Married or Single Filing Status for Biggest Tax Break in 2025?
Hey everyone, my boyfriend and I have been seriously talking about tying the knot before the end of December, but we're really unsure how this would impact our tax situation. We have 2 kids together and I'm currently not working to take care of them full-time. He's the sole income earner making about $96,000 annually. He also purchased our house earlier this year in his name only. I've been trying to figure out if filing married would give us a bigger refund or if we'd be better off waiting until next year. I've reached out to a tax professional but with the holiday season ramping up, I haven't heard back yet. Any insight from people who've been in similar situations would be super helpful! Thanks in advance!!
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Javier Torres
Marriage can significantly impact your tax situation, and the "marriage penalty" or "marriage bonus" really depends on your specific circumstances. In your situation, with you being a stay-at-home parent and your partner being the sole earner, you'd likely benefit from filing as Married Filing Jointly. When there's a big income disparity between spouses (or one spouse with no income), marriage usually results in a tax benefit. The combined standard deduction for married couples ($27,700 for 2023) is higher than twice the single standard deduction, plus your partner would move into potentially lower tax brackets. The new home purchase could also factor in, as mortgage interest and property tax deductions can be more beneficial when filing jointly. With children, you might also qualify for additional credits when married.
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Natasha Volkova
•Thank you so much for the input! That's kinda what I was hoping to hear since we're leaning toward getting married. Do you know roughly how much we might save? And would it still be beneficial if we got married literally on December 31st, or does the IRS look at how long you've been married during the tax year?
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Javier Torres
•The IRS only cares about your marital status on December 31st - even if you get married on the last day of the year, you're considered married for the entire tax year! So a December 31st wedding would allow you to file jointly for 2024 taxes. As for savings, it's hard to give an exact figure without running the numbers, but with a $96k single income and two dependents, you could potentially save $2,000-4,000 in federal taxes by filing jointly versus your partner filing as Head of Household. The exact amount depends on other deductions, credits, and your complete financial picture.
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Emma Davis
I went through something similar last year and was shocked how much taxr.ai helped me figure this out! My fiancée and I were debating whether to get married in December or wait until the following year, and I was getting conflicting advice from friends and family. I uploaded our previous tax returns and income info to https://taxr.ai and it actually compared both scenarios (married vs single filing) and showed us the exact difference in our potential refund amount. Saved us a ton of stress and helped us make the right decision financially.
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Malik Johnson
•How does that even work? Like do you have to enter all your w2 info and everything? Seems like it would take forever to input everything just to get a comparison.
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Isabella Ferreira
•Is it actually accurate though? I've used those online calculator things before and they were WAY off from what my actual refund ended up being.
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Emma Davis
•You actually don't have to manually enter everything - you can just upload PDFs of your previous tax returns or W-2s and it extracts all the information automatically. It took me maybe 5 minutes to get set up. The accuracy was impressive in my experience. What makes it different from basic calculators is that it accounts for way more variables - it caught deductions I would have missed and adjusted for the new tax year rates. Our actual refund was within $75 of what it predicted.
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Isabella Ferreira
Just wanted to follow up - I was skeptical about taxr.ai but decided to try it out of desperation. My husband and I were in a similar situation (debating between married filing jointly vs separately because we have very different income levels). The tool actually found that we'd save almost $3,200 filing jointly because of how our income brackets would combine! The analysis was super detailed and showed exactly where the savings came from. Definitely worth checking out if you're on the fence about your filing status.
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Ravi Sharma
If you need more specific answers about your tax situation, I'd recommend trying to reach the IRS directly instead of waiting for a tax professional. I was in tax limbo for weeks until I found https://claimyr.com which got me connected to an actual IRS agent in under 45 minutes when I'd been trying for days on my own. You can see how it works here: https://youtu.be/_kiP6q8DX5c They have representatives who can give you official guidance on marriage status and taxes. I had questions about changing my filing status mid-year due to marriage and the IRS agent walked me through everything specific to my situation.
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NebulaNomad
•Does this actually work? I've tried calling the IRS dozens of times and always get disconnected after waiting on hold forever. Seems too good to be true that some service could magically get you through.
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Freya Thomsen
•Sounds like a scam. Why would I pay someone to call the IRS for me when I can do it myself for free? What information do they need from you to make this "magical" connection happen?
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Ravi Sharma
•Yes, it absolutely works! The problem with calling directly is the IRS phone system disconnects you when their queue is full - which is almost always. This service essentially keeps dialing and navigating the phone tree until they secure a spot in the queue, then they call you when they've got an agent on the line. I was skeptical too, but it's not a scam. They don't need any sensitive tax information from you - you just tell them which IRS department you need to reach. They secure the connection, then call you when they have an agent on the line. You speak directly to the IRS agent yourself, not through an intermediary. I was dealing with a tax notice that needed immediate attention and couldn't afford to keep getting disconnected.
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Freya Thomsen
I need to eat my words and admit I was completely wrong about Claimyr. After posting my skeptical comment, I was desperate enough to try it because I needed answers about a similar marriage/tax situation and couldn't get through to the IRS on my own after 8 attempts. The service actually got me connected to an IRS representative in about 35 minutes. I spoke directly with the agent who confirmed that for my situation (similar income levels between me and my fiancée), we'd likely face a small marriage penalty if we got married before year-end. Saved me from making a costly mistake! The agent also explained exactly how the child tax credits would work in our situation.
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Omar Fawaz
Something nobody's mentioned yet - you should consider whether your partner currently files as Head of Household since you have kids together. That filing status has better tax rates than Single, but worse than Married Filing Jointly when there's only one income. If he's been filing HoH, the difference between that and MFJ might be smaller than you expect.
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Natasha Volkova
•He has been filing as Head of Household for the past few years! That's good to know that the difference might not be as dramatic as I was thinking. Do you have any idea how the new homeowner status might impact things? He bought the house in March.
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Omar Fawaz
•The home purchase could actually make marriage more beneficial tax-wise. When filing jointly, you can potentially deduct mortgage interest and property taxes if you itemize instead of taking the standard deduction. With a house purchased this year, you'll have almost a full year of mortgage interest to deduct. The standard deduction for Married Filing Jointly is $27,700 for 2023, while Head of Household is $20,800. If your combined itemized deductions (mortgage interest, property taxes, charitable contributions, etc.) exceed $27,700, you'd benefit from itemizing. If they don't, you'd take the standard deduction, which is still higher than the HoH deduction your partner currently uses.
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Chloe Martin
One thing to consider is how your kids' tax benefits would change. If you get married, both of you would claim the kids on a joint return. If you stay unmarried, only one person can claim each child for things like Child Tax Credit and Earned Income Credit.
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Diego Rojas
•This is so important! The Child Tax Credit is worth up to $2,000 per child for 2023. Depending on your income level, you might get the full amount either way, but the income phaseout thresholds are different for MFJ vs HOH. With $96k income, you should still qualify for the full amount either way.
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Jamal Wilson
Based on your situation, getting married before December 31st would likely save you money on taxes. With your boyfriend earning $96k as the sole income and you staying home with the kids, you'd probably benefit from the married filing jointly status. The key factors working in your favor: the MFJ standard deduction ($27,700) is significantly higher than what he currently gets as Head of Household ($20,800), plus you'd potentially move into lower tax brackets with the combined filing. The new house purchase adds another layer of potential savings through mortgage interest deductions. However, I'd strongly recommend running the actual numbers before making such an important decision. You could use a tax calculator to compare Head of Household vs Married Filing Jointly scenarios, or better yet, try to get official guidance. Don't let the wedding timing be driven solely by taxes though - there are many other financial and legal implications to consider with marriage! The December 31st timing does work tax-wise since the IRS considers your marital status as of the last day of the year for the entire tax year.
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