Thank you for this wonderful service. Apologies if you have answered this question before. I got married last August 2010 and my wife is living outside US. Her application to come to US is currently in process. She has never worked/lived in US before. I believe I need to file “Married Filing Jointly” on my taxes as the returns are supposedly higher. Please correct me if I am wrong. She has no income as she is not working and my current income is below $65,000. I am telling her to fill out the W7 form and send me notarized copies of her passport so that she can get an ITIN. I believe I then need to file the taxes by mail. If the tax returns are going to be insignificant or none then I would not want to go through all this trouble and therefore would file “Married but Filing Separately”.

Thanks and any advice would be appreciated.

The difference between Filing Married Filing Separately and Married Filing Jointly WILL be significant if your wife is not working, so, yes, it IS worth the effort.

You have the basic idea right, but, in addition to getting the passport photocopy notarized, she must also get an apostille (a certificate of authenticity) from the government agency that issued her passport, or the IRS will reject the ITIN request.

Note that she must also sign BOTH the tax return and the Form W-7. The process WILL be time-consuming, but it IS feasible; I do it every year for my clients. It IS what I do!

If you need professional help filing your return, email me at [email protected].