My son is in college in KY & lived there full time in 2016. He earned $ in KY only. For tax purposes, is he a resident of KY? Even though we live in another state

[ldlydick]

He still has an Illinois driver's license, but an apartment in KY.

[DanielV01 · Accepted solution]

It depends.  The key is that he's in school.  School is considered a temporary absence, unless he has made a definitive move to make Kentucky his permanent home.  If you are claiming him as a dependent for tax purposes, he is not a Kentucky resident, but an Illinois resident.  The fact that he has an apartment in Kentucky does not in and of itself make him a KY resident.  What matters is if he is temporary in Kentucky for school or not.

If he is an Illinois resident, his income is taxable to Illinois, but not Kentucky, because Illinois and Kentucky are reciprocal states and agree to only tax you in the state you live.  Because of this, he would want to file an Illinois resident return and a Kentucky nonresident reciprocal return.  Kentucky returns all of the taxes withheld, but then he pays tax on his income to Illinois.

However, if he has truly moved to Kentucky and plans to make KY his permanent home, he could correctly file a Kentucky resident return, and it would not be necessary to report anything to Illinois because he does not live there anymore.