That article fails to mention that Pell grant money can be shifted from non-taxable to taxable, thereby garnering the full AOTC. In the example used in the article, $1,200 of the Pell grant could have been shifted to non-qualified expenses, which would have meant $4,000 of qualified expenses available to claim the full AOTC.
Given that the article you cite gets this wrong, I’m doubtful about it’s advice that “you’re not allowed to claim a tax credit for money you didn’t pay out-of-pocket.”
The problem is in all the examples the student and or family has actually paid out more than $4000 dollars in real money (cash or loans) toward the education expenses so shifting tax free money to taxable money is not a problem.
In OP’s case and in ours we have not paid out of pocket (or with loans) the full $4000 toward school expenses.
How can you claim a tax credit for money you spent on education when you didn’t spend the money???
The scholarship was awarded to the student. The student spent the scholarship money on education expenses. If the student had been given a cash gift from a friend and then turned around and spent that gift on tuition, would you say that the student hadn’t spent any money?
The way I look at (which can be completely wrong) is that once the scholarship is declared as income and the taxes are paid on that income then it is income like any other income. Basically the school is paying the student income and depositing the pay into a student owned account. From this account, the bills are paid. The fact that the income was never physically in their hands doesn’t matter. Just as the fact that a scholarship that pays for room and board is taxable income even though the student never sees it in their bank account nor did they have any say about what the money was use for. Yet it is treat the same as income from a job.
The logic sounds twisted but by agreeing to pay taxes on the scholarship you are being allowed to treat the scholarship as regular income.
I am not following the logic here. Consider this scenario:
Tuition and fees 44,000
R &B 12,000
Books 1,000
Travel 600
Personal 1,000
TOTAL $58,600
Say every cent paid by scholarships. That makes $13,600 taxable. So posters are suggesting taking another $4000 and taxing it also-but how do you shift that $4000 to nonqualifying expenses? You can’t. There are no other expenses to allocate that money to. I don’t see how this works if taxpayer/student funds are not somehow paying $4000 somewhere.
Total scholarships $60,000
Scholarships reported as taxable income $14,000
Scholarships applied to tuition and fees $46,000
Tuition and fees $50,000
QEE for AOTC $4,000
But it would have to be seen how much the extra $850 in taxable scholarship income would increase son’s taxes.
If it’s more than the $212.50 gained in credit then it might not be worth it.
Again, it doesn’t matter where the funds come from; everything is seen as coming from the student. What matters is the amount of tax advantaged dollars used (whether it be scholarship or 529 dollars) compared to the amount of AOTC qualified education expenses.
**Coordination with Pell grants and other scholarships. **
"The fact that the educational institution applies the scholarship or fellowship grant to qualified education expenses, such as tuition and related fees, does not prevent the student from choosing to apply certain scholarships or fellowship grants to the student’s actual nonqualified expenses. By making this choice (that is, by including the part of the scholarship or fellowship grant applied to the student’s nonqualified expenses in income), the student may increase taxable income and may be required to file a tax return. ** But, this allows payments made in cash, by check, by credit or debit card, or with borrowed funds such as a student loan to be applied to qualified education expenses. " **
They do not list the now taxable scholarship money as a way of paying.
If you’re not comfortable doing your taxes any particular way, than don’t do it. If you want advice that’s worth something, than find a tax preparer or attorney that you trust and pay them what they’re worth. It doesn’t matter to me one way or the other how you complete your taxes.
@dragonflygarden, personally in OP’s case I would just claim the $3150 for AOTC because everything else has either been paid with 529 money or scholarships.
Also in my tax bracket the couple thousand my D reported in scholarship income wasn’t that much tax, but what if someone was already in a high tax bracket and then added $14000 to their taxable income?
Once you shift that scholarship money to taxable money, it is the same as other taxable money you received from employers during the year. It’s taxable money (unearned as opposed to earned). I understand that you don’t think taxable scholarships can exceed COA, but they can. You can actually pay the school $4000 in August toward the tuition, then when your full ride scholarship is applied to your student account in September, you are going to be owed a refund of $4000. That money will be refunded to you and you will owe taxes on it as an excess scholarship and you can call the $4000 you paid for tuition for the AOTC.
The code is just letting you do with without actually paying the $4000 and then paying tax on the Pell or scholarship. Either way, the QEE is paid and you paid taxes on the QEE less $4000 to claim the AOTC.
Thanks to all of you for your help. We did run the figures both ways and by claiming the full $4K, we end up ahead by just $49 as a family (son pays more tax but we get more credit) so I am not sure it’s worth all of the discussion. I just wanted to do it the right way especially since this will count for two years and for DD entering college in 2017.
You might also check on the EFC impact of higher AOTC, lower parent tax paid versus lower AOTC, higher parent tax paid in case it matters for your situation.
Thank you for all of your help and opinions. I ran the figures both ways and we come out ahead by just $49 so I’m not sure it’s worth all of the discussion. As noted in the different articles, even professionals are not in agreement on the issue.
Most of all, I just wanted my tax return to be right since I will have to use it for 2 straight years with my daughter starting college in 2017. The $49 dollars isn’t so much the issue as doing it properly.