no tax refund even though head of household with a dependent and no income but paid property taxes

[Didi1989]

I got minimal refund in state and virtually nothing for state income tax refund. Is that right? I paid a lot of property taxes but have no income, HOH with a dependent.

[CatinaT1]

It's hard to say without more information. What state? You say you have no income, if that is accurate you wouldn't qualify as head of household. Head of Household is for people who have a qualifying child and pay more than half the cost of keeping up the home. Most credits require you to have income.

Why did my refund go down compared to last year's?

[Didi1989]

Federal gave 7$ refund and CA state gave about 1k but I paid so much more in property taxes. I have been keeping up all the financial responsibilities for my dependent but without any type of w-2 or 1099 income. My family helps us out a lot for meantime but they aren't filing 1099's for the support or rent fogiveness for meantime or anything. So idk why I got so small refund.

[DawnC]

Property taxes are an itemized deduction.   Those deductions help to reduce your tax bill.   But since you had no income, you had no tax bill to reduce.  In your case, you paid no taxes and had no tax bill, so there is nothing to refund.   You need earned income to receive any refundable tax credits like the Additional Child Tax Credit or Earned Income Credit.   Both of those credits require some earned income be reported.   

To maximize those credits, you need to have w-2 income or self-employment reported on your tax return.   What is earned income?