Thinking of Collecting on Your Tax Credit? Read this first.

Reporting from Washington - If you're thinking about applying for the new $6,500 home buyer federal tax credit or the extended $8,000 version, the Internal Revenue Service has just issued its first formal guidelines for you.

Tops on the agency's list of advice: Cool it for a couple of weeks. Even if you qualify for one of the credits, don't send in any requests to the IRS quite yet. Wait until later this month when the agency publishes its revised Form 5405 with the key instructions needed to get you a check from the government.

The forthcoming version of the form will incorporate the major changes to the tax credit program made by Congress in legislation signed by President Obama on Nov. 6. These include expanded income limits, a cap on home prices, additional documentation requirements and prohibitions against claims by dependents.In a tax bulletin issued just before Thanksgiving, the IRS emphasized that all home purchasers after Nov. 6 "must use this new version [of Form 5405] to claim the credit."

Put another way: If you send in the old version -- the one you can currently download from the agency's website, www.irs.gov -- your request for the credit will probably go nowhere.

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