Establishing Florida residency

[Jason Hatcher]

Hey everyone!  Hoping for some insight on a complicated issue.  My fiance and I have been travel nurses for the last 3.5 years. We lived, went to school and maintain our residency in the state of Kentucky.  We have worked from Virginia to California and even to Hawaii.  We have maintained our residency in Kentucky for the duration of our travels.  Last March, my fiance purchased our first investment home in Florida.  We are currently looking to purchase a home in Florida as our permanent residency.  We hope to continue building our rental portfolio and want to have a home base to use when we are in Florida.  We recently got 'per diem' jobs in Northern California that are technically on call positions, but we are currently working full time hours.  We do not have any other income except for this per diem job, but still may take another travel assignment in the Northern California region.  We have an RV that we use for housing that we had to purchase in California and have it registered in California due to their state laws.  

The plan is to purchase a primary home in Florida for both of us, declare non-resident status in the state of Kentucky, move our belongings, licenses, tax addresses, etc to Florida.  We will not have any income from the state of Florida besides the one rental property that we currently own.  We may purchase a multi-unit house and reside in one of the units while renting the others.  At this time, we do not plan on spending much time in Florida as we are working hard in California, but have the intent to move full time to Florida in the near future.  With travel nursing, we made a low taxable hourly wage and received a large tax-free living stipend, but now we are making a much higher, fully taxable wage.  We do pay California income tax.  While we were traveling, we would pay the state income tax of where we worked, as well as in Kentucky.  We currently do not plan on buying a house in California and we are only using our RV as a place to stay while working here.

With that being the situation, here are my questions:

1. With the purchase of a house, transfer of addresses to Florida, and intent to move permanently in the near future, would that be sufficient enough to establish residency? 

2. Any disadvantages of just filing for residency in the state of California versus Florida?  Our primary income is coming from California and is already being taxed.  The main disadvantage I would see for this is if we plan to start another travel assignment.  We can not do a travel assignment close to our primary residency address.  If our residency is in Florida, we are open to doing a travel assignment close to where we are.  If we move our residency to the location we are staying, we would have to get a travel assignment further away and it would just be more complicated.

3. Would we receive any tax credits on our California non-resident state tax return if we lived in Florida as a resident?  I'm assuming I will just pay 100% of the state taxes owed to California and nothing to Florida, whereas I have been paying 100% of the state taxes owed to California and a portion more to Kentucky.

4. I would love to purchase a four-plex house, live in one unit and rent the other 3 units out and do so with an FHA loan. Argument being that Florida will be our resident state, we have family there and already own one house there. One lender already said no way that would work. Any input on the chances of getting an FHA?

Thanks in advance for any help and insight in to this.  We really appreciate it and look forward to hearing some answers!

[Basit Siddiqi]

1. With the purchase of a house, transfer of addresses to Florida, and intent to move permanently in the near future, would that be sufficient enough to establish residency?

I would get a State ID in FL and save onto copies of any utility bills.

2. Any disadvantages of just filing for residency in the state of California versus Florida? Our primary income is coming from California and is already being taxed. The main disadvantage I would see for this is if we plan to start another travel assignment. We can not do a travel assignment close to our primary residency address. If our residency is in Florida, we are open to doing a travel assignment close to where we are. If we move our residency to the location we are staying, we would have to get a travel assignment further away and it would just be more complicated.

It would be more advantageous to file for residency in FL than CA. If you file for residency in CA - you will pay CA tax rates on the income you earned in Kentucky. Also - if the rental income starts to show a profit - you will be paying CA tax on those earnings.

3. Would we receive any tax credits on our California non-resident state tax return if we lived in Florida as a resident? I'm assuming I will just pay 100% of the state taxes owed to California and nothing to Florida, whereas I have been paying 100% of the state taxes owed to California and a portion more to Kentucky.

You would not receive a credit on your California tax return because you don't pay an income tax in Florida.

4. I would love to purchase a four-plex house, live in one unit and rent the other 3 units out and do so with an FHA loan. Argument being that Florida will be our resident state, we have family there and already own one house there. One lender already said no way that would work. Any input on the chances of getting an FHA?

You are required to live in the house where you require an FHA loan. I hear lenders giving a hard-time to people who already own a personal residence. I guess you have to call up a couple lenders to explain to them that you will be selling the home that you live in and ultimately live in the home with the FHA loan.