How Do I Apply For Tax exemption?

How do you obtain tax exemption without being a nonprofit organization?

• Our Home and School association has a tax exempt ID, yet we are not a non-profit organization. How is that possible? How would we have obtained tax exemption? No one in the organization seems to know. What criteria could be used for obtaining a tax exempt ID? And this isn't as important right now, but how do you go about becoming a nonprofit organization? Did you ever hear of a Home and School Association being such? Thanks.

• Answer:

  That depends on what you mean by "non-profit." Some organizations are tax-exempt, and some are also able to receive tax-deductible charitable contributions. As the first link explains, the IRS permits or denies "tax-exempt" status for qualifying organizations, but "non-profit" status is a label used by state laws. Federal tax-exempt status can be requested by filing Form 1023. You may be able to verify your associations status by doing a search. If you know their exact name or (better yet) their EIN, you can look them up on sites like Melissadata.com (see below); if your organization comes up, it will say what IRS status they have (such as 501(c)(3)). Hopefully the below links will help clarify things for you. Good luck! :-)