Publication 501 (2006), Exemptions, Standard Deduction, and Filing Information

Publication 501 - Main Contents

Table of Contents

Who Must File

If you are a U.S. citizen or resident alien, whether you must file a federal income tax return depends upon your gross income, your filing status, your age, and whether you are a dependent. For details, see Table 1 and Table 2. You also must file if one of the situations described in Table 3 applies. The filing requirements apply even if you owe no tax.

You may have to pay a penalty if you are required to file a return but fail to. If you willfully fail to file a return, you may be subject to criminal prosecution.

For information on what form to use — Form 1040EZ, Form 1040A, or Form 1040 — see the instructions in your tax package.

Gross income. Gross income is all income you receive in the form of money, goods, property, and services that is not exempt from tax. If you are married and live with your spouse in a community property state, half of any income defined by state law as community income may be considered yours. For a list of community property states, see Community property states under Married Filing Separately, later.

Self-employed persons. If you are self-employed in a business that provides services (where products are not a factor), your gross income from that business is the gross receipts. If you are self-employed in a business involving manufacturing, merchandising, or mining, your gross income from that business is the total sales minus the cost of goods sold. To this figure, you add any income from investments and from incidental or outside operations or sources.

You must file Form 1040 if you owe any self-employment tax.

Filing status. Your filing status generally depends on whether you are single or married. In some cases, it depends on other factors as well. Whether you are single or married is determined as of the last day of your tax year, which is December 31 for most taxpayers. Filing status is discussed in detail later in this publication.

Age. Age is a factor in determining if you must file a return only if you are 65 or older at the end of your tax year. For 2006, you are 65 or older if you were born before January 2, 1942.

Filing Requirements for Most Taxpayers

You must file a return if your gross income for the year was at least the amount shown on the appropriate line in Table 1. Dependents should see Table 2 instead.

Deceased Persons

You must file an income tax return for a decedent (a person who died) if both of the following are true.

You are the surviving spouse, executor, administrator, or legal representative.
The decedent met the filing requirements described in this publication at the time of his or her death.

For more information, see Final Return for Decedent in Publication 559.

Table 2. 2006 Filing Requirements for Dependents

See Exemptions for Dependents to find out if you are a dependent.

If your parent (or someone else) can claim you as a dependent, use this table to see if you must file a return.
In this table, unearned income includes taxable interest, ordinary dividends, and capital gain distributions. Earned income includes wages, tips, and taxable scholarship and fellowship grants. Gross income is the total of your unearned and earned income.
Caution. If your gross income was $3,300 or more, you usually cannot be claimed as a dependent unless you are a qualifying child. For details, see Exemptions for Dependents.
Single dependents— Were you either age 65 or older or blind?
□	No. You must file a return if any of the following apply. Your unearned income was more than $850. Your earned income was more than $5,150. Your gross income was more than the larger of — $850, or Your earned income (up to $4,850) plus $300.

□	Yes. You must file a return if any of the following apply. Your unearned income was more than $2,100 ($3,350 if 65 or older and blind). Your earned income was more than $6,400 ($7,650 if 65 or older and blind). Your gross income was more than $1,250 ($2,500 if 65 or older and blind) plus the larger of: $850, or Your earned income (up to $4,850) plus $300.

Married dependents—Were you either age 65 or older or blind?
□	No. You must file a return if any of the following apply. Your gross income was at least $5 and your spouse files a separate return and itemizes deductions. Your unearned income was more than $850. Your earned income was more than $5,150. Your gross income was more than the larger of — $850, or Your earned income (up to $4,850) plus $300.

□	Yes. You must file a return if any of the following apply. Your gross income was at least $5 and your spouse files a separate return and itemizes deductions. Your unearned income was more than $1,850 ($2,850 if 65 or older and blind). Your earned income was more than $6,150 ($7,150 if 65 or older and blind). Your gross income was more than $1,000 ($2,000 if 65 or older and blind) plus the larger of: $850 or Your earned income (up to $4,850) plus $300.

U.S. Citizens or Resident Aliens Living Abroad

For purposes of determining whether you must file a return, you must include in your gross income all of the income you earned abroad, including any income you can exclude under the foreign earned income exclusion. For more information on special tax rules that may apply to you, see Publication 54, Tax Guide for U.S. Citizens and Resident Aliens Abroad.

Residents of Puerto Rico

Generally, if you are a U.S. citizen and a bona fide resident of Puerto Rico, you must file a U.S. income tax return if you meet the income requirements. This is in addition to any legal requirement you may have to file an income tax return with Puerto Rico.

If you are a bona fide resident of Puerto Rico for the whole year, your U.S. gross income does not include income from sources within Puerto Rico. However, include in your U.S. gross income any income you received for your services as an employee of the United States or any U.S. agency. If you receive income from Puerto Rican sources that is not subject to U.S. tax, you must reduce your standard deduction, which reduces the amount of income you can have before you must file a U.S. income tax return.

For more information, see Publication 570, Tax Guide for Individuals With Income From U.S. Possessions.

Individuals With Income From U.S. Possessions

If you had income from Guam, the Commonwealth of Northern Mariana Islands, American Samoa, or the U. S. Virgin Islands, special rules may apply when determining whether you must file a U.S. federal income tax return. In addition, you may have to file a return with the individual island government. See Publication 570 for more information.

Dependents

A person who is a dependent may still have to file a return. This depends on the amount of the dependent's earned income, unearned income, and gross income. For details, see Table 2. A dependent may also have to file if one of the situations described in Table 3 applies.

Responsibility of parent. If a dependent child who must file an income tax return cannot file it for any reason, such as age, a parent, guardian, or other legally responsible person must file it for the child. If the child cannot sign the return, the parent or guardian must sign the child's name followed by the words “By (your signature), parent for minor child.”

Earned income. This is salaries, wages, professional fees, and other amounts received as pay for work you actually perform. Earned income (only for purposes of filing requirements and the standard deduction) also includes any part of a scholarship that you must include in your gross income. See chapter 1 of Publication 970, Tax Benefits for Education, for more information on taxable and nontaxable scholarships.

Child's earnings. Amounts a child earns by performing services are his or her gross income. This is true even if under local law the child's parents have the right to the earnings and may actually have received them. If the child does not pay the tax due on this income, the parent is liable for the tax.

Unearned income. This is income such as interest, dividends, and capital gains. Trust distributions of interest, dividends, capital gains, and survivor annuities are considered unearned income also.

Election to report child's unearned income on parent's return. You may be able to include your child's interest and dividend income on your tax return. If you choose to do this, your child will not have to file a return. However, all of the following conditions must be met.

Your child was under age 18 at the end of 2006. (A child born on January 1, 1989, is considered to be age 18 at the end of 2006; you cannot make the election for this child.)
Your child had gross income only from interest and dividends (including capital gain distributions and Alaska Permanent Fund dividends).
The interest and dividend income was less than $8,500.
Your child is required to file a return for 2006 unless you make this election.
Your child does not file a joint return for 2006.
No estimated tax payment was made for 2006 and no 2005 overpayment was applied to 2006 under your child's name and social security number.
No federal income tax was withheld from your child's income under the backup withholding rules.
You are the parent whose return must be used when making the election to report your child's unearned income.

For more information, see Form 8814 and Parent's Election To Report Child's Interest and Dividends in Publication 929.

Other Situations

You may have to file a tax return even if your gross income is less than the amount shown in Table 1 or Table 2 for your filing status. See Table 3 for those other situations when you must file.

Table 3. Other Situations When You Must File a 2006 Return

If any of the four conditions listed below applied to you for 2006, you must file a return.
1.	You owe any special taxes, including any of the following.
	a.	Alternative minimum tax. (See the Form 1040 instructions for line 45.)
	b.	Additional tax on a qualified plan, including an individual retirement arrangement (IRA), or other tax-favored account. (See Publication 590, Individual Retirement Arrangements (IRAs), and Publication 969, Health Savings Accounts and Other Tax-Favored Health Plans.) But if you are filing a return only because you owe this tax, you can file Form 5329 by itself.
	c.	Social security or Medicare tax on tips you did not report to your employer. (See Publication 531, Reporting Tip Income.)
	d.	Write-in taxes, including uncollected social security, Medicare, or railroad retirement tax on tips you reported to your employer or on group-term life insurance and additional tax on health savings account distributions. (See Publication 531, Publication 969, and the Form 1040 instructions for line 63.)
	e.	Household employment taxes. But if you are filing a return only because you owe these taxes, you can file Schedule H by itself.
	f.	Recapture taxes. (See the Form 1040 instructions for lines 44 and 63.)
2.	You received any advance earned income credit (EIC) payments from your employer. These payments should be shown in box 9 of your Form W-2. (See Publication 596, Earned Income Credit.)
3.	You had net earnings from self-employment of at least $400. (See Schedule SE (Form 1040) and its instructions.)
4.	You had wages of $108.28 or more from a church or qualified church-controlled organization that is exempt from employer social security and Medicare taxes. (See Schedule SE (Form 1040) and its instructions.)

Who Should File

Even if you do not have to file, you should file a tax return if you can get money back. For example, you should file if one of the following applies.

You had income tax withheld from your pay.
You made estimated tax payments for the year or had any of your overpayment for last year applied to this year's estimated tax.
You qualify for the earned income credit. See Publication 596, Earned Income Credit (EIC), for more information.
You qualify for the additional child tax credit. See the instructions in your tax forms package for more information on this credit.
You qualify for the health coverage tax credit. For information about this credit, see Form 8885, Health Coverage Tax Credit.
You qualify for the credit for federal telephone excise tax paid. If you are filing a return only to claim this credit, you may be able to file Form 1040EZ-T, Request for Refund of Federal Telephone Excise Tax. See the instructions in your tax forms package for more information on this credit.

Filing Status

You must determine your filing status before you can determine your filing requirements, standard deduction (discussed later), and correct tax. You figure your correct tax by using the Tax Computation Worksheet or the column in the Tax Table that applies to your filing status.

You also use your filing status in determining whether you are eligible to claim certain other deductions and credits.

There are five filing statuses:

Single,
Married Filing Jointly,
Married Filing Separately,
Head of Household, and
Qualifying Widow(er) With Dependent Child.

If more than one filing status applies to you, choose the one that will give you the lowest tax.

Marital Status

In general, your filing status depends on whether you are considered unmarried or married. For federal tax purposes, a marriage means only a legal union between a man and a woman as husband and wife.

Unmarried persons. You are considered unmarried for the whole year if, on the last day of your tax year, you are unmarried or legally separated from your spouse under a divorce or separate maintenance decree.

State law governs whether you are married or legally separated under a divorce or separate maintenance decree.

Divorced persons. If you are divorced under a final decree by the last day of the year, you are considered unmarried for the whole year.

Divorce and remarriage. If you obtain a divorce in one year for the sole purpose of filing tax returns as unmarried individuals, and at the time of divorce you intended to and did remarry each other in the next tax year, you and your spouse must file as married individuals.

Annulled marriages. If you obtain a court decree of annulment, which holds that no valid marriage ever existed, you are considered unmarried even if you filed joint returns for earlier years. You must file amended returns (Form 1040X) claiming single or head of household status for all tax years affected by the annulment that are not closed by the statute of limitations for filing a tax return. The statute of limitations generally does not expire until 3 years after your original return was filed.

Head of household or qualifying widow(er) with dependent child. If you are considered unmarried, you may be able to file as a head of household or as a qualifying widow(er) with a dependent child. See Head of Household and Qualifying Widow(er) With Dependent Child to see if you qualify.

Married persons. If you are considered married for the whole year, you and your spouse can file a joint return, or you can file separate returns.

Considered married. You are considered married for the whole year if on the last day of your tax year you and your spouse meet any one of the following tests.

You are married and living together as husband and wife.
You are living together in a common law marriage that is recognized in the state where you now live or in the state where the common law marriage began.
You are married and living apart, but not legally separated under a decree of divorce or separate maintenance.
You are separated under an interlocutory (not final) decree of divorce. For purposes of filing a joint return, you are not considered divorced.

Spouse died during the year. If your spouse died during the year, you are considered married for the whole year for filing status purposes.

If you did not remarry before the end of the tax year, you can file a joint return for yourself and your deceased spouse. For the next 2 years, you may be entitled to the special benefits described later under Qualifying Widow(er) With Dependent Child.

If you remarried before the end of the tax year, you can file a joint return with your new spouse. Your deceased spouse's filing status is married filing separately for that year.

Married persons living apart. If you live apart from your spouse and meet certain tests, you may be considered unmarried. If this applies to you, you can file as head of household even though you are not divorced or legally separated. If you qualify to file as head of household instead of as married filing separately, your standard deduction will be higher. Also, your tax may be lower, and you may be able to claim the earned income credit. See Head of Household, later.

Single

Your filing status is single if, on the last day of the year, you are unmarried or legally separated from your spouse under a divorce or separate maintenance decree, and you do not qualify for another filing status. To determine your marital status on the last day of the year, see Marital Status, earlier.

Widow(er). Your filing status may be single if you were widowed before January 1, 2006, and did not remarry before the end of 2006. However, you might be able to use another filing status that will give you a lower tax. See Head of Household and Qualifying Widow(er) With Dependent Child, later, to see if you qualify.

How to file. You can file Form 1040EZ (if you have no dependents, are under 65 and not blind, and meet other requirements), Form 1040A, or Form 1040. If you file Form 1040A or Form 1040, show your filing status as single by checking the box on line 1. Use the Single column of the Tax Table, or Section A of the Tax Computation Worksheet, to figure your tax.

Married Filing Jointly

You can choose married filing jointly as your filing status if you are married and both you and your spouse agree to file a joint return. On a joint return, you report your combined income and deduct your combined allowable expenses. You can file a joint return even if one of you had no income or deductions.

If you and your spouse decide to file a joint return, your tax may be lower than your combined tax for the other filing statuses. Also, your standard deduction (if you do not itemize deductions) may be higher, and you may qualify for tax benefits that do not apply to other filing statuses.

If you and your spouse each have income, you may want to figure your tax both on a joint return and on separate returns (using the filing status of married filing separately). You can choose the method that gives the two of you the lower combined tax.

How to file. If you file as married filing jointly, you can use Form 1040 or Form 1040A. If you have no dependents, are under 65 and not blind, and meet other requirements, you can file Form 1040EZ. If you file Form 1040 or Form 1040A, show this filing status by checking the box on line 2. Use the Married filing jointly column of the Tax Table, or Section B of the Tax Computation Worksheet, to figure your tax.

Spouse died during the year. If your spouse died during the year, you are considered married for the whole year and can choose married filing jointly as your filing status. See Spouse died during the year, under Married persons, earlier.

Divorced persons. If you are divorced under a final decree by the last day of the year, you are considered unmarried for the whole year and you cannot choose married filing jointly as your filing status.

Filing a Joint Return

Both you and your spouse must include all of your income, exemptions, and deductions on your joint return.

Accounting period. Both of you must use the same accounting period, but you can use different accounting methods.

Joint responsibility. Both of you may be held responsible, jointly and individually, for the tax and any interest or penalty due on your joint return. One spouse may be held responsible for all the tax due even if all the income was earned by the other spouse.

Divorced taxpayer. You may be held jointly and individually responsible for any tax, interest, and penalties due on a joint return filed before your divorce. This responsibility may apply even if your divorce decree states that your former spouse will be responsible for any amounts due on previously filed joint returns.

Relief from joint responsibility. In some cases, one spouse may be relieved of joint liability for tax, interest, and penalties on a joint return for items of the other spouse which were incorrectly reported on the joint return. You can ask for relief no matter how small the liability.

There are three types of relief available.

Innocent spouse relief, which applies to all joint filers.
Separation of liability, which applies to joint filers who are divorced, widowed, legally separated, or who have not lived together for the 12 months ending on the date election of this relief is filed.
Equitable relief, which applies to all joint filers who do not qualify for innocent spouse relief or separation of liability and to married couples filing separate returns in community property states.

You must file Form 8857, Request for Innocent Spouse Relief, to request any of these kinds of relief. Publication 971, Innocent Spouse Relief, explains these kinds of relief and who may qualify for them.

Signing a joint return. For a return to be considered a joint return, both husband and wife generally must sign the return.

Spouse died before signing. If your spouse died before signing the return, the executor or administrator must sign the return for your spouse. If neither you nor anyone else has yet been appointed as executor or administrator, you can sign the return for your spouse and enter “Filing as surviving spouse” in the area where you sign the return.

Spouse away from home. If your spouse is away from home, you should prepare the return, sign it, and send it to your spouse to sign so that it can be filed on time.

Injury or disease prevents signing. If your spouse cannot sign because of injury or disease and tells you to sign, you can sign your spouse's name in the proper space on the return followed by the words “By (your name), Husband (or Wife).” Be sure to also sign in the space provided for your signature. Attach a dated statement, signed by you, to the return. The statement should include the form number of the return you are filing, the tax year, the reason your spouse cannot sign, and that your spouse has agreed to your signing for him or her.

Signing as guardian of spouse. If you are the guardian of your spouse who is mentally incompetent, you can sign the return for your spouse as guardian.

Spouse in combat zone. If your spouse is unable to sign the return because he or she is serving in a combat zone (such as the Persian Gulf area, Yugoslavia, or Afghanistan), or a qualified hazardous duty area (Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, or Macedonia), and you do not have a power of attorney or other statement, you can sign for your spouse. Attach a signed statement to your return that explains that your spouse is serving in a combat zone. For more information on special tax rules for persons who are serving in a combat zone, or who are in missing status as a result of serving in a combat zone, get Publication 3, Armed Forces' Tax Guide.

Other reasons spouse cannot sign. If your spouse cannot sign the joint return for any other reason, you can sign for your spouse only if you are given a valid power of attorney (a legal document giving you permission to act for your spouse). Attach the power of attorney (or a copy of it) to your tax return. You can use Form 2848.

Nonresident alien or dual-status alien. A joint return generally cannot be filed if either spouse is a nonresident alien at any time during the tax year. However, if one spouse was a nonresident alien or dual-status alien who was married to a U.S. citizen or resident alien at the end of the year, the spouses can choose to file a joint return. If you do file a joint return, you and your spouse are both treated as U.S. residents for the entire tax year. See chapter 1 of Publication 519.

Married Filing Separately

You can choose married filing separately as your filing status if you are married. This filing status may benefit you if you want to be responsible only for your own tax or if it results in less tax than filing a joint return.

If you and your spouse do not agree to file a joint return, you have to use this filing status unless you qualify for head of household status, discussed next.

You may be able to choose head of household filing status if you live apart from your spouse, meet certain tests, and are considered unmarried (explained later, under Head of Household). This can apply to you even if you are not divorced or legally separated. If you qualify to file as head of household, instead of as married filing separately, your tax may be lower, you may be able to claim the earned income credit and certain other credits, and your standard deduction will be higher. The head of household filing status allows you to choose the standard deduction even if your spouse chooses to itemize deductions. See Head of Household, later, for more information.

Unless you are required to file separately, you should figure your tax both ways (on a joint return and on separate returns). This way you can make sure you are using the filing status that results in the lowest combined tax. However, you will generally pay more combined tax on separate returns than you would on a joint return for the reasons listed under Special Rules , later.

How to file. If you file a separate return, you generally report only your own income, exemptions, credits, and deductions on your individual return. You can claim an exemption for your spouse if your spouse had no gross income and was not the dependent of another person. However, if your spouse had any gross income or was the dependent of someone else, you cannot claim an exemption for him or her on your separate return.

If you file as married filing separately, you can use Form 1040A or Form 1040. Select this filing status by checking the box on line 3 of either form. You also must enter your spouse's social security number and full name in the spaces provided. Use the Married filing separately column of the Tax Table or Section C of the Tax Computation Worksheet to figure your tax.

Special Rules

If you choose married filing separately as your filing status, the following special rules apply. Because of these special rules, you will usually pay more tax on a separate return than if you used another filing status that you qualify for.

Your tax rate generally will be higher than it would be on a joint return.
Your exemption amount for figuring the alternative minimum tax will be half that allowed to a joint return filer.
You cannot take the credit for child and dependent care expenses in most cases, and the amount that you can exclude from income under an employer's dependent care assistance program is limited to $2,500 (instead of $5,000 if you filed a joint return).
You cannot take the earned income credit.
You cannot take the exclusion or credit for adoption expenses in most cases.
You cannot take the education credits (the Hope credit and the lifetime learning credit), or the deduction for student loan interest.
You cannot exclude any interest income from qualified U.S. savings bonds that you used for higher education expenses.
If you lived with your spouse at any time during the tax year:
1. You cannot claim the credit for the elderly or the disabled.
2. You will have to include in income more (up to 85%) of any social security or equivalent railroad retirement benefits you received, and
3. You cannot roll over amounts from a traditional IRA into a Roth IRA.
The following credits and deductions are reduced at income levels that are half of those for a joint return:
1. The child tax credit,
2. The retirement savings contributions credit,
3. Itemized deductions, and
4. The deduction for personal exemptions.
Your capital loss deduction limit is $1,500 (instead of $3,000 if you filed a joint return).
If your spouse itemizes deductions, you cannot claim the standard deduction. If you can claim the standard deduction, your basic standard deduction is half the amount allowed on a joint return.

Individual retirement arrangements (IRAs). You may not be able to deduct all or part of your contributions to a traditional IRA if you or your spouse was covered by an employee retirement plan at work during the year. Your deduction is reduced or eliminated if your income is more than a certain amount. This amount is much lower for married individuals who file separately and lived together at any time during the year. For more information, see How Much Can You Deduct? in chapter 1 of Publication 590, Individual Retirement Arrangements (IRAs).

Rental activity losses. If you actively participated in a passive rental real estate activity that produced a loss, you generally can deduct the loss from your nonpassive income up to $25,000. This is called a special allowance. However, married persons filing separate returns who lived together at any time during the year cannot claim this special allowance. Married persons filing separate returns who lived apart at all times during the year are each allowed a $12,500 maximum special allowance for losses from passive real estate activities. See Rental Activities in Publication 925, Passive Activity and At-Risk Rules.

Community property states. If you live in Arizona, California, Idaho, Louisiana, Nevada, New Mexico, Texas, Washington, or Wisconsin and file separately, your income may be considered separate income or community income for income tax purposes. See Publication 555, Community Property.

Joint Return After Separate Returns

You can change your filing status by filing an amended return using Form 1040X.

If you or your spouse (or both of you) file a separate return, you generally can change to a joint return any time within 3 years from the due date of the separate return or returns. This does not include any extensions. A separate return includes a return filed by you or your spouse claiming married filing separately, single, or head of household filing status.

Separate Returns After Joint Return

Once you file a joint return, you cannot choose to file separate returns for that year after the due date of the return.

Exception. A personal representative for a decedent can change from a joint return elected by the surviving spouse to a separate return for the decedent. The personal representative has 1 year from the due date (including extensions) of the return to make the change. See Publication 559 for more information on filing income tax returns for a decedent.

Head of Household

You may be able to file as head of household if you meet all the following requirements.

You are unmarried or “considered unmarried” on the last day of the year.
You paid more than half the cost of keeping up a home for the year.
A “qualifying person” lived with you in the home for more than half the year (except for temporary absences, such as school). However, if the “qualifying person” is your dependent parent, he or she does not have to live with you. See Special rule for parent, later, under Qualifying Person.

If you qualify to file as head of household, your tax rate usually will be lower than the rates for single or married filing separately. You will also receive a higher standard deduction than if you file as single or married filing separately.

How to file. If you file as head of household, you can use either Form 1040A or Form 1040. Indicate your choice of this filing status by checking the box on line 4 of either form. Use the Head of a household column of the Tax Table or Section D of the Tax Computation Worksheet to figure your tax.

Considered Unmarried

To qualify for head of household status, you must be either unmarried or considered unmarried on the last day of the year. You are considered unmarried on the last day of the tax year if you meet all the following tests.

You file a separate return (defined, earlier, under Joint Return After Separate Returns).
You paid more than half the cost of keeping up your home for the tax year.
Your spouse did not live in your home during the last 6 months of the tax year. Your spouse is considered to live in your home even if he or she is temporarily absent due to special circumstances. See Temporary absences, later.
Your home was the main home of your child, stepchild, or eligible foster child for more than half the year. (See Home of qualifying person, later, for rules applying to a child's birth, death, or temporary absence during the year.)
You must be able to claim an exemption for the child. However, you meet this test if you cannot claim the exemption only because the noncustodial parent can claim the child using the rules described later in Children of divorced or separated parents under Qualifying Child or in Support Test for Children of Divorced or Separated Parents under Qualifying Relative. The general rules for claiming an exemption for a dependent are explained later under Exemptions for Dependents.

If you were considered married for part of the year and lived in a community property state (listed earlier under Married Filing Separately ), special rules may apply in determining your income and expenses. See Publication 555 for more information.

Nonresident alien spouse. You are considered unmarried for head of household purposes if your spouse was a nonresident alien at any time during the year and you do not choose to treat your nonresident spouse as a resident alien. However, your spouse is not a qualifying person for head of household purposes. You must have another qualifying person and meet the other tests to be eligible to file as a head of household.

Earned income credit. Even if you are considered unmarried for head of household purposes because you are married to a nonresident alien, you are still considered married for purposes of the earned income credit (unless you meet the five tests listed earlier under Considered Unmarried). You are not entitled to the credit unless you file a joint return with your spouse and meet other qualifications.

See Publication 596 for more information.

Choice to treat spouse as resident. You are considered married if you choose to treat your spouse as a resident alien. See chapter 1 of Publication 519.

Keeping Up a Home

To qualify for head of household status, you must pay more than half of the cost of keeping up a home for the year. You can determine whether you paid more than half of the cost of keeping up a home by using the following worksheet.

Cost of Keeping Up a Home


	Amount You Paid	Total Cost
Property taxes	$	$
Mortgage interest expense
Rent
Utility charges
Upkeep and repairs
Property insurance
Food consumed on the premises
Other household expenses
Totals	$	$

Minus total amount you paid		( )

Amount others paid		$

If the total amount you paid is more than the amount others paid, you meet the requirement of paying more than half the cost of keeping up the home.

Costs you include. Include in the cost of upkeep expenses such as rent, mortgage interest, real estate taxes, insurance on the home, repairs, utilities, and food eaten in the home.

If you used payments you received under Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) or other public assistance programs to pay part of the cost of keeping up your home, you cannot count them as money you paid. However, you must include them in the total cost of keeping up your home to figure if you paid over half the cost.

Costs you do not include. Do not include in the cost of upkeep expenses such as clothing, education, medical treatment, vacations, life insurance, or transportation. Also, do not include the rental value of a home you own or the value of your services or those of a member of your household.

Also do not include any government or charitable assistance you received because of your temporary relocation due to Hurricane Katrina.

Qualifying Person

See Table 4 to see who is a qualifying person.

Any person not described in Table 4 is not a qualifying person.

Example 1—child.

Your unmarried son lived with you all year and was 18 years old at the end of the year. He did not provide more than half of his own support and does not meet the tests to be a qualifying child of anyone else. As a result, he is your qualifying child (see Qualifying Child, later) and, because he is single, is a qualifying person for you to claim head of household filing status.

Example 2—child who is not qualifying person.

The facts are the same as in Example 1 except your son was 25 years old at the end of the year and his gross income was $5,000. Because he does not meet the age test (explained later under Qualifying Child), your son is not your qualifying child. Because he does not meet the gross income test (explained later under Qualifying Relative), he is not your qualifying relative. As a result, he is not your qualifying person for head of household purposes.

Example 3—girlfriend.

Your girlfriend lived with you all year. Even though she may be your qualifying relative if the gross income and support tests (explained later) are met, she is not your qualifying person for head of household purposes. See Table 4, footnote 7.

Example 4—girlfriend's child.

The facts are the same as in Example 3 except your girlfriend's 10-year-old son also lived with you all year. He is not your qualifying child and, because he is your girlfriend's qualifying child, he is not your qualifying relative (see Not a Qualifying Child Test, later). As a result, he is not your qualifying person for head of household purposes.

Home of qualifying person. Generally, the qualifying person must live with you for more than half of the year.

Special rule for parent. If your qualifying person is your father or mother, you may be eligible to file as head of household even if your father or mother does not live with you. However, you must be able to claim an exemption for your father or mother. Also,