How did Arizona find out though? Did your employer report your address change or something? I moved from Illinois to Florida and am considering just filing in Illinois since that's where all my withholding went.

They cross-reference your federal tax return which shows your current address, plus they can see your W-2 information through data sharing with the IRS. In my case, they also had record of the sale of my Arizona home. States are pretty aggressive about collecting tax revenue they're entitled to. If all your withholding went to Illinois but you were a Florida resident for part of the year, you might actually be entitled to a refund from Illinois for the portion of the year you weren't a resident. Florida has no income tax, so you wouldn't file there. Definitely don't leave potential refund money on the table!

I used TurboTax last year for a similar situation (moved from Virginia to North Carolina). The multi-state feature worked pretty well - you just enter the dates you lived in each state and it guides you through the process. I'd say if your tax situation is otherwise relatively simple, TurboTax should be sufficient.

Thanks for sharing your experience! That's reassuring to hear. Did it cost extra for the additional state return, or was it all included in the Deluxe package price?

Wait, so if OP spent $30k buying these cards over the years but only sold them for $26k, they can't claim that $4k loss?

That's correct. With hobby activities, you can only deduct expenses up to the amount of income you received. So in your example, they could deduct $26k of their $30k expenses, zeroing out the income, but couldn't claim the additional $4k as a loss on their taxes. This is different from a legitimate business where you can deduct all expenses and carry forward losses. It's one of the drawbacks of hobby classification, but it's still better than paying taxes on the full $26k without deducting any expenses.

Schedule D is for investment assets, not personal belongings. Trading cards would only go on Schedule D if they were bought specifically as an investment. If you're just selling off your personal collection, it's different.

What about the tiebreaker rules though? I thought those only applied to which parent can claim the child as a dependent, not for determining Head of Household status?

You're right that the tiebreaker rules primarily address who can claim a child as a dependent. However, for HOH purposes, those same determinations become relevant because you need a "qualifying person" to claim HOH status. When a divorce decree specifically assigns which child each parent can claim, it establishes who each child is a qualifying person for. The IRS generally respects these legal agreements as the controlling factor, even with exactly 50/50 physical custody. Without such an agreement, you'd fall back to the regular tiebreaker rules, which would eventually come down to the higher AGI parent if everything else is equal.

This is kinda misleading. If there's a court order specifying which parent claims which child, the IRS nearly always accepts that for HOH purposes even with 50/50 custody. I've been through an audit on exactly this issue and had zero problems once I showed my divorce decree.

This happened to me too! Is there any way to check before buying? The listings all look the same to me and I'm worried about getting scammed.

Always check the product description carefully and look for the specific tax year mentioned (like "TurboTax 2024" for filing in 2025). If it's not clearly stated, message the seller and directly ask "Is this for filing 2024 taxes in 2025?" Get their confirmation in writing. Also, look at seller ratings and feedback - established sellers with good feedback are less likely to be misleading. Some legitimate sellers will specifically mention "newest version" or "current tax year" in their listings. If the price seems too good to be true (like 70%+ off retail), it's probably outdated software or possibly not genuine.

For regular W-2 employees, you're right that tax prep expenses aren't deductible if you take the standard deduction. The rules changed with the 2017 tax law. BUT if you're self-employed (like the original poster mentioned they are), you can deduct tax prep fees on Schedule C regardless of whether you itemize or take the standard deduction. It's considered a business expense for self-employed people.

Could you explain what qualifies as a "tax home"? I thought it was just where you live, but it sounds like you're saying it's different. If I live in one state but do 75% of my work in another state, where's my tax home?

Great question! Your "tax home" isn't necessarily where you actually live - it's your regular place of business or work, regardless of where your family home is located. If you do 75% of your work in another state, that other state would likely be considered your tax home for tax purposes, which means travel there wouldn't be deductible. To deduct travel expenses, you need to be traveling away from your main place of business temporarily. The IRS generally considers "temporary" to be assignments expected to last less than one year.

I've been using Expensify for tracking my business travel. It lets you log per diem meals separately from your actual receipts for lodging. Super helpful for keeping everything organized for tax time.