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Student Loans
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Re: Graduating med student, recently married

Hi,

For the second question, filing jointly one year does not mandate that you need to file jointly the following year.

And for this loan repayment program, I would definitely check to see that filing separately does not cost you more taxes than you will save with a reduced loan payment. A tax accountant can help you figure this out, or you can probably run the numbers yourself on Turbo Tax. And please keep in mind that there are items such as Roth IRAs and deducting student loan interest that aren't allowed to married taxpayers filing a separate tax return.

I had another client ask me the same question recently, and she ended up deciding to file jointly. But the big difference for her was that she had a child, and filing separately eliminates the child tax credit of $1000 and the dependent care credit of $600 - among other tax breaks. So we determined she would be better off filing jointly and paying an extra $200 per month on her loans.

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