Hi
A new job sounds exciting. Congratulations!
Of course, the first thing would be determine whether you have a gain. The fees and closing costs on the home may more than offset any increase in the value since you purchased it. If the gain is small, you may not wish to elect any exclusion because you can only use it once every two years, so you may want to keep your powder dry. For example, if you bought the house for $500,000 and sold it for $540,000 and fees and closing costs were $36,000, your gain would be $4,000 ($540,000 minus ($500,000 plus $36,000). If there’s a chance of another move, you might want to pay the tax on the $4,000.
You may qualify for a part of the exclusion for capital gains on the house. Let’s assume that you have moved for the new job to live closer to the place you worked. This is called an unforeseen circumstance and you can claim a partial exclusion. I assume, when you saw “we”, that you are married filing jointly and both lived in the home. In that case you can claim an exclusion of 7/24 (7 months / 24 months) of the $500,000 exclusion, or approximately $146,000.
I hope this answers the question you were asking. Once again, congratulations.
Regards
maxthetax
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