Some practical info on getting a U.S. state residency if you need one

[BudRight]

The legal advice I've gotten on that subject in the past, at least regarding wills for an American living overseas, is that the last U.S. state where you previously had residence before moving overseas continues to be your state. Similar with voter registration, in that you can continue to be an absentee voter from the last U.S. location where you were registered, even after you've moved outside the U.S.

^This

You are only no longer considered a resident of a state if you take up residency IN ANOTHER STATE.

Otherwise, you are a resident of the last state you lived. This even applies to lawful permanent residents and tourists to the US.

Edit: 'state' is not a proper noun unless referring to a specific state.

Edited April 28, 2015 by BudRight

[connda]

Regarding financial institutions closing your account due to living abroad:

There is NO provision in the Patriot Act which prohibits banks from accepting clients who do not live in the US. However, US banks are looking at the increased diligence provisions in the Patriot Act and using these as an excuse to get rid of any clients who are too difficult to assess.

The US Treasury Department has offered to help citizens who have problems with account closures at US banks. If you are notified of account closure of an existing account by a US national bank (i.e. not a “local” bank), you can file a complaint with the Customer Assistance Group of the Treasury Dept. www.occ.treas.gov/customer.htm . You should also consider filing a complaint with the Consumer Finance Protection Bureau www.consumerfinance.gov/complaint and the Federal Reserve https://www.federalreserveconsumerhelp.gov/complaint/formcomplaint.cfm

ACA, Inc. as well as the Congressional Americans Abroad Caucus are very interested in getting feedback from people who use these resources. And also, ACA, Inc. recommends that you write your own representative in Congress about your banking problems.

Source: Americans Citizen Abroad
https://americansabroad.org/issues/banking/banking-and-the-patriot-act-update/

[CaptHaddock]

The legal advice I've gotten on that subject in the past, at least regarding wills for an American living overseas, is that the last U.S. state where you previously had residence before moving overseas continues to be your state. Similar with voter registration, in that you can continue to be an absentee voter from the last U.S. location where you were registered, even after you've moved outside the U.S.

^This

You are only no longer considered a resident of a state if you take up residency IN ANOTHER STATE.

Otherwise, you are a resident of the last state you lived. This even applies to lawful permanent residents and tourists to the US.

Edit: 'state' is not a proper noun unless referring to a specific state.

After moving abroad you continue to be a resident of the last state you live in for voting purposes. This is distinct from tax domicile. An expat does not necessarily continue to have tax domicile in his last state of residence depending on the criteria for determining tax domicile in that state. It's confusing because, depending on the state as TallGuy points out, some states may consider an expat's continuing to vote in the state as one factor toward establishing tax domicile.

By the way, TallGuy, my mail forwarder in FL offers a service to register their expat clients as FL voters. I haven't pursued it, because it seems to me it might constitute voting fraud, but FL is a swing state where votes count more. Let me know if you want a reference to my forwarder.

Edited April 28, 2015 by CaptHaddock

[JimGant]

You are only no longer considered a resident of a state if you take up residency IN ANOTHER STATE.

Otherwise, you are a resident of the last state you lived.

For tax purposes, Virginia maintains the following in their publications:

"Unless you have established residency in another state, you will still be considered a domiciliary resident of Virginia, and will be

required to file Virginia income tax returns."

And to further substantiate this mantra, a couple, who had permanently moved to another country, asked the Virginia Dept of Taxation (where they had previously lived) what their tax liability was. This is the answer they received:

"The Department advised the Taxpayers that, as citizens of the United States, they remained domiciliary residents of Virginia and must continue to file as residents." http://www.tax.virginia.gov/laws-rules-decisions/rulings-tax-commissioner/12-26

The couple cried foul, and appealed to the Tax Commissioner (link above), who ruled in their favor -- even citing a case from a decade previous:

"The Department has also previously ruled that an individual can abandon a Virginia domicile and establish domicile in a foreign country and continue to be a United State, citizen. See P.D. 00-6 (2/28/2000)."

So, case law in Virginia would certainly indicate that, at least for Virginia tax avoidance, one is not required to have a legal domicile within the US. I wonder how many expats are still paying Virginia taxes due to the advice received from some tax clerk.....?

Interestingly, the Virginia tax rulings show that the main reason the Virginia Dept of Taxation comes after you is because the IRS has notified them that you used a Virginia address on your Federal tax filing. Then, it becomes your burden to prove you've abandoned Virginia for good.

(Sorry if the above looks familiar. I posted similar information on another thread, which I now cannot find.)

[TallGuyJohninBKK]

What you might have also added, Jim, is that Virginia for some reason is among a small group of U.S. states with the toughest state income tax rules for trying to hold onto former state residents who no longer live there.

Most states don't have the same approach as Virginia.

The bottom line is, it's important for a U.S. expat to know the state income tax regulations for the state where they last resided before moving abroad, and then presumably take whatever steps are possible to make sure that you don't fall under your particular state's state income tax qualifications.

I believe the Captain's general advice above was on target in general:

--the notion of last resided state does tend to apply to voter registration eligibility.

--but whether a person has obligations under their former state's state income tax system depends on how they fare vis-a-vis that particular state's own tax regulations, which of course vary from state to state.

Edited April 28, 2015 by TallGuyJohninBKK