topic My husband and I are married filing separately - can or should he claim one of our children, and I claim the other child? in Get your taxes done using TurboTax

My husband and I are married filing separately - can or should he claim one of our children, and I claim the other child?

eddy-silverman — Sat, 28 Mar 2020 20:52:34 GMT

Re: My husband and I are married filing separately - can or should he claim one of our children, ...

JotikaT2 — Sat, 28 Mar 2020 21:08:43 GMT

That is totally up to you.

Just be sure each child is only being claimed once in any given tax year or there will be delays processing your return.

Re: My husband and I are married filing separately - can or should he claim one of our children, and I claim the other child?

DoninGA — Sat, 28 Mar 2020 21:11:28 GMT

It is your choice how you claim the children.

Since you are filing separately you are now going to lose any Earned Income Credit, Education Credits and the Child and Dependent Care Credit if you were eligible. You both must use the Standard Deduction or your both muse use Itemized Deductions. You have to file two separate tax returns and pay for two TurboTax online accounts.

If you live in a community property state, filing separately is even more complex.

TurboTax support FAQ for filing jointly versus separately - https://ttlc.intuit.com/community/married/help/is-it-better-for-a-married-couple-to-file-jointly-or-separately/01/25590

Re: My husband and I are married filing separately - can or should he claim one of our children, and I claim the other child?

D2TIMES — Sat, 28 Mar 2020 21:13:32 GMT

With TurboTax, it is so easy. Try it all THREE WAYS ways and see which way you come out better. The three wats are both with you, both with your husband and one each. It only takes a few clicks to do it.

Re: My husband and I are married filing separately - can or should he claim one of our children, and I claim the other child?

DoninGA — Sat, 28 Mar 2020 21:19:09 GMT

@D2TIMES wrote:

With TurboTax, it is so easy. Try it all THREE WAYS ways and see which way you come out better. The three wats are both with you, both with your husband and one each. It only takes a few clicks to do it.

Not with a few clicks it can't. To compare, there would have to be three separate tax returns created. One for each spouse filing separately and one for them filing jointly.

See this - https://ttlc.intuit.com/community/married/help/how-can-we-compare-married-filing-jointly-with-married-filing-separately/00/26551

Re: My husband and I are married filing separately - can or should he claim one of our children, and I claim the other child?

Jim01 — Sat, 28 Mar 2020 21:21:51 GMT

My wife and I have always filed separately and claimed our children to our tax advantage. Some years they were all on one return, other years they were split between returns. As was said previously, it is up to you. We found for us that it saved on federal and lost on state over filing jointly.