married status

[Shillers]

Last year my husband and I owed. We both filed out our W4's as married jointly, 1. At the time I made 5k more than him. When we realized we owed so much, we talked to a family friend tax accountant, after reviewing our W2's he suggested we claim married, hold at single rate and 1. We changed out W4's last year around March. And now we owe again. What do we do? Everything I'm reading says we should claim married filing jointly. When I put in just my W2 information, I get a refund but when I put in my husband's information, we owe. What should we do??

[Critter-3]

On the new W-4  there is no "1" option any longer ... you should BOTH choose the  single/ MFS option and leave the rest of the form blank.   In a couple of weeks  you see that you will not have enough withheld then one of you should add an amount to line 4c  ...  say you will be 1200 short and you are paid monthly then you would enter $100 on that line ... this amount is added to what is already being withheld.

Of course you changed last year in march which means you were under withheld for the first 1/3 or 1/4 of the year ... so if you extrapolate the difference in the quarterly withholding and you will be ok going forward you really have nothing to change. 

Of course you could waste a lot of time completing the 4 page worksheet for each of you if you don't use my shortcut. 

[Shillers]

Why should we claim MFS instead of MFJ? Everything i'm reading says it's not beneficial to file MFS?

[HelenC12]

If you still owe after withholding at the higher single rate and one (1), reduce it to zero. Even then, you may have to have extra withholding. See Form W-4, Step 4, (4c). 

Please read the TurboTax FAQ Why did my refund drop when I entered a second W-2? for an explanation of how a second W-2 affects your income tax return(s).

[DoninGA]

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@Shillers wrote:

Why should we claim MFS instead of MFJ? Everything i'm reading says it's not beneficial to file MFS?

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What you select on the W-4 has absolutely no bearing on the filing status you enter on your tax return.  As noted filing a tax return as Married Filing Jointly is usually the best filing option when married.

[Shillers]

Can you explain what the difference is between claiming married file jointly and married file separately?

[DoninGA]

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@Shillers wrote:

Can you explain what the difference is between claiming married file jointly and married file separately?

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See this TurboTax support FAQ for filing jointly versus separately - https://ttlc.intuit.com/community/married/help/is-it-better-for-a-married-couple-to-file-jointly-or-...

[Critter-3]

What  you put on the W-4 simply tells the employer which withholding chart to use and what you have on the W-4 doesn't have to be the same as what is on the tax return.   See the withholding charts here:

https://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-pdf/p15t.pdf