Military with new spouse

[PDO1]

Here's my situation. I'm active duty home of record Maryland stationed in Maryland.  I have only ever filed Maryland state taxes.  I was married 2024 to my wife who is a travelling nurse.  She's a resident of North Dakota.  She's lived with me in Maryland basically all of 2024 except for two months working in Rhode Island.  For her job she kept her home base as North Dakota (mailing address, driver's license, car registration, etc) because then she doesn't get her stipends taxed or something to that effect.  She received two w-2's for the contract work in Rhode Island and contract work in Maryland.  I have the desktop version and we want to file federal jointly.  What options do I have for filing for the three different states? I thought I would file myself and her jointly for Maryland but wouldn't she be a non-resident since I'm filing her as a resident of North Dakota?

[PDO1]

Also, if I do a MFJ federal and separate us for state, I read that you can do "mock" federal returns for each of us to generate the individual state returns that we'd need.  Has anybody done this?

[MaryK4]

If your wife wishes to retain her North Dakota residency and you are filing a joint federal return, here is how to file your states:

NORTH DAKOTA: You can file using the joint federal and indicate your nonresident status.  You will be required to indicate all of your income as non-ND.  She will get the credit for taxes paid to another jurisdiction, so you will want to prepare this return last.  

RHODE ISLAND: You will want to use the "mock" separate return then she will file separate for Rhode Island.  Here are the instructions:  How do I prepare a joint federal return and separate state returns?

MARYLAND: You can choose to file joint or separate, but since you both have Maryland income, it may be beneficial to file joint.  She will be able to indicate nonresident and allocate her Maryland income on the return.

Please let us know if you have any additional questions.  

[PDO1]

Thanks for replying MaryK4. Truly a life saver..

So in order I can:

1. File MFJ for federal

2.  Do a "mock" seperate federal return for only her to generate a Rhode island return.  Is she filing "single" on the mock federal return to generate the Rhode island return "single"?  Just wondering if we'll get in trouble her filing single in RI and MFJ in federal. Don't know if state and feds crosscheck. 

3. File Maryland Jointly, me as resident and her as nonresident.  Is there any link to show how I'd do that in the software?  When the states pop up, it only gives the option to file resident or nonresident for the whole tax return. 

4. File North Dakota jointly, me as nonresident and her as resident.  Same question as Maryland above.

[MaryK4]

Her mock return will need to be Married- Separate.  Rhode Island does not have itemized deductions, so you can save time and not enter all that info if you had it on your federal.  They will do a check, but it is not an uncommon situations so they do know what to look for- and for most things on the federal, single and married/separate have the same amounts used for thresholds and limits.  

MARYLAND In the Maryland section, you will file a RESIDENT return.  TurboTax should ask you to allocate your wife's income - See the screen below and post here if you do NOT see it and we can help guide/troubleshoot.

NORTH DAKOTA: For North Dakota, you will file a NONRESIDENT ND-1 (TurboTax will default you to this).  The ND allocation entry shows the total from the federal return and you indicate your wife's amount from the total. (see below).  For North Dakota, you will also have to add the credit for the taxes to other states, TurboTax will have the Maryland amount but you will have to have a copy of the Rhode Island return and input the information.

@PDO1 

[PDO1]

I did the mock Fed and RI state return for my wife.  That looks ok.   Then I did the real MFJ federal return.  It suggested I do MD nonresident form 505 but I chose Full-year resident form 502... (should i have picked Part year resident form 502?).  It asked me the area I lived in and I filled in that info.  It asked what county my wife lived in 12/31/24. I put the Maryland county.  It then showed a screenshot similar to what you provided but instead of saying "other Maryland additions", it shows "other Maryland subtractions" with nothing in the total.  The first three rows is all me.  I would have expected the last row to show our combined MD income in the 4th row but it shows zero.  So I'm not sure what I'm supposed to enter under her column.  I tried entering zero and then entering a number and both ways took me to the "two income marriage deduction" notice.  Her MD income was 16k and her RI income was 6K.  Not sure if I'm doing this right?

[MaryK4]

Yes, the Maryland two-income married couple subtraction.  Married couples filing a joint return, when both have taxable income, may subtract up to $1,200 or the income of the spouse with the lower income, whichever is less. @PDO1