Born in USA lived in Canada since 2 years old. Taxes WTF?

BornInTheUsa · Post by **BornInTheUsa** » Wed Aug 17, 2011 9:16 am

Hi All,

I stumbled upon this forum while googling taxes for dual citizens.

My wife was born in the USA and move with her Canadian father and American mother to Canada when she was 2 years old and has lived there ever since. (She is now 42)

She has a Canadian passport and no formal US documents (like passport or social security number.) She has always traveled through the US with her
Canadian passport.

I read somewhere that she is now expected to file US taxes?
She was not actually sure that she was a US citizen but it seems that if you are born there you are unless you have renounced it after you are 18 years old which she has not done.

What are her options at this point?

Could she just do noting and claim she did not know about these new rules? (How could she, she is not living in the USA and did not receive any personal mail about it. Why would anyone be expected to keep up with laws from places where you do not even live.)
What can happen if the IRS find her later and she has not filed taxes but is not actually owing any taxes?
What are the chances that they actually find her?

I guess if she has to file US taxes then how hard is that to do?

We live in Toronto, are there any people who could provide help with filing if needed for a reasonable fee?

Are there any issues that could cause her to have to actually pay taxes to the US?

tsanaha · Post by **tsanaha** » Wed Aug 17, 2011 10:08 am

if your wife does not plan in the future to move/live in US, i guess she may just do nothing.

all she has in US is a record of her (birth certificate), i am not sure if she has SSN. Now by law, each new born will get a SSN (the application is sent from hostpital).

if she wants to keep tie with US, then she can just file last 6 years return -- if no tax owe, it is just paper work.

no need CPA/lawyer.. just DIY.

oldgringo · Post by **oldgringo** » Wed Aug 17, 2011 10:49 am

have you read my post ..double trouble? my wife was born in the states and moved to Canada at age 14..she didn't know about filing taxes either utill i read a globe and mail article about the IRS coming after U.S. citizens in Canada (do a search for that article)...she has now obtained a u.s. ssn and has filed 6 years back taxes and Fbar...it's your choice not to file or not...we filed because we could not live with the threat of the IRS coming after us in the future.

BornInTheUsa · Post by **BornInTheUsa** » Wed Aug 17, 2011 11:37 am

[quote="oldgringo"]have you read my post ..double trouble? my wife was born in the states and moved to Canada at age 14..she didn't know about filing taxes either utill i read a globe and mail article about the IRS coming after U.S. citizens in Canada (do a search for that article)...she has now obtained a u.s. ssn and has filed 6 years back taxes and Fbar...it's your choice not to file or not...we filed because we could not live with the threat of the IRS coming after us in the future.[/quote]

Did you do it yourself?

What was involved with it?

I guess a T4 slip does not really match their tax forms?

I read somewhere that there might be issues around RRSP?

oldgringo · Post by **oldgringo** » Wed Aug 17, 2011 1:22 pm

if you are going to file you should start reading this forum and if you read my double trouble post you'll see what i did about finding a person to do her u.s. taxes...i read over 100 pages here to find most of the answerer's to my questions..you start by getting her a social security number ..you will have to fill out forms for rrsp's and tfsa's if you have one... and if your wife has her own or [u]joint [/u]accounts that add up to over $10,000 you must file FBAR forms...like it been stated here many times that if no tax is owing back file 3 years along with 3 years Fbar's and you if you owe money file 6 years... and you should be fine.