Dual-Status Return or Full-Year Election? How to File Your First US Year

Dual-status is what the arrival year hands you by default: nonresident before your residency starting date, resident after it. Three separate elections can change that, and they are not interchangeable. Section 6013(g) is for the year your spouse is still a nonresident at the close. Section 6013(h) is for the year you become a resident and your spouse is a US citizen or resident at the close. The first-year choice under section 7701(b)(4) needs no spouse, and it still leaves you dual-status.

What does a dual-status year actually mean on my return?

Your arrival year gets cut in two at your residency starting date. Before it, the US taxes you on US-source income; from it, on income from all sources. If you got there through the substantial presence test, the statute puts that date on the first day you were present in the US in that calendar year, so a February house-hunting trip can pull it back months ahead of the move itself, unless that trip falls inside the narrow closer-connection relief of up to 10 days set out below. Resident on December 31, and you file Form 1040 with Dual-Status Return written across the top.

“In the case of an individual who meets the substantial presence test of paragraph (3) with respect to any calendar year, the residency starting date shall be the first day during such calendar year on which the individual is present in the United States.” (IRC 7701(b)(2)(A)(iii))

The split is written into the same paragraph. Clause (i) treats a first-year resident as a US resident “only for the portion of such calendar year which begins on the residency starting date,” which is why a dual-status return exists at all. The IRS puts the consequence plainly: all sources for the resident part, US-source income only for the nonresident part (IRS, taxation of dual-status individuals). One relief sits in clause (C) of the same paragraph and it’s small: days you can establish a closer connection to Canada for are disregarded in fixing the starting date, up to 10 of them and no more (the statute is written generally, as “a foreign country”; Canada is just the usual one on these facts). Counting your days comes first, so start with the arrival-year day count and the forms that come with it.

Why does a dual-status return cost more than a resident one?

Because of what it takes away. A dual-status filer can’t use the standard deduction, and that holds even for the resident months, so itemizing is the fallback. A joint return is out unless one of the section 6013 elections below applies. The head-of-household tax column is out too. A married filer generally has to use the married-filing-separately column, and the earned income credit, the credit for the elderly or disabled and the education credits are barred as well.

“Standard deduction. You cannot use the standard deduction allowed on Form 1040 or 1040-SR. However, you can itemize any allowable deductions.” And: “Joint return. You cannot file a joint return. However, see Choosing Resident Alien Status under Dual-Status Aliens in chapter 1.” (IRS Publication 519, chapter 6)

The 1040-NR instructions say it more bluntly, that you “can’t take the standard deduction even for the part of the year you were a resident alien,” and they carry the credit bar in the same list (Instructions for Form 1040-NR). One narrow opening sits inside the rate rule and it happens to be Canada-specific. Publication 519 adds that you may be able to file as single if you lived apart from your spouse for the last 6 months of the year and you’re a married resident of Canada, Mexico or South Korea, then sends you to the 1040-NR instructions to qualify. Those attach five tests, including a child whose main home was yours for more than half the year, and your paying over half the cost of keeping it up. Real route, narrow gate.

Which election applies to me: 6013(g), 6013(h), or the first-year choice?

Two facts pick it: who your spouse was on the last day of the year, and whether you were a US resident that day yourself. Section 6013(g) is for the year your spouse is still a nonresident alien then. Section 6013(h) is for the person who was a nonresident at the start of the year and a resident at the close, married that day to a US citizen or resident. The first-year choice sits outside section 6013 and needs no spouse.

	IRC 6013(g)	IRC 6013(h)	First-year choice, IRC 7701(b)(4)
The household it’s written for	Your spouse is a nonresident alien on the last day of the year; you’re a US citizen or resident that day. The IRS says this reaches the case where you arrived mid-year and your spouse stayed behind	You were a nonresident at the start of the year and a US resident on the last day of it, and on that day you’re married to a US citizen or resident. If you’re single at the end of the year, Publication 519 says you can’t make this choice	Anyone who meets the presence tests. Publication 519 puts it plainly: “You do not have to be married to make this choice”
What it does to the year	Treats the nonresident spouse as a US resident for chapter 1 for all of the taxable year, and for wage withholding	Treats the arriving individual as a US resident for chapter 1 for all of the taxable year, and for wage withholding	Treats you as a resident only “for the portion of the election year” starting on the first day of the earliest qualifying testing period, so the year generally stays split
Whether it ends the dual-status restrictions	Yes on the IRS’s stated position: file a joint return under this provision and the dual-status restrictions don’t apply to you	Yes, and Publication 519 says so in the same list: the chapter 6 restrictions “do not apply to you”	No. It moves where the split falls, it doesn’t remove the split, so the dual-status rules generally still run
Entry test you have to clear	Both spouses elect; a joint return is required for the year of the choice, and later years may be joint or separate	Both individuals elect, and a joint return is required for the year of the choice	You must not have been a US resident in the election year itself or in the year before it, and then at least 31 consecutive days of US presence in the election year, plus 75 percent of the days from the start of that stretch to year end, with up to 5 absence days counted as presence
When you can make it	With the return for the year of the choice, or by amended return inside the statutory window	With the return for the year of the choice, or by amended return on Form 1040-X inside the same 3-year / 2-year window	Not until you’ve met the substantial presence test for the FOLLOWING calendar year, so the return generally waits on an extension
How long it lasts	Applies to the year made “and to all subsequent taxable years until terminated,” and doesn’t apply for a year in which neither spouse is a citizen or resident at any time	The statute attaches no continuing-years rule to this subsection at all. Publication 519 says neither spouse can make this choice for any later tax year	Remains in effect for the election year unless revoked with the Secretary’s consent
Whether you get a second bite	Once terminated, those two individuals can never elect under (g) again	Once it applies for two individuals for a year, those two can never elect under (h) again	No once-in-a-lifetime bar in the statute; the presence tests are what gate it
Treaty position	Publication 519 is flat about it: neither spouse can “claim under any tax treaty not to be a U.S. resident.” The IRS web page puts it more softly, that generally neither spouse can claim treaty benefits as a resident of a foreign country while the choice is in effect, though a saving-clause exception may still allow one on specified income	Publication 519’s list of consequences for this choice carries no treaty sentence; the 1040-NR instructions warn generally that electing resident treatment “may forfeit” treaty benefits, so treat it as a live question rather than a settled difference	Nothing in the statute or in Publication 519’s first-year-choice discussion addresses treaty position, so it’s unsettled here too

The third column is the one people get wrong, and the IRS is explicit about it: someone who meets the tests “may choose to be treated as a dual status resident for this taxable year” (IRS, taxation of dual-status individuals). The choice moves where the line falls. It doesn’t erase the line. Every row above is checkable at IRC 6013, subsections (g)(1), (g)(2), (g)(3), (g)(6), (h)(1) and (h)(2), and at IRC 7701(b)(4)(A), (C), (E) and (F).

The (g) and (h) labels get swapped constantly, so read the first row twice. The commonest Canadian arrival: you move, you’re a US resident partway through the year, your spouse stays in Canada. Your spouse is the nonresident alien at the close, so it’s a (g) case, and the IRS confirms (g) reaches “situations in which one of you was not a U.S. resident at the beginning of the tax year but was at the end of the year, and the other was not a U.S. resident at the end of the year.” If you both moved, or you married an American, your spouse is a citizen or resident at the close and you’re the arriving one, which is the (h) shape. The Canadian side of a split household has its own page: what happens when your spouse stays in Canada.

What does a section 6013 election actually cost?

Worldwide income, for both of you, and with the (g) election it runs past this year. Each spouse reports their entire worldwide income for the year of the choice and for all later years unless the choice ends or is suspended, and the IRS says you generally can’t claim treaty benefits as a resident of a foreign country while it’s in effect. You may be able to claim a credit for the Canadian tax paid on that foreign income, which softens the bill without removing the reporting.

“Each spouse must report their entire worldwide income for the year you make the choice and for all later years unless the choice is ended or suspended.” (IRS, Nonresident spouse)

Duration is the one place the two subsections genuinely diverge. IRC 6013(g)(3) is an express continuing-years rule: the election “shall apply to the taxable year for which made and to all subsequent taxable years until terminated.” Section 6013(h) has no clause like that. It carries the conditions and a once-only bar and nothing else, so a claim that the (h) election rolls forward isn’t supported by its text. Publication 519 puts the (h) bar in plain words: neither spouse can make this choice for any later tax year, “even if you are separated, divorced, or remarried.”

What should I do next?

Settle three facts before you compare anything. Your residency starting date, because that’s what splits the year. Your spouse’s status on the last day of the year, because that decides which provision is even available to you. And how much pre-move Canadian income an election would pull onto the US return, because that’s the trade in one number. Then price every year a (g) election would run, and don’t stop at the first one.

• Bought a business rather than took a job? The E-2 version of the arrival year covers the surrounding filings, which differ even though the split runs the same way.
• Haven’t actually moved, and trying to stay a nonresident on a winter pattern? The weighted three-year day count is the page you want instead.

This guide is general information, not tax advice for your specific situation. Which points apply, and how, depends on your facts.