As your spouse is a nonresident, to file jointly, you would need to make an election to claim him as a resident. TurboTax does not provide any tools or forms to assist you to make the election, unfortunately. You would need to follow IRS's instructions to attach the statement to your 2020 tax return. You cannot e-file. Instead, print out all your tax forms along with the statement and paper-file. Click here to see Nonresident to resident
If your spouse did not have SSN or ITIN, you would need to apply for an ITIN for him. To do so, you must file a Form W-7 along with filing your tax return. Without an SSN or ITIN, you won't be able to e-file either.
To prepare your tax return in the program, here are the steps:
- In the program, as you enter the information, leave the SSN space blank
- After entering all your information, print out returns and required forms ( write APPLIED in the spouse's space)
- As TurboTax does not support the Form W-7, fill out the forms by following
- https://www.irs.gov/Individuals/General-ITIN-Information and attach to other required documentation
- Submit both the Form W-7 and your tax forms to IRS Austin location in Texas. ( see Form W-7 instructions)
As far as your foreign account, if you collected interest in the account and met certain requirements, you would need to file a Form 8938. Here are the steps:
In TurboTax online,
- Sign in to your TurboTax account and select Pick up where you left off
- At the right upper corner, in the search box, type in "foreign assets" and Enter
- Select Jump to foreign assets
- Follow prompts
- On-screen, Amounts Related to Foreign Financial Assets, enter information
A Form 8938 is used when you have specified foreign financial assets and the total value of all the foreign assets in which you have an interest is more than the appropriate reporting threshold. For details, click here: https://www.irs.gov/instructions/i8938
As you have earned foreign income, you might qualify for a foreign income exclusion. If you did not receive any US tax documents like a W-2 or 1099, follow these steps to enter information:
- After sign into your account, select Pick up where you left off
- At the right upper corner, in the search box, type in "foreign income" and Enter
- Select Jump to foreign income
- Follow prompts
After you enter the information, if you qualify for a foreign earned income exclusion, the program will prompt you to fill out a Form 2555 Foreign Earned Income Exclusion. To qualify, you have to live outside the United States for at least 330 days during 12 consecutive months. For more information, please see Foreign income and exclusion and Extension.
If you have paid taxes to both foreign and the US tax authorities, the IRS allows you to claim a foreign tax credit on your US tax return. To claim this foreign tax credit, you would need to file a Form 1116 Foreign Tax Credit.
Here are the steps:
- At the right upper corner, in the search box, type in "foreign tax credit" and Enter
- Select Jump to foreign tax credit
- Follow prompts
For example, if you made $110,000 overseas, you can use the exclusion Form 2555 to exclude up to $107,600, then apply the foreign tax credit on the difference (110,000-107,600). Or you can use foreign tax credit on the whole amount, whichever benefits you the most. However, you cannot use both benefits ( double-dip) on the same amount.
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