FAQ: Non-US Spouses

Last updated: April 9, 2026

Luminary is primarily built to support US transfer tax situations. However, in the event your client has a non-US spouse, you can use this guide to simulate the estate tax implications of this unique scenario.

Specifically, one major consideration is non-US spouses do not have lifetime or GST exemptions, and do not benefit from the unlimited marital deduction.

In Luminary, you can model tax outcomes by following these steps:

  1. On the People tab, edit the non-US spouse's information to be a resident of a state with no state-level estate tax (i.e. CA or FL)

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  2. On the Exemptions tab, adjust the non-US spouse so they have used all of their Federal and GST exemptions.

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  3. Additionally, click Manage portability and DSUE in the upper right corner, and toggle the portability toggle to Off. 

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  4. On the Waterfall tab, mark the recipient type of ALL transfers to the non-US spouse as G2 or other individual, instead of Spouse(martial exclusion). This can be done in the Dispositions section of each trust or entity. 

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