CA Filing Requirements

[Snaggletooth]

Client roamed the country in 2015 making some money wherever he went.

With respect to what TTB says about California filing requirements:
1) Number of dependents: does this include the taxpayer himself, or just additional dependents.
2) Are there a residency requirement such as # of days spent in the state? If so, TTB does not mention it.
3) TTB verbiage leads me to believe that Federal Gross Income of $24,238 constitutes a filing requirement even if a single dollar is California source income. Am I reading too much into this?

Would appreciate hearing from some of you left coast folks. Haven't heard from Slugg in awhile - here is a golden opportunity to rise to the privilege of responding to one of my glorious posts...

[S T]

Calif is source income so could be part year resident or non resident - did t/p establish residency in Calif
see ftb https://www.ftb.ca.gov/forms/2015/15_540nrlongins.pdf

Need to establish residency or non-resident or part year resident

Dependency is number of dependents t/p can claim

complete Calif CA form py or nonresident to pro-rate income taxed by Calif goes by dates and answers to those questions

Sandy

[Snaggletooth]

Thanks Sandy

Good instructions for PY or NR, but nowhere obvious does it mention how long someone must stay in CA before achieve residency status. Is there a quick answer?

[Snaggletooth]

Include himself?

Dependency is number of dependents t/p can claim Sandy

Does this include himself as a dependent?

[Rapid Robert]

Good instructions for PY or NR, but nowhere obvious does it mention how long someone must stay in CA before achieve residency status. Is there a quick answer?

https://www.ftb.ca.gov/forms/2015/15_1031.pdf

"Quick" is relative. I created a CA residency flow chart once when I worked for another tax firm.

[peggysioux]

A California resident is any individual who meets any of the following:
•Present in California for other than a temporary or transitory purpose.
• Domiciled in California, but located outside California for a temporary or transitory purpose. ◦Domicile is defined for tax purposes as the place where you voluntarily establish yourself and family, not merely for a special or limited purpose, but with a present intention of making it your true, fixed, permanent home and principal establishment. It is the place where, whenever you are absent, you intend to return.
◦For a complete definition, refer to "Meaning of Domicile" in Publication 1031 - Guidelines for Determining Resident Status.


A nonresident is any individual who is not a California resident.

A part-year resident is any individual who is a California resident for part of the year and a nonresident for part of the year.

Hope this helps.

Peggy Sioux

[Roland Slugg]

Does this include himself as a dependent?

No. A taxpayer is never his own dependent.

You wrote that the T/P roamed the country, but you didn't say where he lives when not roaming. I assume it's not in California, though, or you would have said so. Wouldn't you?

It probably doesn't really make much difference, though, because the California NR return uses a ratio calculation that prorates the tax. I suggest you simply complete a California return (form 1040NR) and see how it comes out. If you have the California state module, it won't be difficult. On Schedule CA(540)NR there are questions about dates moved into or out of California, if applicable, and the number of days spent in the state. The California tax, however, is not based on those dates or days. Instead it is a ratio based on California income to total income then factored against the California tax on the total income. The only major difference between a resident return and a NR return is in the allowance of a credit for tax paid to another state. Residents can take that credit ... nonresidents can't.

[Snaggletooth]

Back in Tennessee

The guy is back in Tennessee and has in 2016 accepted a job as a coach at a TN high school.

Thanks, Mr. Roland Slugg, and good to hear from you. Apparently no difference between a part-yr resident and a non-resident. To be honest, I'm not chomping at the bit to file a CA return. If you get in their taxpayer database, a whole arsenal of revenue-grabbing dings seem to be launched at innocent taxpayers whose only crime was to file and pay their taxes.

Not just California - some of the other states are getting worse and worse - desperate for money. When things get tough at home, people have to cut back their budgets and deal with economic malaise the best they can. Governments somehow don't think they have to live by the same economic rules, and don't even live themselves by the same rules they create for the rest of us.