At Ask Me Help Desk you can ask questions in any topic and have them
answered for free by our experts. To ask questions or participate in
answering them you must register for a free account. By registering you
will be able to:
Get free answers from experts in any of our 300+
topics.
Filing head of household, 20 year old girlfriend as dependant.
I am doing taxes for a friend. Last year, he used H&R Block and filed as head of household. He claimed his 19 year old girlfriend as a dependant. I would have thought he would not be able to do that. Instead, I thought they would have to file separate raturns for each of them. She was in school part time in 2006 but was not in school in 2007.
Is it legal for him to file as head of household and claim his 20 year olg girlfriend as a dependant or should they be filing separate returns?
She is an adult, he can't legally claim her as a dependent.
Progunr is right - but for the wrong reason. To file as HoH and claim someone as a dependent requires that the person is either a "qualifying child" or a "qualifying relative," which means the GF must be this fellow's child, sibling, parent, grandparent, or in-law. The GF does not qualify - unless there's something really kinky going on
Progunr is right - but for the wrong reason. To file as HoH and claim someone as a dependent requires that the person is either a "qualifying child" or a "qualifying relative," which means the GF must be this fellow's child, sibling, parent, grandparent, or in-law. The GF does not qualify - unless there's something really kinky going on
Well they do live in Apache Junction. If you know about AZ and the Phoenix area that comment may apply! ha
Progunr is right - but for the wrong reason. To file as HoH and claim someone as a dependent requires that the person is either a "qualifying child" or a "qualifying relative," which means the GF must be this fellow's child, sibling, parent, grandparent, or in-law. The GF does not qualify - unless there's something really kinky going on
Progunr is right. You could have just left it with that. Because I assumed that his girlfriend
was not a relative, makes my answer right, but for the wrong reason? OK.
Sorry Progunr - perhaps I was splitting hairs, but what you said was "she is an adult, he can't legally claim her as a dependent," which could be misinterpreted to mean that if the GF was, say, 17 years old he could claim her. That would be incorrect.
He may be able to claim her as a dependent:
A qualifying "relative" does not have to be related.
They have to (1) not be the qualifying child of the taxpayer, (2) must live with the taxpayer for the entire year as a member of the taxpayer's household, (3) have an adjusted gross income of less than $3,400 and (4) the taxpayer must provide more than half of the dependents total support for the tax year.
Many things are not what they appear to be. Ask the right questions and you might get the right answer.
So to clarify all this - the boy friend can claim the GF as a dependent under the rules as a "qualifying relative," but he can not file as Head of Household since the qualifying relative is not a qualifying person for HoH purposes. Bottom line - he should file as single with one dependent. Agreed?
No - he can claim head of houshold if she meets all of the criteria for dependency. She is then a qualifying person. I had a tax professor years ago that said if you try to use logic to figure out tax law most often you will be wrong.
Linear Mode
