Married but different state residencency. How do we file taxes?

Question

I am in the military and claim Texas as my state of residency. My wife is a California resident. We both own property, individually, in our respective states of residency. Can we file a joint return? Also can we claim the property tax and mortgage interest for each of our respective properties?

Answer 1

Yes, you can file a joint federal return and combine everything just as if you lived together, and you get to count both mortgage interests, both property taxes, etc.

The interesting part is when you file state taxes.  I can't tell you about California specifically, but most states require you to file the same kind of return in their state as they file for the federal - joint or separate.  You will have to read CA's directions closely.  For the states I am familiar with, you would file a joint non-resident return for CA, and on there it would allow her to be a CA resident and you to be a non-resident.  Texas of course doesn't have a state tax.

Just to make sure - you do realize your state of residence while in the military is the state you entered from -  your last state of civilian residence.  So when you say you claim Texas, that had to be the state you entered from.  You don't get to just pick a nice no-tax state, and where you are stationed has absolutely nothing to do with it.