@waterskier wrote:
Thank you for the reply.
Yes, as I mentioned it the beginning. She lives with us and watched our children in the home we share together.
You can look at it two ways. Neither the IRS or anyone else would question it if you did not claim the childcare expenses and she did not claim the income and you just treated it as her sharing household chores and expenses and you just gave her gifts to appreciate it. That is just a family sharing a home, chores and costs and there are no tax consequences.
If you want to claim a tax deduction for child care, which you can, then she must claim the income as household employee income.
She would report it as:
Household Employee income under $2,100 should be reported in:
Miscellaneous Income
Other Income not reported on a W-2
Other wages (yes)
House Hold Employee.
OR Use the "Tools" menu (if online version under My Account) and then "Search Topics" for "household employee income” which will take you to the same place.
In her case, since the $2,100 limit does not apply, she can enter any amount that she received. That would put the income on line 1 on the 1040 form just as if it was W-2 wages with HSH next to it.
**Disclaimer: This post is for discussion purposes only and is NOT tax advice. The author takes no responsibility for the accuracy of any information in this post.**
