How does getting married affect my tax return

[Mvaught8476]

My fiance always files head of household and claims our 4 children because I don’t work, we’ll be getting married next month so that will be the only change to his tax return. Will that change the amount of our refund? 

[Faith C]

Hi Mvaught8476,

First of all, congratulations for getting married! Filing married jointly can give you some tax advantages, but it all depends from cases to cases. Our tax calculator is a great tool for you to get an idea how the change on marital status can affect your tax return. You will first want to try to file as head of household (based on your case), and then try again with married filing jointly. If you work, you will also want to include your income when doing the calculation. 

I hope the tax calculator will answer your questions. Please feel free to contact our TurboTax Live if you have any further questions. Again, congratulations and best wish to you and your family! 

[K M W]

First and foremost, congrats on the upcoming wedding!

To answer your question, the main change will be in the Filing Status used, which can also impact several other areas of the tax return.

The filing status used will be either Married Filing Joint (MFJ) or Married Filing Separate (MFS).  Generally speaking, MFJ usually is better than filing separate.  The IRS rules are that your filing status is determined as of the last day of the year - so if you are legally married as of December 31, then you are considered married for the entire year. 

The amount of tax assessed on your income is dependent in part on your filing status.  Going from the Head of Household filing status to the Married Filing Joint filing status, less of the income is taxed at higher tax rates. For example, if the only income for the year was from a W2 job, and Taxable Income is $50,000, under the Head of Household filing status the 2022 tax (before credits and withholdings) would be $5,707.  But if the filing status were Married Filing Joint, the tax would be $5,589.

The second big change is in the Standard Deduction.  The Standard Deduction for 2022 is $19,400 for Head of Household, but is $25,900 for Married Filing Jointly.  So for a taxpayer that is taking the Standard Deduction, the amount of the deduction increases.

Those will be the main items that change when a taxpayer becomes married. Of course, there are other tax credits and benefits that may be impacted, based on phaseout amounts and other limitations.

[VolvoGirl]

Have you been filing your own tax return?  Has he been claiming you as a dependent too?   When you get married a spouse is never a dependent.

Here's some general info on getting married.  Did you both use Turbo Tax last year?

You can not transfer from or combine 2 returns or accounts.  Just pick the return for the spouse that has the most complicated return to enter or has any depreciation or business or  more investments.  Or use the account for whoever you want to be listed first going forward (by the way you can not change the order of the names).  Then add the other spouse's name, ssn and info to it.

You should usually  file a Joint return which is only 1 return combined for the both of you.  Make sure to stick with this one account for the future.  Just ignore the other spouse's account.

Getting Married FAQ

https://ttlc.intuit.com/community/tax-filing-status/help/what-does-getting-married-mean-for-my-taxes...

And info on Getting Married…..

http://turbotax.intuit.com/tax-tools/tax-tips/Family/Getting-Married/INF12006.html

Is it better to file Joint or Separately?

https://ttlc.intuit.com/questions/1894449-is-it-better-for-a-married-couple-to-file-jointly-or-separ...

[SuziM]

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