You can claim your son if;
- He is under the age 24 and a full time student, and doesn't provide more than half of his total support, or
- If he is older... his gross income is less than $4,050 and you do provide more than half of his total support.
If you do claim him, he is required to file as a dependent if he made more than $6300 on a W-2 or more than $400 as self -employed; he can file anyway to get his withholding back.
I recommend that you enter your son's information into TurboTax, the program will help you determine if he qualifies. If not, you won't have to delete his information, the program will simply not use his info. Please note that his income is never reported on your tax return.
For claiming dependency exemption, a dependent is either:
- Qualifying
child, or
- Qualifying relative
To claim dependency for a qualifying child, the child must:
- Be the taxpayer’s child, stepchild,
eligible foster child, brother, sister, stepbrother, stepsister, niece,
nephew, or descendant of any of them.
- Be younger than
taxpayer and either under age 19 or a full-time student under age 24; or
any age if totally and permanently disabled.
- Live with the taxpayer more than half the year.
- Not
provide more than half of his own support. (Publication 501, page 16)
- Not file a joint
return (unless filed only to claim a refund).
- Not be a qualifying
child of another taxpayer with higher priority under the tie-breaker
rules.
To claim dependency for a qualifying relative, the person
must not be a qualifying child of anyone else and must meet all three test
below:
- The
person cannot be your qualifying child or the qualifying child of any
other taxpayer.
- The person must
either: a. Live with you all year
as a member of your household OR b. Be related to you.
- The person’s gross
income for the year must be less than $4050. (Gross income means all
income in the form of money, property and services that is not exempt from
tax).
- You must provide
more than half of the person’s total support for the year.
