Us citizen living abroad

Forum|Forum|7 years ago
June 7, 2019
5 replies
16 views

Dear Sir/ Madam,

I am US citizen living abroad in Europe and my concern is about filing taxes. I am not sure which form to fill in for the income earning less than 9000$ per year. My question is do i qualify for income tax exclusion (because i earn less than 9000$ per year)?, and another question is when you are unemployed in foreign country do you still need to file any form (to report 0 earned income or any other procedure). I would really appreciate your help by answering these questions.

Thank you and Best regards

Visar

Best answer by bine22

With $9000 in income you are below the filing requirements, so theoretically you would not need to file. But please remember, that all foreign income needs to be reported (including unemployment). It might also be a good idea to file anyway to create some sort or track so the IRS wont come after you years later demanding you file.

If you qualify, you can use the foreign earned income exclusion (if you even need it, since your income of $9000 would not be taxed anyway as it is below personal exemption plus standard deduction), another option is the foreign paid tax credit.

Have a look at publication 54:https://www.irs.gov/publications/p54/

If you have foreign accounts with 10,000 USD or more at one point during the year, you would have to report those as well.

A lot of countries also have tax treaties with the US regulating how certain types of income are taxed and where.