District of Columbia Tax Residency (183-day abode rule)

Key parameters
Threshold	183 days
Period / Window	Tax year (1 Jan – 31 Dec)
Counting	Days the abode is maintained
Alternative	Domicile
Additional requirements	Place of abode in the District

This applies to anyone who owns or rents somewhere to live in the District, whatever state they treat as their own. You are a DC resident if either of these applies:

• Domicile at any time in the year — the District is your permanent home at any point during the tax year, not merely at the end of it.
• Abode maintained for 183 days — you keep a place of abode within the District for an aggregate of 183 days or more during the tax year, whether you are domiciled there.

The second route is unlike almost every other jurisdiction's. Everywhere else pairs a home with a count of the days you were present. The District counts the days the abode itself was maintained, and days of temporary absence are included. The trigger is having ongoing access to a DC dwelling, owned or leased.

The practical effect is stark: a lease or a deed running past six months can make you a DC resident on worldwide income even in a year you barely set foot in the District.

Domicile is also tested generously against you. Being domiciled in the District at any time during the year is enough, so a move in either direction still leaves part of the year exposed.

• You can be a DC resident without being there. Because the count measures the abode rather than your presence, a dwelling held all year makes you a resident even in a year you spent almost entirely elsewhere.
• Buying in June is enough. A property acquired around the halfway point and held to the year-end can reach 183 days on its own.
• Renting counts as much as owning. The test asks whether a place of abode is maintained, not whether you hold title to it.
• Domicile at any moment in the year counts. Unlike states testing domicile on a single date, the District looks at the whole year.
• DC, Maryland and Virginia work differently from each other. Each of the three uses a different structure, so a regional commuter can be caught by more than one at once.

A resident is taxed on income from all sources while a nonresident pays only on DC-source income, so an error usually surfaces as out-of-state earnings never reported by someone who assumed a low day count kept them out. The Office of Tax and Revenue charges interest from the original due date and adds penalties for filing late and for underpaying, with greater exposure where an understatement is treated as deliberate. Professional tax advice is strongly recommended in situations like this.

An apartment kept but rarely used

You are domiciled in Virginia, keep a Washington apartment on a year-long lease, and stay there perhaps 40 nights. The abode was maintained for the whole year, so you are a DC resident despite the low presence.

A purchase in the first half of the year

You buy a DC condominium in May and hold it to the year-end, spending most of your time in New York. The abode ran well past 183 days, so the residency test is met on the property alone.

A short-term let that falls short

You take a four-month furnished rental in the District for a project and give it up afterwards, keeping no other property there. The abode was maintained for well under 183 days, so this route does not attach.

• DC Code — Section 47-1801.04, general definitions
• DC Office of Tax and Revenue — Audit division frequently asked questions