest you can claim, but if you both have a lot of itemized deductions, those will be added together on the joint return, and might offset the student loan limitation. You can deduct the interest on both homes, if you have it. You should also look into which state has higher sales tax and see if using the standard sales tax rather than state income tax will help you (this is new in the past couple of years). You should also look into deducting your other education expeneses, and any expenses that you paid to move if it was necessary for work/internship. Also, don't forget to take the Saver's Credit if you are setting aside money for your retirement in a 401K (or similar) or IRA. If you aren't, check to see how it will affect the tax return - you can contribute for the 2007 return until April 15 2008.
Let me know if I can be of more assistance. But legally you do have to either file Married Filing Jointly, or Married Filing Seperately (not typically recommended, but sometimes it works out better). You might consider seeing a tax professional this year, just to make sure you've gotten everything you're entitled to with your life changes. Make sure you see a professional who has had continuing education recently, and has dealt with situations like yours.
Have a Blessed Day!
2007-12-15 03:51:25 · answer #1 · answered by Katie Short, Atheati Princess 6 · 0⤊ 0⤋
There is no special situation according to the IRS rules. You can either file "Married Filing Separately which is the least desirable filing status to use or Married Filing Jointly. Try it both ways.
2007-12-14 15:38:32 · answer #2 · answered by Gary 5 · 1⤊ 0⤋
If you are married, your only choices are married filing joint or married filing separately.
What loans are you talking about? If it is qualifed student loans, you are correct. You are limited to $2500 per return. If you file as married filing seperately, you cannot deduct any of it.
2007-12-12 17:57:15 · answer #3 · answered by Mark S 5 · 2⤊ 0⤋
No you can't - but you also have a number of wrong understandings.
If you file a joint return, you get TWO exemptions of$3400 and a standard deduction of $10,700 or twice the amount a person filing as single would get.
2007-12-13 08:51:26 · answer #4 · answered by Judy 7 · 0⤊ 1⤋
I always recommend to see an accountant or cpa to do taxes, but I do have an answer.
You can file married or single. You do not have to file as a married couple as long as both persons are filling taxes. I always have my cpa run it both ways to see which way we come out better. Thus far for me it has always been married.
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Sorry I meant to say filling joint or separate as a married person. But I wasn't wrong about contacting a cpa. especially since you can write that expense off the following year.
I do have a cpa run it both ways and it has always worked out for us to file joint.
Taxes are not my thing I thought this was an easy one though, and i still screwed it up, so I will be staying away from them for now on.
2007-12-12 17:02:29 · answer #5 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 4⤋