About Stateside Money
Stateside Money publishes plain-English guides to three things people moving for work must deal with and usually get bad information about: filing US tax, borrowing to buy a house in the US, and arranging health cover.
There are eighteen guides across three sections — US Tax, Mortgages & Home Loans, and Health Cover. Each is built the same way: the rule, where it is published, the date it was checked, and where the widely repeated version is wrong.
Who publishes this
Stateside Money is an independent publication, written and edited by the Stateside Money desk. It is a small operation — a publishing site, not a firm. There is no client list, and nobody here takes instructions from a lender or tax preparer about what the guides say.
The editor can be reached at [email protected]. Privacy and data questions go to [email protected].
What this site covers
US Tax. How US income tax works; which return you need — Form 1040, 1040-NR or 1040-SR; filing from outside the United States; the documents to assemble first; deadlines, extensions and late penalties; paying from a foreign bank account; FBAR and FATCA reporting; and getting an Employer Identification Number.
Mortgages & Home Loans. VA loans end to end, including entitlement and the funding fee; FHA and conventional routes for first-time buyers; what is possible with poor credit; minimum credit scores, and whose minimum they are; mortgage insurance — PMI, FHA MIP and the VA funding fee; and what happens between offer and closing.
Health Cover. What health insurance costs on a US work visa, what an employer is and is not required to provide, and what UK health cover costs alongside the NHS.
What this site deliberately does not do
Stateside Money is not a tax practice, not a lender, not a mortgage broker, not a law firm and not a government body. It is not regulated as any of those, because it does not do any of those things.
That has concrete consequences, worth stating plainly rather than in a footer:
- No article is advice for your situation. Everything is general information about published rules.
- The site will not tell you what you owe, whether you qualify, or which loan to take. It does not know your circumstances.
- Nothing here is an offer of credit, an insurance quotation or a tax opinion.
- Nobody here can review your return or your file. The guides explain the process; a CPA, enrolled agent, licensed loan officer or solicitor handles your case.
The Disclaimer sets this out in full.
How it is funded
Advertising. Stateside Money carries display advertising served by third-party networks, and that is the whole of the revenue model. There are no affiliate commissions on lenders or tax preparers, no sponsored articles, and no paid placements inside the guides.
Advertisers have no say in what is written or how a product is described, and they do not see articles in advance. Keeping it that way is self-interested as much as ethical: the only thing this site has to offer is that the figures are right and are not for sale.
The Privacy Policy explains what advertising vendors collect and how to opt out of personalised advertising.
The editorial approach
One rule governs everything: every figure traces to a primary source, and the source is named.
That means the Internal Revenue Service for tax figures, the Department of Veterans Affairs and the eCFR for VA loan rules, HUD for FHA, the FHFA for conforming limits, the CFPB for consumer mortgage rules, and gov.uk and the NHS for UK material. Articles cite the publication, not somebody else's summary of it.
Where a figure cannot be verified against a primary source, the article says so. It does not estimate, and it does not quote an industry average as though it were a rule. When the Department of Veterans Affairs publishes no processing time for a Certificate of Eligibility, the guide says so.
Every page carries the date it was last checked. Figures change annually, and a dated page is one you can judge for yourself. The Editorial Policy explains the checking process, corrections, and the role AI tools play.