my divorce decree says I can claim both my sons as dependents on federal, state, city taxes. Then it says I may claim HOH for my one son born in 2007 while my ex-husband per divorce decree gets to claim our older son born in 2003. How do I get the children as dependents, yet only file HOH on one son?
Decree says " the mother shall be entitled to claim both children as dependents on her federal, state and local income taxes. The parties acknowledge that father has parenting time with son #1 for more than half the year and may claim "head of household" as it relates to son #1. The mother has parenting time for more than half the year for son #2 and may claim "head of household" as it relates to son #2 on fed, state, local....
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First, head of household is determined by physical custody during the tax year - not the divorce decree. Your ex-husband can only use one of your son's for head of household filing status if your son slept in his home for 183 (184 days in a leap year) days of the year. If both of the son's lived with you for the majority of the year, you are the only one that can claim the children for head of household filing status.
If there is a son than lived with the other parent for more than half of the year that you can claim as a dependent, you will need to make sure that you indicate that the child lived with you for less than 6 months of the year, there is a custody agreement, and that the other parent is letting you claim your child as a dependent.
Tax benefits for children are split as follows when the custodial parent allows the noncustodial parent to claim the children as dependents:
The parent that had physical custody gets:
The noncustodial parent gets:
First, head of household is determined by physical custody during the tax year - not the divorce decree. Your ex-husband can only use one of your son's for head of household filing status if your son slept in his home for 183 (184 days in a leap year) days of the year. If both of the son's lived with you for the majority of the year, you are the only one that can claim the children for head of household filing status.
If there is a son than lived with the other parent for more than half of the year that you can claim as a dependent, you will need to make sure that you indicate that the child lived with you for less than 6 months of the year, there is a custody agreement, and that the other parent is letting you claim your child as a dependent.
Tax benefits for children are split as follows when the custodial parent allows the noncustodial parent to claim the children as dependents:
The parent that had physical custody gets:
The noncustodial parent gets:
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