generally, if you are maintaining a home / household for a qualifying child. relative and you pay at least 1/2 of all expenses for the home, then you can claim HOH filing status -- the number of qualifying children do not make a difference. Where it gets sticky , is if each of you take a child and claim HOH in the same physical home. Can be done? yes Should it be done ? probably no. If you do do it, then you have make very sure that the same home is supporting two households i.e. funds / expenses are not co-mingled and extremely well documented, if challenged. It is not an easy path , to live together and keep funds and expenses completely separate for each household, it is like living in two separate apartments in the same building.
