I currently make 100,000 a year before taxes and wanted to raise my pay as we are thinking of buying a house. My wife does not work and I have 4 children. Currently I am claiming 9 allowances. Am I able to claim 11? I normally get a refund of 3500 a year.
What are you calling an "allowance"? From what I see, you have a total of 6 "exemptions" - one for each child and the self-exemption for you and the wife. Where is this 9 and 11 coming from?
On the personal allowances worksheet I am entering 1 in A, 1 in B, 1 in C, 2 in D (I had 2 kids at the time), and 4 in G. Which is a total of 9 exemptions. I plan on updating my W-4 to reflect the fact that I have 4 kids now so on line D it would be 4, which means my exemptions would be 11. I wanted to know if was able to do that or not.
I've just conducted a search through my entire 247 page 2015 return (PDF file) and find no worksheet called "personal allowance" Care to elaborate more so I have a clue what each letter you reference, refers to? Also, I have no clue what flavor of the program you're using, and weather you're online or desktop.
The personal allowances worksheet is part of the W4
<a rel="nofollow" target="_blank" href="https://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-pdf/fw4.pdf">https://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-pdf/fw4.pdf</a>
You can claim anything you want on the W4. It doesn't have to match your tax return. The W4 is not reported to the IRS.
Turbo Tax can help you fill out the W4. You can just type w-4 or W4 in the search box at the top of your return , click on Find. Then Click on Jump To w-4
Or go to
Federal Taxes Tab or Personal (for H&B version)
Other Tax Situations
Other Tax Forms
Form W-4 and Estimated Taxes - Click the Start or Update button
Ok thanks everyone. I heard that the max exemptions you can claim is 10. My old W4 was based on me having 2 kids. I was thinking if I updated it to reflect the fact that I now I have 4 it would then be 11. Since I currently get a refund of around 3500 a year I am assuming that having new exemptions at 11 would increase my take home pay, but of course not have a refund at the end of the year.
Thanks Critter #2, did not know that. I will adjust my W4 today.
Try this tool: