Procrastinator alert: your taxes are due! If you are nowhere near ready as the scary deadline approaches, you may file an extension with the IRS that gives you up to six more months to file your taxes. Filing an extension will spare you from late filing penalties — 5% of the amount of tax you
Tax Returns
How many people like the IRS? According to Facebook, it’s almost 110,000! Does it bother you that the Internal Revenue Service is more popular than you are?
If you regularly use social media outlets to stay in touch with friends and follow people or businesses that you find interesting and relevant, consider adding the Internal
Can you eliminate debt by settling with a creditor to pay less than you owed and still come out on the short end? It is possible, based on potential tax liabilities. Not only that, but “…any time an account is settled for less than you originally owe, it’s going to hurt your credit scores,” cautions
Wouldn’t it be nice if you could deduct your credit card debt from your taxes? For most Americans, that’s just a dream that will never come true. However, some circumstances allow you to deduct some credit card debt – all related to using your card for business purposes.
The 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act
You’ve completed your 2018 tax return, and you don’t like the results. How did you end up owing so much money? There’s nothing you can do about it now … or is there?
While the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (TCJA) made sweeping changes to the tax laws, it didn’t offer any retroactive means
A stable income is critical to a comfortable retirement – as is limiting the amount of that income that you give to Uncle Sam. Maximizing retirement income and minimizing taxes requires advance planning – as illustrated in these seven tips.
1. Use a Roth IRA Because Roth IRAs are funded with post-tax dollars, they are
Let’s assume that you drew the short straw on the 2018 tax cuts, and you owe Uncle Sam this year. How do you plan to pay? There are plenty of ways other than the old-fashioned check submitted with a paper tax return.
If you file electronically, why not pay electronically? Electronic Funds Withdrawal (EFW) is
Chances are that if you have student loans, you need every bit of extra cash that you can get. Did you realize that your student loans might be able to generate some cash for you?
Under certain circumstances, you may be able to save on your tax bill by deducting the interest that you pay
Claiming dependents on your taxes is usually a fairly straightforward procedure, but in some cases, more than one person (or couple filing jointly) will claim someone as a dependent, muddying the process. The most common example is when divorced or separated parents both want to claim their children as dependents for tax purposes.
Dependents can
Your smartphone is probably full of fun apps, but we have one more app to add to help you deal with a painful task: your taxes. Did you know that the IRS has a free smartphone app to help taxpayers handle basic tax-related functions? They do, and it has been in existence since 2011.
The
Nightmare: you’ve been called to a meeting with an IRS agent to discuss your tax return, and you can’t afford professional help. Did you know that you could have someone help you at low cost or even free? It’s one of your rights as a U.S. taxpayer.
You may know about the Bill of Rights,
What will you do with your tax refund? We hope you have something fun in mind, but a new survey suggests that you might use it to pay bills instead.
The Center for Financial Services Innovation (CFSI) recently released baseline survey results for their U.S. Financial Health Pulse, a study designed to assess and track
Preparing a tax return is not most people’s idea of a good time. As a result, we tend to procrastinate and wait until the last minute to file our returns. However, there are good reasons to start preparing your tax return as soon as you have all the necessary documents:
1. Reduce the Chance of
One of the most controversial provisions of the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (TCJA) was the limit it placed on state and local tax (SALT) deductions. The TCJA capped the deduction on combined payments for state and local property, sales, and income taxes at $10,000 beginning in the 2018 tax year.
According to the
Do the words “tax return” send shivers down your spine because you always end up with a gigantic headache and little or no tax refund at the end? Maybe the problem is in preparation and planning – or lack of it. Tax law is complicated, and it takes a coordinated, sustained effort to optimize your
Identity thieves have many ways to steal your money – including fraudulent tax returns. They file a return in your name as early as possible to beat your legitimate return, with fake financial data designed to claim a large refund. You won’t realize this until your tax return is denied because there’s already been a
The holiday season is full of plans and activities that make December incredibly hectic. If you are the average American, tax considerations and financial adjustments are pretty low on your holiday to-do list. However, you are not the average American — you enjoy saving money, are diligent in seeking ways to save, and excellent at
By Eric Olsen, Executive Director, HELPS Nonprofit Law Firm
Federal law protects Social Security and retirement incomes from garnishment by almost all collectors. But what about the IRS and student loan debts? The IRS and public student loan lenders can and occasionally will garnish 15% of a senior’s Social Security income. There is much information
Uh-oh. You didn’t pay your taxes by the deadline. You’re facing late payment penalties – but, believe it or not, you may be able to convince the IRS to waive those penalties.
It’s not well publicized, but the IRS does have a First Time Penalty Abatement (FTA) Policy. The FTA only applies for a single
Did you miss the April 17 tax deadline for 2018? If so, you probably filed for and received a six-month extension from the IRS. Don’t relax too much, because October will be here before you know it.
The IRS offers a series of tips to help taxpayers avoid common errors when filing their taxes, whether
Have you ever lied for financial gain? The odds are strong that you’ve done it at least once. According to a new study from finder.com, almost 4 out of 5 Americans have admitted to lying for some type of financial gain – and many don’t feel guilty about their lies.
Over 2,000 U.S. adults
The term “administrative offset” brings to mind meaningless governmental jargon. It is governmental jargon – but if you are affected, it’s not meaningless at all.
In layman’s terms, administrative offset is the government’s way of applying money that would normally be owed to you (such as tax refunds and certain Social Security benefits) to outstanding
Who wants simpler taxes? Most of us do, assuming we also keep more money in the process.
Starting in 2018, homeowners are more likely to have simpler tax returns – but they may need to make similar tax calculations to ensure a lower tax bill.
Tax simplification was part of the pitch to sell the
Retirement has finally arrived. You’re ready to start drawing on your retirement income sources. Enjoy this new phase of your life.
Unfortunately, you haven’t been able to retire from taxes – and your taxes will enter a new phase as well. You don’t have an employer to hold out taxes on your salary anymore. You’re
You anticipated a large refund on your taxes to pay off some bills and put some money away in a rainy-day fund. Unfortunately, the money never showed up. What happened?
Your refund may have gone toward an unpaid bill selected by the government – your unpaid student loan.
Your federal student loan is
What goes up must come down – when considering the effects of gravity. That principle doesn’t typically apply to taxes. In the rare cases where taxes do go down, other taxes tend to go up to compensate government coffers.
Because state taxes are often linked to the federal tax code in different ways, changes in
The recent Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (TCJA) represents one of the biggest changes to the tax code in many years. Will the Internal Revenue Service be up to the challenge of enforcing these changes?
For the last five years, the IRS has been examining fewer and fewer returns. In calendar year 2016, 1.1 million
You are experiencing sweet satisfaction knowing that your taxes were filed on time. That is, until you realize that you took a deduction when you did not qualify for it, or forgot to claim an important tax credit that could save you hundreds of dollars … or until Congress suddenly resurrects some expired tax breaks,
Did your paycheck increase due to the recent tax cuts? Many Americans saw a change in their take-home pay beginning in February once the IRS issued its new tax withholding tables.
Businesses adjusted the withholding for their employees according to the new tables. To avoid a tax surprise in 2019, you may need to make
Most individuals in the U.S. know to keep their tax returns for three years in case the IRS decides to audit them, but few know that there are exceptions to that time limit. Some people throw away their oldest return when they file their new one annually, which is normally okay. However, in the following