can my husband claim one of his two kids on his taxes?

Question

he pays at just about 10,000 in support a year and his ex-wife works part time, and from what I have read her income has to be double what his support is.

When I went to turbo tax the new tax law states that: support payed can not exceed half of the other partents income. if it does the parent who is claiming the child has to have a letter stating that they can claim the children on their taxes from the other parent.

please only answer if your serious and to the one who answered and told me to stay out of their business, this IS my business he IS my husband we do have a valid question that we would like answered

Answer 1

It depends on what is in the divorce agreement. If the wife is entitled to claim then, then no your husband can't.

Answer 2

If the children live with their mother and do not live with their father, then the father cannot claim the children unless the mother waives her right to the exemption.

This waiver is accomplished either through court papers, such as a divorce decree, or by the mother signing Form 8332 and giving it to the father. The father attaches the Form 8332 to his return.

The amount of child support is not considered when determining dependency for a child that lives with a parent. The parent with whom the child lives the longer period of time has a higher claim to the dependency exemption than the other parent.

Answer 3

The only thing that i can add is, if his ex wife signs the 8332 or if the child support agreement states he can claim the children, the you husband can only claim the dependency exemption and the child tax credit. His ex wife can still claim head of household filing status, the earned income credit, and the dependent care credit. The benefits that the Ex can claim are independent of the dependency exemption and the child must live with you in order to claim them.

Hope this helps if she is reluctant to sign the 8332.

Answer 4

No, he can not, unless she signs over the exemption to him by completing Form 8332 or a similar written statement which he would then attach to his (or probably your joint) tax return.

Under the law, the custodial parent gets the exemption. The law defines the custodial parent as the one with whom the children spend the most amount of time with throughout the year.

I'm not sure what you were reading, but you were not reading the rules on a Qualifying Child. The support test for a Qualifying Child is that the CHILD must not have provided more than half of their OWN support. Your husband could provide 100% of their support and he would NOT get the exemption under the law. Sorry.

Answer 5

It depends on what is in their divorce agreement. Sometimes the agreement provides for claiming one child, sometimes both, sometimes alternate years. If it doesn't specifically spell it out, then the custodial parent has the right to the deduction. In the case of joint custody, then it remains up to the court.

What you may have read is that in order to claim ANYONE on a return, you need to provide 51% of their support. Unfortunately divorce agreements supercede that calculation and so it becomes the defacto rule.

What you DON'T want to do is arbitrarily take the child(ren) on your return without getting a document from the mother, and completing form 8332, Release of Exemption to Non-Custodial Parent, which she will need to sign. With sophisticated computer mapping of both returns, if both parents try to claim the child by the IRS, the non-custodial parent will be required to amend the return and potentially pay additional interest, fees and penalties to the IRS.

Good Luck
ED

Answer 6

If you have two kids between you the fair thing the court will do is you get to claim one child and he gets to claim the other. If there is just one you will alternate each year...this is what the court did to my Exhusband and myself...I guess it's the fair thing. It doesn't matter about income at all...this should all be settled between them when they were divorced or during the dissolution. Whatever you read about her income being double doesn't make sense child support is based on a table they compute for each state and claiming a child has nothing to do with that.

Answer 7

I am assuming that neither child lived with him for over half the year. He can only claim one of them if the divorce decree says he can (and includes all the required language), or if his ex gives him a signed form 8332 giving him permission to claim one of the kids - otherwise no matter how much support he pays, he can't claim either of them. Doesn't sound very fair, I know, but that's the rules unfortunately.

Answer 8

I know in my state, the child has to live with the parent over half the year, that's more than 6 months, to be claimed by that parent. Then check the divorce/child custody papers to see if it's mentioned in there.

Answer 9

If she's the custodial parent, she gets the deduction for both unless there is an agreement to the contrary.

You do NOT "always put child support in your income taxes," otherwise married people would have a tax bonanza for their spawn.

This link to the IRS website will help you; it searches on the keyword "noncustodial."

http://search.irs.gov/web/query.html?col=allirs&charset=utf-8&qp=&qs=-Wct%3A%22Internal+Revenue+Manual%22&qc=&qm=0&rf=0&oq=&qt=noncustodial

Answer 10

By law I can tell you this; his ex can release the dependency for one or both children to him with a form 8332. He can take the dependency for said children and his ex can take the filing catagory for them if they reside with her; thereby she can collect the EIC for them which would be $ 4,172 for two children with an income of 20K. If she releases just one to him and the one she retains is age 16 or under then she can also collect the $ 1,000.00 in CTC (child tax credit). It is a basic win/win situation for both your husband and his ex.

Answer 11

You need to get the other parent to complete a 8832 form. This form can be downloaded from the IRS web site.