Health Insurance and State Residency
April 22, 2019 11:56 AM Subscribe
My daughter is a grad student in MO. We live in VA. I won't be claiming her on my taxes as a dependent in the future, as we realized she could get subsidized health insurance as a grad student way cheaper than I can keep her on my company health insurance. (She has better insurance than I do...) Plus she is pretty damn independent and it would be a stretch to meet the legal definition of a dependant with her.
Since she is receiving subsidized health insurance in MO does that mean she needs to become a resident of MO and get a MO driver's license, register her (my) car in the state, etc? Where you live legally can obviously be different than where you actually reside for a full-time student, but I don't know how the insurance issues affect this, and I haven't been able to Google up an answer.
Since she is receiving subsidized health insurance in MO does that mean she needs to become a resident of MO and get a MO driver's license, register her (my) car in the state, etc? Where you live legally can obviously be different than where you actually reside for a full-time student, but I don't know how the insurance issues affect this, and I haven't been able to Google up an answer.
Based on what I see on healthcare.gov, it doesn’t seem like she needs to be a state resident in order to get marketplace health insurance.
However, even if her income wouldn’t require her to file a tax return of her own, she does have to file a federal return if she’s getting health insurance from the marketplace, and a lot of states require a tax return if you file a federal return (not sure specifically about VA or MO). So she should look into whether she would need to file two state tax returns if she’s a VA resident, and whether it’s worth doing that to avoid changing her car registration and driver’s license. There may also be tuition/financial aid advantages to her being “in-state."
If she decides to be an MO resident, then she does need to get a new driver’s license and register the car.
posted by Kriesa at 1:46 PM on April 22, 2019
However, even if her income wouldn’t require her to file a tax return of her own, she does have to file a federal return if she’s getting health insurance from the marketplace, and a lot of states require a tax return if you file a federal return (not sure specifically about VA or MO). So she should look into whether she would need to file two state tax returns if she’s a VA resident, and whether it’s worth doing that to avoid changing her car registration and driver’s license. There may also be tuition/financial aid advantages to her being “in-state."
If she decides to be an MO resident, then she does need to get a new driver’s license and register the car.
posted by Kriesa at 1:46 PM on April 22, 2019
For what it’s worth, I lived in Louisiana for five years while keeping all car related things (license, registration, car insurance) based in Texas with no problems. I voted and filed taxes and got a Marketplace health insurance plan in Louisiana with a Texas driver’s license as my primary ID and never had a problem. This is not the right way to do things (I think the Louisiana rule is everything should be switched within 30 days of moving here) but for various reasons it is what I did.
I switched my license, car insurance and car registration to LA last fall and no one batted an eye or asked me when I’d moved to the state. Obviously this depends on the state, but my takeaway was that there really is no “official” register of residents of a state and none of these systems talk to each other.
posted by MadamM at 1:56 PM on April 22, 2019
I switched my license, car insurance and car registration to LA last fall and no one batted an eye or asked me when I’d moved to the state. Obviously this depends on the state, but my takeaway was that there really is no “official” register of residents of a state and none of these systems talk to each other.
posted by MadamM at 1:56 PM on April 22, 2019
The grad and undergrad students at my U get health insurance through the U and their state residency status doesn't matter at all.
posted by k8t at 1:59 PM on April 22, 2019 [1 favorite]
posted by k8t at 1:59 PM on April 22, 2019 [1 favorite]
Is her health insurance through healthcare.gov or through her university, which is located in MO? If it is through her university, she should 100% be able to keep her VA residency while using her graduate student health insurance plan. I am less sure about government health insurance.
If it is helpful: I had a NC license, a car registered (only to myself, my parents were not on the title or cosigners on the loan) in NC, and was still listed on my parents car insurance (NC). At the time I was also a grad student in GA that filed only GA and federal taxes, was registered to vote in GA, and used my graduate student health insurance, which was through my university located in GA. I kept my NC residency* because doing this made everything substantially simpler. The whole process is overly complicated and I'm not convinced I did everything completely correctly, despite trying my absolute best. Also, my university was absolutely no help. Good luck!
*Note: I didn't get financially penalized if I kept my NC residency. This is not universally true, a friend at another institution was required to petition for residency after a year, or pay for the cost difference between an an out-of-state tuition and an in-state tuition. I suspect the difference is because my university waived tuition and her university required tuition be paid from her home department as part of an TA/RA assistantship package.
posted by lucy.jakobs at 2:02 PM on April 22, 2019
If it is helpful: I had a NC license, a car registered (only to myself, my parents were not on the title or cosigners on the loan) in NC, and was still listed on my parents car insurance (NC). At the time I was also a grad student in GA that filed only GA and federal taxes, was registered to vote in GA, and used my graduate student health insurance, which was through my university located in GA. I kept my NC residency* because doing this made everything substantially simpler. The whole process is overly complicated and I'm not convinced I did everything completely correctly, despite trying my absolute best. Also, my university was absolutely no help. Good luck!
*Note: I didn't get financially penalized if I kept my NC residency. This is not universally true, a friend at another institution was required to petition for residency after a year, or pay for the cost difference between an an out-of-state tuition and an in-state tuition. I suspect the difference is because my university waived tuition and her university required tuition be paid from her home department as part of an TA/RA assistantship package.
posted by lucy.jakobs at 2:02 PM on April 22, 2019
This is state-dependent. In California, there are a pretty strong set of restrictions as to what it takes to become a state resident for tuition purposes, see e.g. https://advocate.berkeley.edu/california-residency-for-tuition-purposes/. If your daughter is paying her own tuition, that could be quite useful (find out what the MO rules are, they will very likely be different from the CA ones or those for any other state).
Even if she isn't paying her own tuition, whoever is covering it (her department or her advisor), then it might benefit her to become an MO resident for tuition purposes because money not spent on her tuition is available for other things that will help her.
As regards your actual question, is she getting subsidized health insurance through the exchange? Or through her school? If it is through the school, contact them to find out their residency rules. If it is through the exchanges, then contact the state insurance commissioner's office for more information.
posted by nat at 2:03 PM on April 22, 2019
Even if she isn't paying her own tuition, whoever is covering it (her department or her advisor), then it might benefit her to become an MO resident for tuition purposes because money not spent on her tuition is available for other things that will help her.
As regards your actual question, is she getting subsidized health insurance through the exchange? Or through her school? If it is through the school, contact them to find out their residency rules. If it is through the exchanges, then contact the state insurance commissioner's office for more information.
posted by nat at 2:03 PM on April 22, 2019
Response by poster: She is getting subsidized insurance via healthcare.gov. MO doesn't have its own exchange. All her income (she is on a funded assistantship so tuition is not an issue) in 2019 will be in MO as she will stay over the summer to work on her research project, and probably pick up a part-time job to earn extra funds while her teaching load is down over the summer. For all practical purposes, she is a resident of MO.
I can sell her the car for $1 and let her go register it, get a license, get her own insurance etc. in MO. I just can't figure if we have to do that because of the insurance.
I guess I worded this question poorly. What I'm really asking is does a college student need to be a legal resident of MO to buy insurance via healthcare.gov while attending school in MO. The healthcare.gov above link above seems to imply that it doesn't matter.
posted by COD at 2:29 PM on April 22, 2019
I can sell her the car for $1 and let her go register it, get a license, get her own insurance etc. in MO. I just can't figure if we have to do that because of the insurance.
I guess I worded this question poorly. What I'm really asking is does a college student need to be a legal resident of MO to buy insurance via healthcare.gov while attending school in MO. The healthcare.gov above link above seems to imply that it doesn't matter.
posted by COD at 2:29 PM on April 22, 2019
Here's the phone number 1-800-318-2596 listed on the Contact Us Section of healthcare.gov website. Maybe call them for peace of mind? They're supposedly open 24/7.
posted by mundo at 3:48 PM on April 22, 2019
posted by mundo at 3:48 PM on April 22, 2019
Response by poster: What we learned is that there is no connection between state of legal residence and state of residence from the healthcare.gov point-of-view. Healthcare.gov only cares where you are living - they don't care what the address is on your drivers license.
So no complications based on the health insurance situation. As a full year resident of MO earning above the threshold to file state taxes, MO considers her a resident. However, my car insurance company is fine with me keeping her on the car insurance as long as she is a full time student. So basically we are not changing anything and we'll deal with it next year when she graduates.
posted by COD at 6:41 AM on May 5, 2019
So no complications based on the health insurance situation. As a full year resident of MO earning above the threshold to file state taxes, MO considers her a resident. However, my car insurance company is fine with me keeping her on the car insurance as long as she is a full time student. So basically we are not changing anything and we'll deal with it next year when she graduates.
posted by COD at 6:41 AM on May 5, 2019
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posted by mundo at 1:31 PM on April 22, 2019 [1 favorite]