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naturegirl321
Joined: 18 Jul 2006
Location: Home sweet home
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 Posted: Tue Feb 15, 2011 1:26 am Post subject: If you file US taxes and get free housing, then . . . |
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YOu'll have to file the LONG form of the 2555 and fill out
line 21a (housing)
21b (meals, if you get them)
And if you got airfare, severance, and pension, you also have to claim that. BUt I'd just put it under income (line 19) |
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decolyon
Joined: 24 Jul 2010
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| Posted: Tue Feb 15, 2011 4:32 am Post subject: |
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| I'm just about to send my tax stuff off to the family accountant in the States. What's the benefit/drawback of claiming housing as you said and just ignoring it? |
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naturegirl321
Joined: 18 Jul 2006
Location: Home sweet home
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| Posted: Tue Feb 15, 2011 4:50 am Post subject: |
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| decolyon wrote: |
| I'm just about to send my tax stuff off to the family accountant in the States. What's the benefit/drawback of claiming housing as you said and just ignoring it? |
Legally, you have to declare it. YOu're allowed $91,500, if you put housing at $500 a month, that's an extra of $6000 a year, Let's say that you make $3000 a month, rounding up highly, so that's a total of $36,000 plus $6,000
Grand total of $42,000, you're still in the clear and don't have to pay US taxes.
Drawback of not declaring it, well, you'd be lying on your taxes. |
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redaxe
Joined: 01 Dec 2008
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| Posted: Tue Feb 15, 2011 7:24 am Post subject: |
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| Yeah, you do have to declare those benefits as income, but you don't necessarily have to itemize them, you could also just add all your benefits up together and put the number in the income adjustment box, effectively claiming them as cash income. |
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AsiaESLbound
Joined: 07 Jan 2010
Location: Truck Stop Missouri
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| Posted: Tue Feb 15, 2011 5:06 pm Post subject: |
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| I still yet to get my 2009 filing in as my electronic filing failed last year where they rejected it without explanation and it needs to be sent in on paper. So for filing 2010, you wouldn't be taxed on housing in Korea as long you spent at least 330 days abroad, because your tax exempt teaching income is much lower than the max exemption? |
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naturegirl321
Joined: 18 Jul 2006
Location: Home sweet home
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| Posted: Tue Feb 15, 2011 5:13 pm Post subject: |
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| redaxe wrote: |
| Yeah, you do have to declare those benefits as income, but you don't necessarily have to itemize them, you could also just add all your benefits up together and put the number in the income adjustment box, effectively claiming them as cash income. |
You can't file the 2555 EZ if you get housing, so you're forced to itemise, i.e. file the long form. But I agree, just guestimate and add it on line 21, you'll still be FAR below the 91,500 cut off.
| AsiaESLbound wrote: |
| I still yet to get my 2009 filing in as my electronic filing failed last year where they rejected it without explanation and it needs to be sent in on paper. So for filing 2010, you wouldn't be taxed on housing in Korea as long you spent at least 330 days abroad, because your tax exempt teaching income is much lower than the max exemption? |
If you live overseas, you have to kill trees and file on paper 
No, you won't be taxes on housing if you have less than 91,500 TOTAL, including housing, and I highly doubt the majority of teachers in Korea will. Sad, but true. |
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tideout
Joined: 12 Dec 2010
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| Posted: Sun Apr 24, 2011 5:01 pm Post subject: State taxes |
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| What, if anything are people doing about the taxes in their states? |
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rainism
Joined: 13 Apr 2011
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| Posted: Sun Apr 24, 2011 5:04 pm Post subject: |
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shell out the dough for Turbotax, it's worth it, considering the nightmare hassle of navigating the nonsense on those forms.
tax returns from outside the country cannot be filed electonically, so you'll have to send them via snail mail and take a trip to the post office. |
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northway
Joined: 05 Jul 2010
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| Posted: Sun Apr 24, 2011 7:19 pm Post subject: Re: State taxes |
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| tideout wrote: |
| What, if anything are people doing about the taxes in their states? |
Ignoring it. I've always been a dependent when living at home, and this is the first time I'm filing as an independent. Considering I'm unlikely to ever live there again, Massachusetts can bugger off. |
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naturegirl321
Joined: 18 Jul 2006
Location: Home sweet home
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| Posted: Sun Apr 24, 2011 7:50 pm Post subject: Re: State taxes |
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| tideout wrote: |
| What, if anything are people doing about the taxes in their states? |
File the 2555
| northway wrote: |
| tideout wrote: |
| What, if anything are people doing about the taxes in their states? |
Ignoring it. I've always been a dependent when living at home, and this is the first time I'm filing as an independent. Considering I'm unlikely to ever live there again, Massachusetts can bugger off. |
Never say never. I'm guessing you're still in your 20s? State taxes, I can see about not filing, if you can prove that you don't have anything that really holds you there, such as property. federal taxes, just file. It's required by law. It's not like you're going to owe anyting, but you still have to file. |
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northway
Joined: 05 Jul 2010
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| Posted: Sun Apr 24, 2011 8:51 pm Post subject: Re: State taxes |
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| naturegirl321 wrote: |
| northway wrote: |
| tideout wrote: |
| What, if anything are people doing about the taxes in their states? |
Ignoring it. I've always been a dependent when living at home, and this is the first time I'm filing as an independent. Considering I'm unlikely to ever live there again, Massachusetts can bugger off. |
Never say never. I'm guessing you're still in your 20s? State taxes, I can see about not filing, if you can prove that you don't have anything that really holds you there, such as property. federal taxes, just file. It's required by law. It's not like you're going to owe anyting, but you still have to file. |
Of course I'm filing federal, I'm just not going to file in a state where I have nothing in my name aside from a bank account when said state is going to want 5% of my earnings. |
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redaxe
Joined: 01 Dec 2008
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| Posted: Sun Apr 24, 2011 9:52 pm Post subject: Re: State taxes |
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| northway wrote: |
| naturegirl321 wrote: |
| northway wrote: |
| tideout wrote: |
| What, if anything are people doing about the taxes in their states? |
Ignoring it. I've always been a dependent when living at home, and this is the first time I'm filing as an independent. Considering I'm unlikely to ever live there again, Massachusetts can bugger off. |
Never say never. I'm guessing you're still in your 20s? State taxes, I can see about not filing, if you can prove that you don't have anything that really holds you there, such as property. federal taxes, just file. It's required by law. It's not like you're going to owe anyting, but you still have to file. |
Of course I'm filing federal, I'm just not going to file in a state where I have nothing in my name aside from a bank account when said state is going to want 5% of my earnings. |
There's no such thing as citizenship for states, state tax is based on residency. You only owe state taxes on money that you earned while residing inside a given state. If you didn't live in the US at all during 2010, you were not a resident of any state and therefore do not owe any state income tax. |
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northway
Joined: 05 Jul 2010
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| Posted: Sun Apr 24, 2011 11:29 pm Post subject: Re: State taxes |
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| redaxe wrote: |
| There's no such thing as citizenship for states, state tax is based on residency. You only owe state taxes on money that you earned while residing inside a given state. If you didn't live in the US at all during 2010, you were not a resident of any state and therefore do not owe any state income tax. |
Not true. Massachusetts considers you a resident of the state until you provide them with documents proving that you no longer live there (leases, bank accounts, etc.). Moreover, they don't recognize the foreign earned income exemption, and there's no floor to the tax, so even if you made a couple thousand bucks, you're technically supposed to pay 5% on that money, even if it was made in a different country. |
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Bibbitybop
Joined: 22 Feb 2006
Location: Seoul
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| Posted: Mon Apr 25, 2011 1:03 am Post subject: |
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| Ignore the long form. Don't worry about claiming housing if your total income would be less than 91,500. Even if, IF, you were audited, you would not have to pay any penalties because you still wouldn't owe anything with the housing added. |
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tideout
Joined: 12 Dec 2010
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| Posted: Mon Apr 25, 2011 3:21 am Post subject: Re: State taxes |
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| northway wrote: |
| redaxe wrote: |
| There's no such thing as citizenship for states, state tax is based on residency. You only owe state taxes on money that you earned while residing inside a given state. If you didn't live in the US at all during 2010, you were not a resident of any state and therefore do not owe any state income tax. |
Not true. Massachusetts considers you a resident of the state until you provide them with documents proving that you no longer live there (leases, bank accounts, etc.). Moreover, they don't recognize the foreign earned income exemption, and there's no floor to the tax, so even if you made a couple thousand bucks, you're technically supposed to pay 5% on that money, even if it was made in a different country. |
This may be the battle I'm engaged in in a Mid-Atlantic state. I was barely here before leaving for Korea so I felt I wasn't a resident here in reality. I'm filing late with the Feds anyway and I'm going to file last year's return from a tax friendly state using my friend's address as my US address. I hope that works.
For public school teaching in SK you get the tax break via a treaty agreement between the US and SK. It's hard to believe a State can in a sense, supercede a US treaty agreement with another foreign country.
Anyone have more specific info on this? |
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