How to Choose the Right Tax Return Preparer
Picking a good tax preparer can make filing your taxes a lot easier and make sure everything is done right, keeping you safe from legal or money troubles. But, if you choose a bad or unqualified person to do your taxes, it could cause a bunch of problems, some of which might be pretty serious.
Here are some of the potential consequences of choosing the wrong tax professional and essential tips to select the right tax professional.
Simplify Tax Season: 8 Benefits of Hiring a Tax Professional
Are you tired of the tax season stress and the uncertainty of whether you're maximizing your tax savings or risking an audit? It might be time to consider the invaluable services of a tax professional.
Here are eight benefits of working with a tax professional that can help you save money, time, and ensure a stress-free tax season.
How to Prepare for an IRS Audit
When conducting an audit, the IRS will ask you to present certain documents that support income, credits or deduction you claimed on your return. In this article we will share a list of the kinds of records that might be requested from you during an audit.
Why Would the IRS Select You For an Audit?
There are a couple of reasons your tax return may be chosen for an audit. Your return may have been compared against the "norms" for similar returns in your industry and the information you reported didn't align with the standards or your return involved issues or transactions with other taxpayers whose returns were selected for audit.
Last-Minute Year-End Tax Strategies for Your Stock Portfolio
When you take advantage of the tax code’s offset game, your stock market portfolio can represent a little gold mine of opportunities to reduce your 2022 income taxes.
Last-Minute Year-End Tax Strategies for Marriage, Kids, and Family
Are you thinking of getting married or divorced? Do you give money to family or friends? Here are five strategies to consider as we come to the end of 2022.
Buying an Electric Vehicle? Know These Tax Law Changes
There’s good and bad news if you’re in the market for an electric or plug-in hybrid electric vehicle.
The good news is that the newly enacted Inflation Reduction Act includes a wholly revamped tax credit for electric vehicles that starts in 2023 and continues through 2032.
The IRS Wants to Know about Your Crypto
Cryptocurrency such as bitcoin is all the rage these days. Crypto is not legal money. It is property, similar to gold. Like gold, its use can result in taxable income.
Investing in Treasury Inflation-Protected Securities (TIPS)
If you are thinking of investing conservatively but in a way that also offers some inflation protection, here’s an option to consider.
Earn 9.62 Percent Tax-Deferred with Series I Bonds
Through October 2022, you can buy Series I bonds that pay 9.62 percent interest. And you receive that rate for six months from the time of purchase.
The interest you earn for the first six months gets added to the principal, and you earn interest on that interest during the next six months (think compound interest).
Are Self-Directed IRAs for Real Estate a Good Idea?
The stock market is tanking while real estate continues to skyrocket.
If your retirement savings have taken a hit, you may be wondering if this is the time to invest in real estate through your IRA, Roth IRA, or SEP-IRA.
You can’t invest in real estate with a traditional IRA or Roth IRA (or SEP-IRA) you establish with a bank, brokerage, or trust company, but you can invest in real estate if you establish a self-directed IRA with a custodian that allows self-directed investments.
If You Own Rental Property You're One of the Net Investment Income Tax Prime Targets
If you own rental property, you’re one of the NIIT’s prime targets. You pay the NIIT only if your modified adjusted gross income (MAGI) exceeds $200,000 if you’re single, or $250,000 if you’re married filing jointly ($125,000 for married couples filing separately), and you have net investment income.
Selling Your Appreciated Vacation Home? Consider the Taxes
When you have both rental and personal use of a home, your tax life gets more complicated because you have entered the tax code’s vacation home section. Continue reading to learn more.
Transferring Your Home to Your Adult Child
With today’s home prices and the crazy real estate market, it’s likely difficult for your children to buy a home.
Say you’re feeling so generous that you might just simply give your home to your adult child. What a deal for the kid! Say you’re feeling generous, but not so generous that you want to simply give away your home. Fair enough. The idea of giving your child a free house might be unappealing to you. Very well.
Donor-Advised Funds: A Tax Planning Tool for Church and Charity Donations
Do you give money to 501(c)(3) charities? Do you get a tax benefit from those donations?
Recent changes in the tax code have done much to destroy your benefits from church and other tax-deductible 501(c)(3) donations. But there’s a way to donate the way you want, get revenge on the tax code, and realize the tax benefits you deserve.
Tax Implications When Your Vacation Home Is a Rental Property
If you have a home that you both rent out and use personally, you have a tax code-defined vacation home.
The tax code classifies your vacation home as a rental property if you rent it out for more than 14 days during the year, and your personal use during the year does not exceed the greater of (a) 14 days or (b) 10 percent of the days you rent the home out at fair market rates.
Send Tax Documents Correctly to Avoid IRS Trouble
You have heard the horror stories about mail sent to the IRS that remains unanswered for months. Reportedly, the IRS has mountains of unanswered mail pieces in storage trailers, waiting for IRS employees to process them.
If you must file a physical document with the IRS, don’t use regular U.S. mail, Priority Mail, or Express Mail.
Health Savings Accounts: The Ultimate Retirement Account
Not everyone can have an HSA. But you can if you’re self-employed or your employer doesn’t provide health benefits. Some employers offer, as an employee fringe benefit, either HSAs alone or HSAs combined with high-deductible health plans.
Vacation Home Rental—What’s Best for You: Schedule C or E?
Do you have a vacation home that you rent out?
If the average period of rental is less than 30 days, you likely have a choice—either claim the income and expenses on Schedule C, or claim the income and expenses on Schedule E.