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Education
Just one part that I would like to point out and reiterate.
You cannot claim a credit if you are, or can be, claimed as a dependent by someone else.
So if you qualify to be claimed as a dependent on someone else's tax return (such as your parents) then you can not claim any credits. The key word here is *qualify*. It flat out does not matter if your parents claim you as a dependent or not. If they *QUALIFY* to claim you (and the probably do) then you can not claim any education credits at all.
There are 5 qualification requirements, with the support requirement being the most misunderstood one. That requirement reads:
If the student did not provide more than 50% of the students own support, then the parents qualify to claim the student as a dependent on the parent's tax return.
Note that the support requirement is on the student, and only the student. There is no requirement for the parents to provide any support - not one penny. There are only two possible ways the student can provide more than 50% of their own support.
- If the student had a W-2 job or was self-employed during the tax year, and made enough money to "prove" they provided more than 50% of their own support.
- If the student is the "PRIMARY" borrower on a qualified student loan, and sufficient funds were distributed to the student during the tax year to justify and prove the borrowed money provided more than 50% of the student's support.
Even with both of the above, it's still possible for the student to not provide more than 50% of their own support. For example, if the student has a job making $100,000 a year and receives $50,000 in scholarships, grants and/or 529 distributions. If tuition comes to $20K for the year, rent for the year comes to $15K and food, clothing and other support requirements come to another $15K, that's a total of $50K for the entire tax year. So the $50K of scholarships, grants and 529 distributions would be applied to those support expenses *first*. Therefore it wouldn't matter if the student earned a million dollars. There's just no way possible the student provided more than half of their own support. The parent's qualify to claim the student as a dependent on the parent's tax return.