Filing joint tax return before spouse has SSN

I had been told on the old forum several times that this is not possible, but I managed to dig up the process on how to do it which involves filing a W7 along with your taxes (and including the relevent marriage and citizenship info). What i just read today makes this even more important. Seems that the consulate in Guangzhou is taking the lack of "married" status on the tax return as evidence of not being a bona fide marriage. It is completely insane for them to make this leap, but knowing this will hopefully help those of us in the process avoid this issue.

Brian per my tax professional filed married joint listing Seyue 2008 and 2009 with the W7. All copies they will see of my returns at the interview have Seyue on them. As slow as the visa process is going most likely will file 2010 returns before interview. 3 years of returns?

Bob S.

Crap, you all would start talking about taxes.. Mine are going to be a mess.

Clif

Like Brian said just trying to be prepared. It does amaze me that if petitions are approved at USCIS and NVC that some idiot at Guangzhou has the right to reject the petition.

Bob S.

I think the problem people were running in to was filing single instead of married and separate. Still a crazy thing, if I hadn't been thinking about how to file jointly for the bigger return, it would have never occurred to me and I could have easily made the same mistake. In our case, the AOS papers we sent in only have the years where I was filing single anyway, but hopefully taking a copy of this years returns with us to the interview will help. As the time gets closer I'm getting more and more paranoid.

Cliff, for the federal stuff, Turbo tax has free online federal filing. Since you're a part year resident of only Texas you don't have to worry about the state stuff.

What's nice about Texas is no state income tax. Glad I left that crap behind in California. Plus the cost's to live here are a little more than half the cost of living out there.

Bob S.