Household Size Question

[evilxs]

We are married, going to stay married.

Looking at filing chapter 7 or 13.

I and my son are living here, my spouse and two kids are living 1,000 miles away.

Is my household 2 or 5?
What is the definition of household?

Thoughts?

[mdabcdefg]

I would guess it is only those who live in your physical household.

A household includes all the persons who occupy a housing unit. The occupants may be a single family, one person living alone, two or more families living together, or any other group of related or unrelated persons who share living arrangements.

[justbroke]

Agreed. The term "household" is defined by the IRS. To answer your question, you have two households. The household of which you are a member, contains two family members. Those members consist of your son and yourself.

The Census Bureau defines “household” as “all of the people, related and unrelated, who occupy a housing unit. A housing unit is a house, apartment, group of rooms or single room that is intended for occupancy as a separate living quarters. Households may be either family or nonfamily. Family households include the householder and all the other people in the living quarters who are related to the householder by birth, marriage, or adoption. ..

[Doghouse]

I think it may also be dependent on how you file your taxes. Filing as head of household, if you provide more than 50% of support for the family member claimed even if they are not living with you then I think you may be able to claim them as part of your household.

So, if I am single person and my mom lives with me but my dad lives with my brother 2000 miles away and I also provide for most of the financial support (or maybe dad lived with me more than half the year), then I can claim a household of three when filing.

[Flamingo]

In order to claim a dependent on your taxes, the dependent must have resided with you for more than six months out of the tax year in question and you also have had to provide more than 50% of that person's support. Review the IRS rules on IRS.gov as to this; however, if there is a custody agreement involved stating the other party claims the child as a dependent but you have custody most of the year, that will override adding that child to your household as the other person claims the child as a dependent. Again, review the IRS guidelines and also review with an attorney as to your own situation.

[albacore44]

Agreed. The term "household" is defined by the IRS. To answer your question, you have two households. The household of which you are a member, contains two family members. Those members consist of your son and yourself.

Which brings up additional questions. I have a house that also has a small house in the back, in which my mother in law resides. It is all part of the same property/address. My mother-in-law does not contribute to our living expenses, her finances are hers, and ours are ours. However there are costs associated with her living there, mainly utilities. Can i include her as a family member, and not drag her financially into my bankruptcy filing ??

[BKParalegal]

Which brings up additional questions. I have a house that also has a small house in the back, in which my mother in law resides. It is all part of the same property/address. My mother-in-law does not contribute to our living expenses, her finances are hers, and ours are ours. However there are costs associated with her living there, mainly utilities. Can i include her as a family member, and not drag her financially into my bankruptcy filing ??

I would include the additional utility costs to maintain the house, if that is what you are paying. If it goes beyond that, i.e. you pay for her food,meds etc. then you will have to show her financial contribution to the household and then subtract out all her personal expenses.

Good Luck.

PS in regards to the children living away from home, if you are supporting them, then in Sched. J there is an entry for contribution to a dependent not living in the home

[2Bshinyandnew]

my soon to be ex retained an attorney yesterday. He has lived in a separate household for 2 years. He pays alimony and child support, we are not yet divorced, so he can claim his wife and 2 kids as dependents, even though he lives in a separate apartment. For income purposes and the means test, even though he doesn't reside under the same roof, his income supports a family of 4, so he is under the income means test for my state. If he was divorced, his income would be for a single person and he would likely be forced into a Ch. 13, unless we had a different agreement regarding who got to claim the kids when filing taxes, etc.

The attorney he saw yesterday said this was fine and perfectly legal. So, I guess for BK purposes, household size doesn't necessarily mean how many people sleep under the same roof each night.

[evilxs]

Which is actually the answer we got.

Our attorney said we are absolutely a household of 5.

2 of the children who don't live with us are pretty much 100% supported by us and we get them on taxes every single year. Their mother does not work full time (like 27 hours a week), and makes minimum wage so our child support payment is far, far above what she makes. Heck we probably pay half her bills with that child support payment, God knows the kids don't get it.

1 child lives here full time so that is easy.

Husband lives here often enough (flys out minimal twice a month) and is here for every holiday and weeks at Christmas, Thanksgiving, Spring Break, 4 weeks in the summer). We're filing married jointly, he has been job hunting and really earnestly trying to get employment down here. He has moved a lot of his personal stuff here. We have to share our financial burden, but since I net more he is technically to an extent dependant on me, etc so the lawyer felt fully confident of his ability to argue his inclusion. He says it is just unfortunate that his employment keeps him away from home much like a truck driver. Since he doesn't own realty in the state he works in, the lawyer views his rent cost as the extra cost of being employed so far away from home. And is including a lot of those costs, plane tickets, etc, in a seperate document for the trustee as the extraordinary costs of his employment situation.

Now I had to add his earnings to my household income, but for the means test this truely now reflects our family situation and our means to be able to repay any of this. I am hoping for an answer today on Chapter 7 or 13. I just wanted to post up in case anyone else ever has this happen, and wanted to know how it turned out.

[justbroke]

While you get to claim them in the Means Test... in a Chapter 13 repayment plan, you'll be sure to get objections to confirmation if you support two separate living quarters. But, it may vary by District.