<p>My two kids (both in college) earn about $5000 each summer and we have them pay about half that in tuition, books, etc., I just found out they each did the EZ Form and did not claim the American Opportunity Credit. ($2500). I believe that would have meant a couple thousand back each. Unfortunately we as parents did not qualify for any $$$ ... I guess we made too much. Anybody out there know if we screwed this up accountant out of the office until Tuesday. The suspense is killing me.</p>
<p>Curious now, too. Just did ds’s taxes today, and the service we used didn’t mention that.</p>
<p>Nightingale,</p>
<p>Did you claim your kids as dependents on your tax return?
If yes, they are not eligible for AOC.
But you are.
You get a tax credit for up to $4000 you paid for their college qualified expenses (tuition and books) - max $2500</p>
<p>I do not think they can claim it if they are your dependents! </p>
<p>I work for a CPA. </p>
<p>If they are not your dependents, a return can be amended, you have 3 years to amend a return.</p>
<p>The amended return is a 1040x. Go to the IRS website, and read up on it. Maybe your entire family needs to file corrected returns.</p>
<p>Good luck!</p>
<p>Wow you guys are already doing taxes? Jeez, it is February. I haven’t even opened the envelopes with the 1099’s from the banks.</p>
<p>Our FAFSA is due March 1. We had to get our taxes done first.</p>
<p>If you claim them as dependents then only you can claim the AOC. They can not.</p>
<p>If you do not claim them as dependents then they can claim the AOC. But it would probably not mean a couple of thousand back each. The AOC has 2 parts - a nonrefundable part of $1500 and a refundable part of $1000. A non refundable credit reduces your tax liability but you cannot get any more than your tax liability. So to get the full nonrefundable part you must have a tax liability of $1500. If you only have say $800 tax liability then you save $800 in taxes, but can’t benefit from the other $700. If their incomes were $5000 then they will probably not benefit from the non refundable part at all.</p>
<p>A refundable credit means you can get money back even if you don’t have a tax liability. However the powers that be have thrown in a little spanner in the works for the AOC - for a student under the age of 24 to be eligible to claim the refundable part of the AOC, the student must have sufficient earned income to have provided half their own support.</p>
<p>Thanks for this thread. Have written a note so we can ask our accountant about claiming a credit for both of our kids–S from 2006 through 2010 and D from 2007 through 2012. I don’t believe BOTH kids received credits for each of the years & we’re under the income threshhold.</p>
<p>We’ve claimed credit for S2 for the last two years.<br>
Is it for full-time students only? S1 (24yrs. old and self-supporting) is taking one grad.school class. Could he claim a credit for that?</p>
<p>Besides not being claimed as dependents, in order to receive the refundable part of the AOC, the student must have provided more than half their own support from Earned Income.</p>
<p>Keep in mind the income limits for claiming the AOTC.</p>
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<p>[»</a> American Opportunity Education Tax Credit Extension for 2011 and 2012 Eligibility, Income and Phase-out Limits | Saving to Inve$t](<a href=“http://www.savingtoinvest.com/2011/02/american-opportunity-tax-credit-extension-for-2011-and-2012-eligiblity-income-and-phase-out-limits.html]»”>American Opportunity Tax Credit (AOTC) – Eligibility, 2022 Income and Phase-out Limits | $aving to Invest)</p>
<p>HIMom, the AOC wasn’t available prior to 2009. Before that the Hope credit would have been used. I don’t believe you can still amend for 2006…only the last 3 tax years can be amended. </p>
<p>Packmom, I don’t recall seeing any mention of credit hours at all in Pub. 970 and he would be eligible to tax the credit.</p>
<p>Graduate students can qualify for either the tuition and fees deduction or the lifetime learning credit, whichever is better for them. Credit hours are not a factor.
Also, there is no income limit for the tuition and fees deduction, so the OP could at least take that. It reduces AGI before taxes are calculated.</p>
<p>Actually there is an income limit for the tuition and fees deduction. The full deduction is available for single incomes under $65000 and married filing joint under $130000. The allowed deduction is halved for taxpaters whose incomes fall between those I listed and a max of $80000 (single) and $1600000 (married joint). Income above those limits - no tuition and fes deduction.</p>
<p>As I said, we, as a couple, are over the max allowed to realize any part of the AOC. So in claiming them as dependents we gain nothing via the AOC. I just spoke with our accountant who basically apologized for not calling this option to our attention. Seems like we’d have to file an amended return dropping the kids as dependents. Then the kids file their returns and realize the credit, in whole or in part. The question now is, with each of our children filing independently, does the amount they would get back, via the AOC, exceed the additional $1000 we as parents would have to pay (in dropping them both as dependents). The non-refundale portion of the credit, $1500, is only available if you have a $1500 tax liability as was indicated in post #8. Neither of our kids do. So the most they could realize is $1000 each… but the spanners reduce that to 40% according to my accountant. Looks like my kids would get about $400 back each via the AOC credit. That being the case it is not worth changing things. Still, if your kids earn more than a few thousand a year AND pay a good deal of it toward their own education AND you as parents do not qualify for any of the AOC having earned 180K or more, it might be worth looking into.</p>
<p>Thanks for all of this–will double-check with the accountant about whether we should have and did get these deductions. He’s usually pretty careful but I’m not sure he had info that BOTH kids were in college for all of the years they were attending. So many tax rules & pieces of paper!</p>
<p>Not to complicate things, but I think the HOPE is still available too. You can take ONE of the deductions depending on your situation.</p>
<p>Our FAFSA is also due by March 1.</p>
<p>Just another interesting tidbit about claiming your son or daughter as a dependent…
If they went to a college that finished in April, they were only a full-time student for 4 months that year, therefore you can not claim them, even if they attended commencement in May! That is what the IRS rep just told me on the phone. We’ve been trying to figure out if we could claim him this year since we have provided half his support, but he doesn’t meet the full-time student requirement of “enrolled full-time for at least part of 5 months of a calendar year”. Most colleges go into May so it isn’t an issue with a graduating senior, but if your senior finished in April, you lose them as a dependent. Think that’s worth about $800 or so to us when we file!</p>
<p>
No, it’s not. It was available in 2009 (with expanded $$ amounts and eligible costs) for students in certain mid west disaster areas. It is not available for 2010.</p>