education

[mikesuekos]

Son graduated in 2019 from college. Parents paid most expenses including rent , tuition, etc..

He worked 6 months and is filing separately. Can parents claim the expenses?

[MinhT1]

If your son is under age 24 at the end of 2019, a full-time student (for at least 5 months or part-months) and did not provide for more than half of his own support in 2019, you can claim him as a dependent. You can also claim his education credits.

If you claimed him as a dependent and he files his own tax return, he has to indicate on his tax return that he can be claimed as a dependent by someone else.

[Carl]

If your son does not qualify as your dependent for 2019, then you can't claim anything for education expenses paid in 2019.

He worked 6 months and is filing separately.

That tells me he was married on/before Dec 31 of 2019. One requirement for him to qualify as your dependent if he is married, is that he must file as married filing separate. Additionally, his spouse can "NOT' claim the deduction for him on her return, and he must select the option for "I can be claimed on someone else's return" when your son is completing his tax return.

Additionally, assuming he was under the age of 24 on Dec 31 of the tax year, he must also *not* have provided more than half of his own support for the *entire* year.

It's important for your son to understand that when a married couple files separate, they both "AUTOMATICALLY" disqualify themselves for a large number of deductions and credits they would have qualified for if they filed joint. This includes all education expenses, as well as any deduction for interest he may have paid on a qualified student loan.

If kids are involved, they will not be able to take the EITC or the deduction for childcare expenses.

So just be aware of all that they will potentially lose, if you want to claim him as a dependent on your tax return.

[Carl]

Oh one other thing. If your son does in fact qualify as your dependent under the "qualifying child dependent" rules, there is no requirement for the parents to provide the student any support. Not one single penny. THe support requirement is on the student, and *ONLY* the student. That requirement reads:

"If the student did *NOT* provide more than 50% of their own support (scholarships, grants, 529 distributions, etc., *do* *not* *count* for the student providing their own support) then the parents' qualify to claim the student as a dependent on the parent's tax return.

There are only two possible ways the student can provide more than half of their own support.

1) The student had a job or was self-employed and actually earned enough money during the tax year to justify their claim to providing more than half of their own support. That earned money also has to be an amount that is "MORE" than all other third party support recevied by or provided to the student, or provided to the student's school on the student's behalf. That includes scholarships, grants and 529 distributions.

2) The student was the *PRIMARY* borrower on a *qualified* student loan, and sufficient funds were distributed to the student in the tax year to justify a claim to the student providing more than half of their own support.