“ You are considered unmarried for head of household purposes if your spouse was a nonresident alien at any time during the year and you don’t choose to treat your non resident spouse as a resident alien.”
and
“Choice to treat spouse as resident. You are considered married if you choose to treat your spouse as a resident alien”
Does that mean my dad can treat my mother as a non-resident alien and file as HOH if he claims me and my brother as dependents?
I think this refers to filing a joint tax return for a citizen or resident alien with a nonresident alien spouse.
You can elect for the nonresident alien spouse to be treated as a resident alien for tax purposes and then they can file a joint return with you and you can get an exemption for them and a higher standard deduction than if you are single or HOH (with dependent children).
The nonresident alien then also has to report their worldwide income.
After tax reform last year, there are no more exemptions but a married couple filing a joint return has double the standard deduction of a single person.
I don’t think this situation applies to your parents. They are married and both resident aliens.
How did they file their 2018 tax return? Married filing jointly or separately?
In order for them to claim education and some other credits they will need to file jointly I think. For you to be able to use the data retrieval took in the FAFSA they have to file jointly as well.
If your parents are married and living together, then your dad can’t file HOH I believe.
He can’t treat your mom as a nonresident alien if she is a resident alien.
I don’t know why he would want to. Your mom doesn’t have to have income to be filing a joint return with your dad.
He should consult a tax professional to make sure he files correctly and doesn’t miss out on tax credits.