If my spouse and I are residents of state X and I receive UI from state X, but my spouse earns money from state Z do I need to report my unemployment income to state Z?

[DanielV01]

You will answer that your California residency is from 01/01/2020 to 12/31/2020 (all year).  You will state that your wife is a Calfiornia nonresident.  The Arizona return should have similar questions and answers.

[DanielV01]

The other thing you will do is go back to the Personal Information section and make sure that you state that your resident state is California but that your wife's residency is Arizona.  There are spaces for each when you enter in your personal information.

[Yume]

@DanielV01 The spouse became a resident of AZ about 3 months into 2020 when they were hired for the AZ job.  Does this change anything?

[DanielV01]

Only somewhat.  You will want to make sure that the Arizona residency period is marked in the Personal Information screen.  California's return will still be a Nonresident return, and Arizona's return will definitely be a part-year resident return.  Both will tax only the income earned in the state.

[Yume]

@DanielV01 I've gone through the workflow for CA (with the residency period for AZ is marked in the personal info section and answered for the residency questions) and the screen that lists the state returns still says "Resident".  I'm not sure if this has anything to do with it, but the "Residency Information Before 2020" page has us both marked as "Yes" for line 1, "No" for line 2, and "No" for line 3 (I'm assuming that lines 2 and 3 are regarding other periods of residency in CA) and the next page has my dates as the whole year and her dates until the end of her residency in the state.

[DanielV01 · Accepted solution]

This comes from California's Instructions Guidelines for Determining Residency Status (FTB Publication 1031) :

"However, if you file a joint return and either spouse/RDP
was a nonresident or a part-year resident in 2020, file
a Form 540NR, California Nonresident or Part-Year
Resident Income Tax Return."

You need to go to the beginning of the California return and manually select the California nonresident return.  If you do not have that option, you may need to contact customer service.