filing status - need answer

[indian6]

my wife is living in india from 2013 and i am living us all these years. All these years i am filing as married filing separately.
can i file married jointly? only obvious reason is biggest refund. my wife has ssn.

fyi this is from irs websitee

1. I am a U.S. citizen married to a nonresident alien. What is my filing status and can I claim an exemption for my foreign spouse?
In general, if you are a U.S. citizen or resident alien married to a nonresident alien, you are considered ?Married Filing Separately? unless you qualify for a different filing status.
If you pay more than half the cost of keeping up a home for yourself and a qualifying child or other relative, you may qualify for the head of household filing status. ---- i don't think i qualify for this, since my kids are living in india as well.


If you are a U.S. citizen or resident alien married to a nonresident alien, you and your spouse can choose to have your spouse treated as a U.S. resident for all U.S. federal income tax purposes. This allows you and your spouse to file a joint return, but also subjects your nonresident alien spouse?s worldwide income to U.S. income tax.

i am using turbo tax software, which is selecting married filing jointly based on my inputs, i mentioned that she lived in a foreign country all 2015.

can the tax experts answer? thanks

[okonomi]

my wife is living in india from 2013 and i am living us all these years. All these years i am filing as married filing separately.
can i file married jointly? only obvious reason is biggest refund. my wife has ssn.

fyi this is from irs websitee

1. I am a U.S. citizen married to a nonresident alien. What is my filing status and can I claim an exemption for my foreign spouse?
In general, if you are a U.S. citizen or resident alien married to a nonresident alien, you are considered “Married Filing Separately” unless you qualify for a different filing status.
If you pay more than half the cost of keeping up a home for yourself and a qualifying child or other relative, you may qualify for the head of household filing status. ---- i don't think i qualify for this, since my kids are living in india as well.


If you are a U.S. citizen or resident alien married to a nonresident alien, you and your spouse can choose to have your spouse treated as a U.S. resident for all U.S. federal income tax purposes. This allows you and your spouse to file a joint return, but also subjects your nonresident alien spouse’s worldwide income to U.S. income tax.

i am using turbo tax software, which is selecting married filing jointly based on my inputs, i mentioned that she lived in a foreign country all 2015.

can the tax experts answer? thanks

You are eligible to file MFJ. You had been eligible to file MFJ in the past years as well. And all your children are dependents (do you have tax payer ID numbers for each of your children?).

However, remember that any earnings of your wife in India would have to be reported as your world-wide joint income on your US Tax Returns... or the Turbo Tax questionnaire. If the total balance of any of your +your wife's bank accounts exceed $10000 during the year, you should also remember to file FinCEN 114 ( Foreign bank account reporting requirement) before June 30th.

If your wife is employed (suffering TDS etc..), has a lot of financial investments of a complex nature, and files India Income taxes, you may have chosen a US tax filing status of MFS to keep out the hassle of complexity of tax filing and dual taxation issues. Each person has a different monetary value on avoiding tax filing hassles.

I believe (not sure...) Turbo Tax may allow you to do either of MFJ and MFS.

[kkassociate]

Dear Indian6,

You can file MFJ, please note by doing so, you will be required to report the global income for your spouse as well, along with that all the required compliance needs to be done for FBAR, FATCA filings etc.

I hope the above helps. We provide both US and India tax filing and planning services, you can drop us an email on [email][email protected][/email] visit us at www.kkassociate.com

Regards,
KKA,
US and India Tax Filers and Advisors
www.kkassociate.com

my wife is living in india from 2013 and i am living us all these years. All these years i am filing as married filing separately.
can i file married jointly? only obvious reason is biggest refund. my wife has ssn.

fyi this is from irs websitee

1. I am a U.S. citizen married to a nonresident alien. What is my filing status and can I claim an exemption for my foreign spouse?
In general, if you are a U.S. citizen or resident alien married to a nonresident alien, you are considered “Married Filing Separately” unless you qualify for a different filing status.
If you pay more than half the cost of keeping up a home for yourself and a qualifying child or other relative, you may qualify for the head of household filing status. ---- i don't think i qualify for this, since my kids are living in india as well.


If you are a U.S. citizen or resident alien married to a nonresident alien, you and your spouse can choose to have your spouse treated as a U.S. resident for all U.S. federal income tax purposes. This allows you and your spouse to file a joint return, but also subjects your nonresident alien spouse’s worldwide income to U.S. income tax.

i am using turbo tax software, which is selecting married filing jointly based on my inputs, i mentioned that she lived in a foreign country all 2015.

can the tax experts answer? thanks

[indian6]

Thanks,
If your wife is employed (suffering TDS etc..), has a lot of financial investments of a complex nature, and files India Income taxes, you may have chosen a US tax filing status of MFS to keep out the hassle of complexity of tax filing and dual taxation issues. Each person has a different monetary value on avoiding tax filing hassles.

Yes, this is what exactly make things complicated. Even though she worked for few months , but she has few investments on her name. I may choose to do MFS to avoid all these hassles. Thanks for your inputs.
fyi - as far as my kids, one is USC and other has TIN and not USC. but Turbo tax considers USC kid only as dependent and not the other one who is not USC.