You don’t have to be the mother to be head of household
Court finds that unmarried dad was custodial parent entitled to child tax breaks
The Tax Court has held that an unmarried dad was the custodial parent of his minor son and that the son was his “qualifying child” for each of the two years at issue. As a result, he was entitled to various child tax breaks including a dependency exemption, dependent care credit, child tax credit, and earned income credit.
Background. A taxpayer is entitled to a deduction equal to the exemption amount for each person who qualifies as his “dependent.”
A person qualifies as the taxpayer’s dependent if the person is the taxpayer’s qualifying child.
A “qualifying child” of a taxpayer is an individual who: (A) bears a certain relationship to the taxpayer, including being a child of the taxpayer, (B) has the same principal place of abode as the taxpayer for more than one-half of the tax year, (C) meets certain age requirements, and (D) has not provided over one-half of his or her own support for the calendar year.
If the parents claiming any qualifying child do not file a joint return, that child shall be treated as the qualifying child of the parent with whom the child resided for the longer period of time during the tax year (i.e., the custodial parent).
The custodial parent is the parent with whom the child resides for the greater number of nights during the calendar year, and the noncustodial parent is the parent who is not the custodial parent. A child is treated as residing with a parent for a night if (1) the child sleeps at the residence of that parent or (2) where the child doesn’t sleep at either parent’s residence, he child sleeps in the company of the parent.
The noncustodial parent may claim the dependency exemption deduction if the custodial parent executes a written declaration releasing the custodial parent’s claim to the deduction and the noncustodial parent attaches that written declaration to the noncustodial parent’s return for that tax year.
A taxpayer with one or more qualifying individuals including a dependent of a taxpayer who has not attained age 13 may be allowed a dependent care credit under , a taxpayer may be allowed a credit of $1,000 for each qualifying child of the taxpayer.
An eligible individual may be allowed an earned income credit under. In general, an eligible individual includes any individual who has a qualifying child for the tax year.
The Court stressed that there could be a qualifying child of only one parent or another, not both.
The Court acknowledged that the conciliation agreement suggested, by its terms, that the mother should be treated as the custodial parent as the child was to spend the greater part of the calendar year with her. However, the testimony presented at trial convinced the Court that the conciliation agreement did not reflect the time the child spent with each of his parents in 2010 and 2011. Nor did the conciliation agreement reflect where, and in which parent’s company, the child likely slept at night. On the basis of the testimony provided, the Court said that the father played an instrumental role in the child’s life in the years at issue. Given his involvement in child’s active lifestyle, particularly during football and basketball seasons, the Court found that child slept either at the father’s residence or in his company at his great aunt’s house a greater number of nights during the 2010 and 2011 years than the child slept at the mother’s residence or in her company. Consequently, the Court concluded that the child’s custodial parent in 2010 and 2011 and that the child was the qualifying child of the father,who was therefore entitled to the dependency exemption deduction for those years.
