Residing in the Same Household

In order to file your tax return as a head of household (HOH), at least one of the qualifying individuals must live in your household for more than one-half of the year except for temporary absences unless the person is your father or mother. In that case, you can be a HOH if you pay for at least half the cost of maintaining your father or mother's main home for the entire year, even if your parent(s) lives apart from you in a house or apartment, or in a nursing home or other care facility for the elderly. In addition, an institutionalized or hospitalized dependent, other than a parent, may also qualify you as head of a household if you can prove that your home was the "principal" place of abode of the dependent, even though the dependent may never return home because of the nature of the infirmity.

Temporary absences include vacations, illnesses, military service, or time spent in college, provided that you reasonably anticipate that the absentee will return and you continue to maintain a household during the absence.

Also, the birth or death of a qualifying individual during the year will not disqualify you as the head of a household if the individual lived in the household during the part of the year when he or she was alive.

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