Canadian Tax Expert Out There?

If you have income, of course you do. We're special. I'd expect you can credit your Canadian taxes against your US taxes and probably reduce them to zero. I believe you can credit your provincial taxes (which you usually pay on the same return) as well.

They're yours to keep no matter where you live. I don't understand the rules well enough to know if you'll be allowed to make contributions to them. If you plan to stay in Canada you'd probably prefer to contribute to an RSP.

R's, John

If I could claim provincial taxes, then the foreign tax credit would probably reduce my tax to zero. Also, I will almost definitely buy a house in Canada, and I am pretty sure the mortgage interest would still be deductible on my U.S. return but not on my Canadian.

The bizarre part would be if I have to treat my wife as a U.S. resident to avoid the MFS penalty, and subject her income to U.S. tax also.

My question about IRA's has more to do with treatment going forward. I've read something indicating that as a Canadian resident, I would have to pay tax to Canada on the increment in value, but that I can defer it until I take the money out. That would be OK for the traditional IRA's, but it could make anything I earn on the Roth's taxable later on, when it wouldn't be if I stayed in the USA. I wonder if I could be in a bizarre situation where I have to come back to the USA for a tax year just to avoid that penalty.

You also have the foreign tax credit. You can use both the FEIC and FTC, or just the FTC.

They are still yours. The age limit rules still apply.

If you renounce your US citizenship then I'm not sure what happens. I think that include that you can close out your IRA's without penalty, and have to include IRA's in your net asset value for calculating the expatriation tax.