Live in NH, work in MA? You may be overpaying Massachusetts.
We prepare the Massachusetts non-resident return and apportion your wages by day count, so New Hampshire commuters are taxed only on the days they actually worked across the line.
Chris Brown, Enrolled Agent
You work with me directly, start to finish.
How we prepare the NH resident, MA employer cross-border return
If you live in New Hampshire and work in Massachusetts, we prepare the Massachusetts nonresident return and apportion your wages to the days you actually worked in the state. You are taxed on your Massachusetts days, not the ones you worked from home in New Hampshire. When your employer over-withheld on the whole paycheck, that gap comes back to you.
Thousands of New Hampshire households send at least one paycheck across the Massachusetts line, and plenty of them pay Massachusetts more than they owe without ever seeing it on the pay stub. This is the return we prepare most, and getting the day count right is where the money is.
Chris Brown, Enrolled Agent
You work with me directly, start to finish.
Whether you searched for a Massachusetts non-resident return, help with day-count apportionment, or just someone who understands the commute from New Hampshire into Massachusetts, the work behind it is the same. NH Tax Advisors is led by Chris Brown, a federally licensed Enrolled Agent, so we can prepare the return and represent you before either tax authority.
Why cross-border commuters overpay, and how the money comes back
You live in New Hampshire and work in Massachusetts, and Massachusetts income tax comes out of every check, calculated on all of it, even the days you worked at your own kitchen table in New Hampshire. Those at-home days are not Massachusetts income, yet the pay stub never separates them out, and the overpayment only comes back if the return apportions your wages to the days you were physically in the state. Leave that undone and the same overpayment repeats every year, invisibly, for as long as you hold the job. So we count your real Massachusetts workdays, apportion the wages to them on the nonresident return, and get back the tax that was withheld on your New Hampshire days. After that we look through the years still open to us, to see how long the overpayment has run and whatever else those returns left on the table.
- Massachusetts nonresident returns prepared with the wages apportioned to your real day count
- The Massachusetts return e-filed, so your refund is not waiting weeks on a mailed return
- Prior open years reviewed for the same overpayment, and amended where it is worth it
- Your day count and work schedule on file, so the apportionment does not start over each year
- Hybrid and fully remote schedules counted correctly, including the years your days changed
- Licensed to represent you before the IRS, and to prepare the state return that rides along with yours
“He was professional, cordial, and efficient. I'm extremely glad I found NH Tax Advisors and chose to work with them.”
How we get your cross-border return right
- Count the days. We work out how many days you actually worked inside Massachusetts against your total workdays for the year, using your calendar, your worksite, and your remote schedule.
- Apportion the wages. We apply that day-count fraction to your wages on the Massachusetts nonresident return, so only your Massachusetts days are taxed there and the New Hampshire days come off.
- Recover and reset. We file so the over-withheld tax comes back, then set your withholding and check the open prior years, so next spring is not another overpayment.
What day-count apportionment actually looks like
The whole cross-border return turns on one fraction: the days you worked in Massachusetts over your total workdays. Massachusetts taxes only the top of that fraction. When your employer withheld on the whole salary, the rest is the refund. A clean example makes it concrete.
A three-days-in, two-days-home week
Say you earn $100,000, work a steady schedule of three days at the Massachusetts office and two days from home in New Hampshire, and your employer withholds Massachusetts tax on all of it.
| Days | Share of wages | |
|---|---|---|
| Worked at the MA office | 3 of every 5 | 60% |
| Worked from home in NH | 2 of every 5 | 40% |
| Wages MA taxed through withholding | 100% | |
| Wages MA can actually tax | 60% |
Massachusetts was owed tax on $60,000 of your pay, but your employer withheld as if the full $100,000 were earned there. The nonresident return apportions the wages to your real 60/40 split, and the tax withheld on the $40,000 of New Hampshire days comes back to you. Change the schedule and the fraction changes with it: one more day home each week moves more of the wages off the Massachusetts side.
If your days are split, let’s find out what the fraction really is.
Not sure how many days you actually worked across the line last year? That is the first thing we figure out together, and it is usually a quick conversation with your calendar in front of you.
The overpayment usually did not start this year
Here is the part that stings once people see it: the same withholding setup was almost certainly wrong last year, and the year before. If your employer has taxed your full salary the whole time you have worked the hybrid schedule, every one of those years overpaid the same way. Prior years are not closed the moment they are filed. You generally have three years to amend a return and claim the refund, so the recent overpayments are usually still recoverable.
Three years of the same 40% overpayment
Same commuter as above, a steady 60/40 split, but nobody apportioned the wages until now. Here is what the open years hold.
| Tax year | What happened | If we amend now |
|---|---|---|
| Two years ago | MA taxed 100%, owed 60% | Refund on the 40% of NH days, still open |
| Last year | MA taxed 100%, owed 60% | Refund on the 40% of NH days, still open |
| This year | Apportioned correctly the first time | No overpayment to recover |
Each open year gets its own amended nonresident return, apportioned to that year’s real day count, and the refund on the New Hampshire days comes back for every year still inside the window. The years that have already closed are gone, which is why the lookback is worth doing now rather than next spring.
Let’s check how many of your past years are still open to amend.
A cross-border return rarely travels alone. If the Massachusetts wages are only part of the picture, we prepare the rest of your individual and family return the same way. If a past year was filed with the full salary taxed to Massachusetts, that is an amended return, and recovering those refunds is routine. And if a Massachusetts year went unfiled entirely, sometimes one a commuter never realized they owed, start with back taxes and unfiled returns. Most of this happens by secure portal, phone, and video, the same way we work with commuters in Nashua, Salem, and Manchester.
A few of the questions cross-border filers ask us most:
Frequently asked questions
Do I actually owe Massachusetts tax if I live in New Hampshire and work in Massachusetts?
Usually yes, but only on part of your pay. Massachusetts taxes the wages you earn on the days you physically work inside the state, not your whole salary and not the days you work from home in New Hampshire. You report that Massachusetts-source share on a nonresident return, Form 1-NR/PY. If every workday was spent at a Massachusetts worksite, close to all of it is taxable there. The day you start working some days from home, part of your pay stops being Massachusetts income.
I work hybrid, some days in New Hampshire and some in Massachusetts. How does that get taxed?
Your wages get split by where the work actually happened. We take the days you physically worked in Massachusetts, divide them by your total workdays for the year, and apply that fraction to your wages. The Massachusetts-source share is what the nonresident return taxes, and the New Hampshire days come off. The catch is that most employers withhold Massachusetts tax on all of it, so the apportionment is what turns your real day count into money back.
Is the Massachusetts "convenience of the employer" rule still in effect for remote workers?
Not currently. Massachusetts does not have a standing convenience-of-the-employer rule, the kind New York uses. It applied a temporary version during the pandemic that treated a remote day as a Massachusetts day, but that expired in 2021. Today Massachusetts taxes a nonresident on the work actually performed in the state, so a day you genuinely work from home in New Hampshire is a New Hampshire day and comes off the return. We confirm the current Massachusetts position each year before we apportion, so your return reflects the rule as it stands.
My spouse works in Massachusetts and I work in New Hampshire. How do we split our income on the Massachusetts return?
Only the spouse with Massachusetts-source income is taxed there. You file jointly for federal, then on the Massachusetts nonresident return we report just the working spouse’s Massachusetts wages, apportioned to their real in-state days. Your New Hampshire income stays off it entirely. Getting that split right matters, because a joint return can accidentally pull income onto the Massachusetts side that the state was never owed.
Does Massachusetts tax my investment income, like interest, dividends, and capital gains, if I live in New Hampshire?
Generally no. For a New Hampshire resident, Massachusetts taxes income tied to work performed in the state, not your portfolio. Interest, dividends, and gains from ordinary investments are generally not Massachusetts-source just because your employer sits there. Gains tied to Massachusetts real estate or a Massachusetts business are the exception. And New Hampshire stopped taxing interest and dividends starting with 2025, so from that year forward this income carries no state tax at all; through 2024 the old DP-10 could still apply to a back-year or amended return.
I am self-employed with Massachusetts clients but I live in New Hampshire. Do I owe Massachusetts tax?
It turns on where you do the work, not where the client sits. Massachusetts taxes the business income you earn from work physically performed in the state. If you do the work from your New Hampshire office and only the customer is in Massachusetts, little or none of it is usually Massachusetts-source. If you regularly go into Massachusetts to do the work, that portion is. We look at where the work actually happens and source your self-employment income to match.
Want it from Massachusetts directly? These are the pages worth reading.
Where to learn more
- Massachusetts DOR: Who Must FileThe state’s own rules for when a nonresident who earns Massachusetts income has to file a return.
- Massachusetts law: nonresident income (c. 62 §5A)The statute that defines Massachusetts-source income for nonresidents and the basis for apportioning wages to in-state days.
- Massachusetts DOR: Personal Income Tax Forms and InstructionsWhere to find Form 1-NR/PY, the nonresident and part-year return, with the line-by-line filing instructions.
What clients say
Real reviews from real Southern NH clients
“I truly cannot say enough good things about my experience with Chris & Maria at NH Tax Advisors! I came to them with a rather daunting & messy self-employed tax situation, needing resolution for some previous years' filings.”
“We had an unexpected situation this tax season when our original accountant suddenly became ill and had to retire. My husband and I were scrambling to find someone new, especially so close to the deadline.”
“I had a great experience working with Chris Brown. He was incredibly easy to work with and always very reachable. He would respond within minutes or at most a few hours whenever I had a question.”
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