I-864 income question

[aless 0]

In Part 6 of the I-864 for Sponsor's Employment and Income I am including my wife, with whom I file taxes jointly. I will file an I-864a for her. On our tax return we have a huge negative number due to a Net Operating Loss carryover from a previous year. I will be able to combat this with substantial assets. My question is this though. I have to enter my individual annual income, which on Line 22 of the tax return is, let's say, $-200,000. I also have to enter my wife's current income, which since we share a joint return is the same exact figure. At the end of that, in question 15, I am supposed to total all the amounts, thereby making my loss $-400,000, which is incorrect. So what do I enter in the current income for my wife? Anyone filing jointly would have this problem. It's a shared return but you are asked to add two figures that should not be added as that incorrectly duplicates the figure. But if I write "$0" for my wife's current income that is not what appears on the tax return and so that might cause an issue. And in fact on the following page I find a similar problem. I have to enter my assets and her assets and add them together. However, we share the bank accounts in which those assets lie, so again it would end up with a figure double the size of what it is. Confused.

Edited September 22, 2017 by aless

[Villanelle 4,121]

Theres no apparent reason why you are adding everything twice.

 

Does your wife also own the business? I suspect not. So she has no income. If she did own it with you what is her share? That is how you would divide up the income or loss.

 

For the bank account you can only count the account once even if its joint.

[aless 0]

2 minutes ago, Damara said:

Theres no apparent reason why you are adding everything twice.

 

Does your wife also own the business? I suspect not. So she has no income. If she did own it with you what is her share? That is how you would divide up the income or loss.

 

For the bank account you can only count the account once even if its joint.

My worry was that our having a joint tax return meant that we both have the income, since the return doesn't stipulate whose is what. Is that not right then? I can just put $0 for her current individual annual income and for her Total Income? And do the same on her I-864a? Which I am only filing so I can use our jointly held mutual funds that have substantial assets. I was thinking it would seem odd to the person reading our file to see I've filed an I-864a for someone who has $0 income.

[Villanelle 4,121]

theres a spot on the forms for immigrants income and assets. You dont use the 864a

[aless 0]

1 hour ago, Damara said:

theres a spot on the forms for immigrants income and assets. You dont use the 864a

The immigrant is my father, not my wife.

[aless 0]

I guess the bottom line is, everything is incredibly simplified if I can just not include my wife at all and I sponsor my father alone. But will I have problems because some of the mutual fund accounts I am using as assets are in both our names and the tax return is a joint one? Or does it not matter...is an I-864a not necessary just because her name is also on accounts/tax return?