Expat Exclusions - Foreign Earned Income Exclusion

Are you paying too much tax? If you meet certain requirements, you may qualify for the foreign earned income and foreign housing exclusions and the foreign housing deduction. Our Houston CPA firm can assess your personal situation, determine if you qualify for this tax benefit, and prepare the proper forms for your particular tax situation. Call us today at 713-661-1040 for more details.

General Rule for Foreign Earned Income

If you are a U.S. citizen or a resident alien of the United States and you live abroad, you are taxed on your worldwide income. However, you may qualify to exclude from income up to $91,400 of your foreign earnings. In addition, you can exclude or deduct certain foreign housing amounts.

Foreign Earned Income Exclusion - Requirements

To claim the foreign earned income exclusion, the foreign housing exclusion, or the foreign housing deduction, you must have foreign earned income, your tax home must be in a foreign country, and you must be one of the following:

A U.S. citizen who is a bona fide resident of a foreign country or countries for an uninterrupted period that includes an entire tax year

A U.S. resident alien who is a citizen or national of a country with which the United States has an income tax treaty in effect and who is a bona fide resident of a foreign country or countries for an uninterrupted period that includes an entire tax year, or

A U.S. citizen or a U.S. resident alien who is physically present in a foreign country or countries for at least 330 full days during any period of 12 consecutive months

Foreign Country

To meet the bona fide residence test or the physical presence test, you must live in or be present in a foreign country. A foreign country usually is any territory (including the air space and territorial waters) under the sovereignty of a government other than that of the United States.

The term "foreign country" includes the seabed and subsoil of those submarine areas adjacent to the territorial waters of a foreign country and over which the foreign country has exclusive rights under international law to explore and exploit the natural resources.

The term "foreign country" does not include U.S. possessions such as Puerto Rico, Guam, the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands, the U.S. Virgin Islands, or American Samoa. For purposes of the foreign earned income exclusion, the foreign housing exclusion, and the foreign housing deduction, the terms "foreign," "abroad," and "overseas" refer to areas outside the United States, American Samoa, Guam, the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands, Puerto Rico, the U.S. Virgin Islands, and the Antarctic region. The term "foreign country" does not include ships and aircraft traveling in or above international waters. Nor does it include offshore installations which are located outside the territorial waters of any individual nation.

Changes in the Foreign Earned Income Exclusion

For tax year 2009 the maximum amount of the Foreign Earned Income Exclusion under section 911 of the Internal Revenue Code has been increased to $91,400. In addition, Section 515 of the Tax Increase Prevention and Reconciliation Act of 2005 (P.L. 109-222) amends the computation of the Maximum Housing Amount Exclusion under Section 911 of the Code. (Refer to Notice 2006-87 and Notice 2007-25.)

Effective for tax years beginning after 2005, the amount of foreign earned income (and foreign housing costs) excluded from an individual's gross income will be used for purposes of determining the rate of income and alternative minimum tax (AMT) that applies to his or her nonexcluded income. The Tax Increase Prevention and Reconciliation Act of 2005 (P.L. 109-222) adds a new section 911(f) to the Internal Revenue Code. An individual's tax will be the excess of the tax that would be imposed if his or her taxable income were increased by the amount(s) excluded, and the tax that would be imposed if his or her taxable income were equal to the excluded amount(s). For this purpose, the excluded amount(s) will be reduced by the aggregate amount of any deductions or other exclusions otherwise disallowed. In many cases this will have the effect of increasing an individual's U.S. federal income tax to an amount greater than it would have been under prior law.

Foreign Earned Income Exclusion - Can I Claim the Exclusion or Deduction?

To determine whether you can claim the exclusion or deduction please begin with question 1

Do you have foreign earned income?

Yes. Go to question 2.

No. You CANNOT claim the foreign earned income exclusion, the foreign housing exclusion, or the foreign housing deduction.

Is your tax home in a foreign country?

Yes. Got to question 3.

No. You CANNOT claim the foreign earned income exclusion, the foreign housing exclusion, or the foreign housing deduction.

Are you a U.S. citizen?

Yes. Go to question 4.

No. Are you a U.S. resident alien?

Yes. Are you a citizen or national of a country with which the United States has an income tax treaty in effect?

Yes. Go to question 4.

No. Go to question 5.

No. You CANNOT claim the foreign earned income exclusion, the foreign housing exclusion, or the foreign housing deduction.

Were you a bona fide resident of a foreign country or countries for an uninterrupted period that includes an entire tax year?

Yes. You CAN claim the foreign earned income exclusion and the foreign housing exclusion or the foreign housing deduction.

No. Go to question 5.

Were you physically present in a foreign country or countries for at least 330 full days during any period of 12 consecutive months?

Yes. You CAN claim the foreign earned income exclusion and the foreign housing exclusion or the foreign housing deduction.

No You CANNOT claim the foreign earned income exclusion, the foreign housing exclusion, or the foreign housing deduction

Foreign Earned Income Exclusion - Tax Home In Foreign Country

To qualify for the foreign earned income exclusion, the foreign housing exclusion, or the foreign housing deduction, your tax home must be in a foreign country throughout your period of bona fide residence or physical presence abroad.

Tax Home

Your tax home is the general area of your main place of business, employment, or post of duty, regardless of where you maintain your family home. Your tax home is the place where you are permanently or indefinitely engaged to work as an employee or self-employed individual. Having a "tax home" in a given location does not necessarily mean that the given location is your residence or domicile for tax purposes.

If you do not have a regular or main place of business because of the nature of your work, your tax home may be the place where you regularly live. If you have neither a regular or main place of business nor a place where you regularly live, you are considered an itinerant and your tax home is wherever you work.

You are not considered to have a tax home in a foreign country for any period in which your abode is in the United States. However, your abode is not necessarily in the United States while you are temporarily in the United States. Your abode is also not necessarily in the United States merely because you maintain a dwelling in the United States, whether or not your spouse or dependents use the dwelling.

"Abode" has been variously defined as one's home, habitation, residence, domicile, or place of dwelling. It does not mean your principal place of business. "Abode" has a domestic rather than a vocational meaning and does not mean the same as "tax home." The location of your abode often will depend on where you maintain your economic, family, and personal ties.

Example 1:

You are employed on an offshore oil rig in the territorial waters of a foreign country and work a 28-day on/28-day off schedule. You return to your family residence in the United States during your off periods. You are considered to have an abode in the United States and do not satisfy the tax home test in the foreign country. You cannot claim either of the exclusions or the housing deduction.

Example 2:

For several years, you were a marketing executive with a producer of machine tools in Toledo, Ohio. In November of last year your employer transferred you to London, England, for a minimum of 18 months to set up a sales operation for Europe. Before you left, you distributed business cards showing your business and home addresses in London. You kept ownership of your home in Toledo but rented it to another family. You placed your car in storage. In November of last year, you moved your spouse, children, furniture, and family pets to a home your employer rented for you in London.

Shortly after moving, you leased a car, and you and your spouse got British driving licenses. Your entire family got library cards for the local public library. You and your spouse opened bank accounts with a London bank and secured consumer credit. You joined a local business league, and both you and your spouse became active in the neighborhood civic association and worked with a local charity. Your abode is in London for the time you live there, and you satisfy the tax home test in the foreign country.

Temporary Or Indefinite Assignment

The location of your tax home often depends on whether your assignment is temporary or indefinite. If you are temporarily absent from your tax home in the United States on business, you may be able to deduct your away from home expenses (for travel, meals, and lodging) but you would not qualify for the foreign earned income exclusion. If your new work assignment is for an indefinite period, your new place of employment becomes your tax home, and you would not be able to deduct any of the related expenses that you have in the general area of this new work assignment. If your new tax home is in a foreign country and you meet the other requirements, your earnings may qualify for the foreign earned income exclusion.

If you expect your employment away from home in a single location to last, and it does last, for 1 year or less, it is temporary unless facts and circumstances indicate otherwise. If you expect it to last for more than 1 year, it is indefinite.

If you expect it to last for 1 year or less, but at some later date you expect it to last longer than 1 year, it is temporary (in the absence of facts and circumstances indicating otherwise) until your expectation changes.

For guidance on how to determine your tax home refer to Revenue Ruling 93-86. This ruling may be updated from time to time.

Foreign Earned Income Exclusion - Bona Fide Residence Test

You meet the bona fide residence test if you are a bona fide resident of a foreign country or countries for an uninterrupted period that includes an entire tax year. You can use the bona fide residence test to qualify for the exclusions and the deduction only if you are either:

You do not automatically acquire bona fide resident status merely by living in a foreign country or countries for 1 year.

Example:

If you go to a foreign country to work on a particular construction job for a specified period of time, you ordinarily will not be regarded as a bona fide resident of that country even though you work there for 1 tax year or longer. The length of your stay and the nature of your job are only some of the factors to be considered in determining whether you meet the bona fide residence test.

Bona fide residence

To meet the bona fide residence test, you must have established such a residence in a foreign country.

The bona fide residence test applies to U.S. citizens and to any U.S. resident alien who is a citizen or national of a country with which the United States has an income tax treaty in effect.

To see if you meet the test of bona fide residence in a foreign country, you must find out if you have established such a residence in a foreign country. Your bona fide residence is not necessarily the same as your domicile. Your domicile is your permanent home, the place to which you always return or intend to return.

Example:

You could have your domicile in Cleveland, Ohio, and a bona fide residence in London if you intend to return eventually to Cleveland. The fact that you go to London does not automatically make London your bona fide residence. If you go there as a tourist, or on a short business trip, and return to the United States, you have not established bona fide residence in London. But if you go to London to work for an indefinite or extended period and you set up permanent quarters there for yourself and your family, you probably have established a bona fide residence in a foreign country, even though you intend to return eventually to the United States. You are clearly not a resident of London in the first instance. However, in the second, you are a resident because your stay in London appears to be permanent. If your residency is not as clearly defined as either of these illustrations, it may be more difficult to decide whether you have established a bona fide residence.

Determination

Questions of bona fide residence are determined according to each individual case, taking into account such factors as your intention or the purpose of your trip and the nature and length of your stay abroad. You must show the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) that you have been a bona fide resident of a foreign country or countries for an uninterrupted period that includes an entire tax year. The IRS decides whether you qualify as a bona fide resident of a foreign country largely on the basis of facts you report on Form 2555 (PDF). IRS cannot make this determination until you file Form 2555.

Statement To Foreign Authorities

You are not considered a bona fide resident of a foreign country if you make a statement to the authorities of that country that you are not a resident of that country and the authorities hold that you are not subject to their income tax laws as a resident. If you have made such a statement and the authorities have not made a final decision on your status, you are not considered to be a bona fide resident of that foreign country.

Special agreements and treaties

An income tax exemption provided in a treaty or other international agreement will not in itself prevent you from being a bona fide resident of a foreign country. Whether a treaty prevents you from becoming a bona fide resident of a foreign country is determined under all provisions of the treaty, including specific provisions relating to residence or privileges and immunities.

Uninterrupted Period Including Entire Tax Year

To qualify for bona fide residence, you must reside in a foreign country for an uninterrupted period that includes an entire tax year. An entire tax year is from January 1 through December 31 for taxpayers who file their income tax returns on a calendar year basis. During the period of bona fide residence in a foreign country, you can leave the country for brief or temporary trips back to the United States or elsewhere for vacation or business.

To keep your status as a bona fide resident of a foreign country, you must have a clear intention of returning from such trips, without unreasonable delay, to your foreign residence or to a new bona fide residence in another foreign country.

Example 1:

You are the Lisbon representative of a U.S. employer. You arrived with your family in Lisbon on November 1, 2006. Your assignment is indefinite, and you intend to live there with your family until your company sends you to a new post. You immediately established residence there. On April 1, 2007, you arrived in the United States to meet with your employer, leaving your family in Lisbon. You returned to Lisbon on May 1, and continue living there. On January 1, 2008, you completed an uninterrupted period of residence for a full tax year (2007), and you may qualify as a bona fide resident of a foreign country.

Example 2:

Assume that in Example 1, you transferred back to the United States on December 13, 2007. You would not qualify under the bona fide residence test because your bona fide residence in the foreign country, although it lasted more than a year, did not include a full tax year. You may, however, qualify for the foreign earned income exclusion or the housing exclusion or deduction under the physical presence test.

Bona Fide Residence Status Not Automatic

You do not automatically acquire bona fide resident status merely by living in a foreign country or countries for 1 year.

Example:

If you go to a foreign country to work on a particular construction job for a specified period of time, you ordinarily will not be regarded as a bona fide resident of that country even though you work there for one tax year or longer. The length of your stay and the nature of your job are only some of the factors to be considered in determining whether you meet the bona fide residence test.

Bona Fide Resident For Part Of A Year

Once you have established bona fide residence in a foreign country for an uninterrupted period that includes an entire tax year, you will qualify as a bona fide resident for the period starting with the date you actually began the residence and ending with the date you abandon the foreign residence. You could qualify as a bona fide resident for an entire tax year plus parts of 1 or 2 other tax years.

Example:

You were a bona fide resident of England from March 1, 2006, through September 14, 2008. On September 15, 2008, you returned to the United States. Since you were a bona fide resident of a foreign country for all of 2007, you also qualify as a bona fide resident from March 1, 2006, through the end of 2006 and from January 1, 2008, through September 14, 2008.

Foreign Earned Income Exclusion - Physical Presence Test

You meet the physical presence test if you are physically present in a foreign country or countries 330 full days during a period of 12 consecutive months. The 330 qualifying days do not have to be consecutive. The physical presence test applies to both U.S. citizens and resident aliens.

The physical presence test is based only on how long you stay in a foreign country or countries. This test does not depend on the kind of residence you establish, your intentions about returning, or the nature and purpose of your stay abroad. However, your intentions with regard to the nature and purpose of your stay abroad are relevant in determining whether you meet the tax home test explained under Tax Home in Foreign Country in Publication 54.

330 Full Days

Generally, to meet the physical presence test, you must be physically present in a foreign country or countries for at least 330 full days during the 12-month period. You can count days you spent abroad for any reason. You do not have to be in a foreign country only for employment purposes. You can be on vacation time.

You do not meet the physical presence test if illness, family problems, a vacation, or your employer's orders cause you to be present for less than the required amount of time.

Full Day

A full day is a period of 24 consecutive hours, beginning at midnight. You must spend each of the 330 full days in a foreign country. When you leave the United States to go directly to a foreign country or when you return directly to the United States from a foreign country, the time you spend on or over international waters does not count toward the 330-day total.

Example:

You leave the United States for France by air on June 10. You arrive in France at 9:00 a.m. on June 11. Your first full day in France is June 12.

Passing Over Foreign Country

If, in traveling from the United States to a foreign country, you pass over a foreign country before midnight of the day you leave, the first day you can count toward the 330-day total is the day following the day you leave the United States.

Example:

You leave the United States by air at 9:30 a.m. on June 10 to travel to Spain. You pass over a part of France at 11:00 p.m. on June 10 and arrive in Spain at 12:30 a.m. on June 11. Your first full day in a foreign country is June 11.

Change Of Location

You can move about from one place to another in a foreign country or to another foreign country without losing full days. But if any part of your travel is not within a foreign country or countries and takes 24 hours or more, you will lose full days.

Example 1:

You leave London by air at 11:00 p.m. on July 6 and arrive in Stockholm at 5:00 a.m. on July 7. Your trip takes less than 24 hours and you lose no full days.

Example 2:

You leave Norway by ship at 10:00 p.m. on July 6 and arrive in Portugal at 6:00 a.m. on July 8. Since your travel is not within a foreign country or countries and the trip takes more than 24 hours, you lose as full days July 6, 7, and 8. If you remain in Portugal, your next full day in a foreign country is July 9.

In United States while in Transit

If you are in transit between two points outside the United States and are physically present in the United States for less than 24 hours, you are not treated as present in the United States during the transit. You are treated as traveling over areas not within any foreign country.

How To Figure The 12-month Period

There are four rules you should know when figuring the 12-month period:

Example 1:

You are a construction worker who works on and off in a foreign country over a 20-month period. You might pick up the 330 full days in a 12-month period only during the middle months of the time you work in the foreign country because the first few and last few months of the 20-month period are broken up by long visits to the United States.

Exceptions to the Bona Fide Residence and the Physical Presence Tests

There are two exceptions to meeting the requirements under the bona fide residence and the physical presence tests.

Waiver Of Time Requirements

Both the bona fide residence test and the physical presence test contain minimum time requirements. The minimum time requirements can be waived, however, if you must leave a foreign country because of war, civil unrest, or similar adverse conditions in that country. You also must be able to show that you reasonably could have expected to meet the minimum time requirements if not for the adverse conditions. To qualify for the waiver, you must actually have your tax home in the foreign country and be a bona fide resident of, or be physically present in, the foreign country on or before the beginning date of the waiver. Refer to Revenue Procedure 2004-17 for more information. This Revenue Procedure may be updated from time to time.

U.S. Travel Restrictions

If you are present in a foreign country in violation of U.S. law, you will not be treated as a bona fide resident of a foreign country or as physically present in a foreign country while you are in violation of the law. Income that you earn from sources within such a country for services performed during a period of violation does not qualify as foreign earned income. Your housing expenses within that country (or outside that country for housing your spouse or dependents) while you are in violation of the law cannot be included in figuring your foreign housing amount.

The countries to which travel restrictions apply and the effective dates of the restrictions are as follows:

Foreign Housing Exclusion or Deduction

In addition to the foreign earned income exclusion, you can also claim an exclusion or a deduction from gross income for your housing amount if your tax home is in a foreign country and you qualify for the exclusions and deduction under either the bona fide residence test or the physical presence test.

The housing exclusion applies only to amounts considered paid for with employer-provided amounts. The housing deduction applies only to amounts paid for with self-employment earnings.

Your housing amount is the total of your housing expenses for the year minus the base housing amount. The computation of the base housing amount (line 32 of Form 2555) is tied to the maximum foreign earned income exclusion. The amount is 16% of the exclusion amount (computed on a daily basis), multiplied by the number of days in your qualifying period that fall within your tax year.

Your housing expenses may not exceed a certain limit. The limit on housing expenses varies depending upon the location in which you incur housing expenses.

The bottom line is that if you work overseas you may qualify to exclude some or even all of your income from US tax. Call Houston CPA Jim Trippon to have us analyze your situation and file the proper tax forms to save you money. Give us a call at 713-661-140 and let us put our 30 years of experience to work for you TODAY!

-A U.S. citizen, or

-A U.S. resident alien who is a citizen or national of a country with which the United States has an income tax treaty in effect.

--Your 12-month period can begin with any day of the month. It ends the day before the same calendar day, 12 months later

--Your 12-month period must be made up of consecutive months. Any 12-month period can be used if the 330 days in a foreign country fall within that period

--You do not have to begin your 12-month period with your first full day in a foreign country or to end it with the day you leave. You can choose the 12-month period that gives you the greatest exclusion

--In determining whether the 12-month period falls within a longer stay in the foreign country, 12-month periods can overlap one another

--Cuba - January 1, 1987 through the present (Still in effect)

--Iraq - August 2, 1990 through July 29, 2004

--Libya - January 1, 1987 through September 20, 2004