If you are a Uniformed Service Member, your domicile is your address for the purposes of voting (Voting Address). Your Voting Address determines your voting jurisdiction and where your ballot will be counted.
Generally speaking, if you are on active duty, your domicile is the place where you lived and had your domicile immediately before you entered active duty. If, pursuant to your military assignment, you established a new domicile at the place where you physically reside, it would then become your new domicile.
For example, if you lived at your parents’ house in Ann Arbor, Michigan, and after graduating from high school there you enlisted in the Navy, while you are on active duty your domicile would still be the house in Ann Arbor where you were living just before you entered active duty.
Even if you are serving within the U.S. but stationed away from your family home in Ann Arbor, you are still eligible to vote by absentee ballot in Ann Arbor under the protections of UOCAVA.
That will remain your Voting Address/domicile unless you establish a new domicile at some other place while you are on active duty. It does not matter if your parents no longer live in that house and have sold it to someone else, or even if the house was torn down to make way for a parking lot. That is still your Voting Address/domicile.
If you are the spouse of a Uniformed Service Member, you are allowed to retain the same residence or domicile that your Service Member has established, even if you have not physically been present at that address. Or, if you have established residency or domicile that is different from your spouse, you may elect to retain that.
If you are the dependent of a Uniformed Service Member who is 18 years or older, you may use the same Voting Address as your Uniformed Service Member parent, even if you never lived at or visited that address. Alternately you may use your last established residence in the U.S., even if it is different from your Uniformed Service Member parent’s residence.
NOTE: You may not choose your Voting Address/domicile. Your domicile is determined by law. You cannot choose to vote in a different state based on its favorable tax policy or on the perception that the election in that state is close and your vote might determine the outcome.You must have established residency in a state in order to vote in that state. Residency requirements vary by state.