What Is A 'tax Home'?, Can I use my parents address for my tax home? Options

[Willy]

I basically live in my truck right now and I use my parents address as my home address. I get all my mail there and stop by once a month or so to pick it up. Someone told me that I could get in trouble with the IRS for doing that and I want to know it that's true.

[John Ewing]

That all depends on how your relationship with your parents is set up. Here's a quote from an article I did a couple years back on this topic.

TAX HOME - in order to claim travel expenses you must have a “tax home”. This is the place where you live when you are not on the road. A PO Box is not a “tax home”! If you live in your truck and do not have a physical street address then you cannot claim any travel expenses. In addition to a physical address, you also must “have living expenses at your main home that you duplicate because your business requires you to be away from that home”. Using your parents or another relative or friends address as your “tax home” is only valid if you pay that person an amount equal to the going rate for a room in the area and regularly use that room when you are off duty as your residence. In the event of an audit you will have to substantiate these expenses to prove that you have an actual “tax home”. If you can’t you will probably lose all your deductions for travel expenses and will then be subject to fines and penalties for the amount of the tax increase.

So if you're paying your parents room & board and actually spending time there (have a room there) when you're off duty then it probably qualifies as a tax home. But if they just collect your mail for you then it would not qualify and you could get into trouble if you're taking the per diem allowance for being out on the road.