Do you do your own income taxes?

[❤ mollymouser ❤]

The very first day in 2011 taxes can be e-filed is January 15 ... and for many early birds, now's the time to start planning, figuring, adding up, and gathering paperwork.

This thread is for anything and everything related to income tax filing (detailed tax questions should probably go to the Tax Forum!)

[mommydl]

I used to to my own taxes, but now that I own a 2-family home and there are so many different things that I can write off or depreciate, it's easier and SAFER for me to have someone do them for me....that way their name is on it and NOT mine! Either way, I make out pretty good, since there are many things I wouldn't have thought I could write off.
If it was just my own home, I would DEFINITELY do them myself...and do many others for them.

[chiver78]

absolutely not. the one year I tried to do my own, I owned a condo that I rented out, and completely screwed up the calcs on that property. (depreciation is a little difficult in a condo, since you do not own the land the unit sits on)

I've been going to the same CPA since the year after that one. I show up with all my tax docs, answer a few questions, leave with a list of things I forgot and need to send in, and come back in a week when it's all set. all for $85. well worth the non-stress.

[suzwantstobefree]

I am an accountant and I have a CPA do mine. I am well on my way to becoming a CPA myself, but don't want to deal with the rental property at all. If I didn't have the rental property (ie-the noose around my neck that causes me nothing but headaches) I would probably do it myself. I worry about the same things Chiver experienced.

[Plain Old Petunia]

Dec 26, 2010 17:25:03 GMT -5 chiver78 said:

(depreciation is a little difficult in a condo, since you do not own the land the unit sits on)

Not owning the land makes the calculations simpler as land is never depreciated.

[cronewitch]

I have always done my own since I was 18. I also do my mom and boyfriends returns. I worked in CPA firms for 17 years and in tax software as a tax analyst and was a CPA and I did accounting software support more than 10 years.

My method now since I am old and learned on paper is to put it on spreadsheets first as projections then as actual numbers when I get them. I totally compute it by hand and know exactly what I expect the program to come up with. Then I use free filing on IRS.gov and when it matches what I expected I efile.

I don't like software entirely because I have trouble seeing what they are doing so never sure I have input right so I have to calculate to feel sure they are right.

I tax plan all year starting before my first paycheck when I need to decide
how much to put in the 401K plan. I have my tax planning out to after death in less detail. Poor planning can cost you tens of thousands over decades after retirement it is still important.

I reduced my 401K contribution this year to 11K down from my normal 22K to control taxes in retirement. 401K is ordinary income when you take it out and has RMD after 70.5 so you lose control. I like having enough income in retirement to cover the exemptions and deductions but don't want pushed into making SS taxable every year.

[Deleted]

Yes, I do my own online but I have a very easy situation, just take the standard deduction......Feel sorry for people who are in my shoes but go to someplace like H&R Block or similar, again it comes back to money being a taboo subject in society and believing that its just too hard for a regular person to do.

[carolinagirl]

I take the standard deduction and do my own taxes. never had a problem, but I also dont have any thing to complicate it.

[chiver78]

Dec 26, 2010 21:42:00 GMT -5 Plain Old Petunia said:

Dec 26, 2010 17:25:03 GMT -5 chiver78 said:

(depreciation is a little difficult in a condo, since you do not own the land the unit sits on)

Not owning the land makes the calculations simpler as land is never depreciated.

but when you're trying to do the calcs in software that doesn't tell you land never depreciates, and doesn't let you continue without a value...you end up guessing just to get it done. good thing you can refile to amend screwups without a major penalty!

[Malarky]

After a couple of years of going to a CPA because of DH's former company imploding and some sketchy compensation, as well as a home office I wanted to be sure was deducted properly we're going back to doing our own.
We have a long enough paper trail to prove that we paid taxes in good faith on the sketchy compensation (a 25% payout, by way of personal check, with no taxes paid, on money owed to DH so we wouldn't be at the very end of the line when the really big bills were paid.) and the home office is no longer used on a daily basis.
DH will use a program, but I'm more the pen and paper type.

[kadee]

I have done my own taxes most of the time since I was....let's just say since about 1964!
I've done them when we owned a business and without. With capital gains & without. If you can read, you can generally figure out what is allowed & what isn't. The government offers booklets that cover most aspects of most situations...they are free for the postage.
Going to be fun this year as we started a small business during the year. I just hope my DH has all the figures I tried to pound into his head that I would need! If not, we will have to pay a bit extra!
And I do them on paper & send it thru snail mail. I don't put any of our info on the net! I know, others places put our stuff up there, but no one will get it from something I've done!!!

[mommax4]

I used to do my own, before I was married and we had a business & rental properties. Now, I prep things like the business/rental expenses, but have a CPA keep track of the depreciation rules and such. I don't want the headache of all that.

[Plain Old Petunia]

Dec 27, 2010 9:37:42 GMT -5 chiver78 said:

but when you're trying to do the calcs in software that doesn't tell you land never depreciates, and doesn't let you continue without a value...you end up guessing just to get it done. good thing you can refile to amend screwups without a major penalty!

Agreed, guessing can lead to an amended return.

I will do my own at work, using Pro Series. It's a pretty good program. If I didn't have it available, I would just fill out a paper return. My tax situation is not at all complex.

[tiredturkey]

We've used a CPA for many years because of inheritance and investment issues. But primarily because DH only respects information from males with initials after their names. One year he mouthed off about our taxes because he didn't like the fact we owed money. Since then I've let a CPA give him the news. I would rather pay a good man than argue with a fool.

[Knee Deep in Water Chloe]

I used to do my own, but dh won't let me now.
I didn't do the rental property thing right the first year we were together, so he made me go to his accountant. I feel like it costs a ridiculous amount of money (about $225), but I'm not willing to fight him on it.

[blackcard]

With Turbotax why struggle with anything else. It is so easy.

[Deleted]

Normally I do my own, and my brothers and sisters.














































I normally do my own. This year might be different as my friend who does taxes for a living is insisting she do mine as a repayment for all the tech support I've provided her with this year

[Deleted]

I do ours- other than dealing with various types of investment income (most of which comes straight off brokerage reports), it's not all that complicated. There are just a lot of moving parts. Any decent software will have an "interview" feature to jog your memory about what might be deductible and select the forms you need to complete.

When I was married in 1984, I used the CPA my husband had been using for years and found he didn't add much value- the taxes were only as good as the records I put in front of him. When he waited till April 14 to ask for about $2,000, that was the end of him. I'd told him late the year before that we'd married and he never said a word about the fact that we'd get hit with much higher state taxes because essentially one income was being taxed entirely at the highest marginal rate. So of course when he actually did the taxes we were under-withheld and needed to pay installments going forward. I could have used a warning.

[TheOtherMe]

I do my own. I'm a retired IRS agent and have worked several years preparing tax returns for others. I think I am more than qualified to prepare my own tax returns. I prefer Turbo Tax.

I would add that you do need some tax knowledge to use tax software. If you answer one question wrong, the programs will not give you the correct answer.

[breezy]

I have a CPA do mine, although w/the help of a program, I could probably do them myself.

[Opti]

Yes, I do my own.

[tiredboomer]

No, my husband does them. That's about the only thing that MBA has been good for.

[notallwhowander]

I do ours using TurboTax. I second Taxpro's comment, though, that you need to know what you're doing in an online program if you have anything "interesting" going on. Sometimes the program won't ask the question you need it to, or you might not know how to answer it otherwise. But overall, I like the way TurboTax works.

We went to a CPA once, four years ago. He charged us $400, and I had to find and make him fix mistakes he had made on our return - small stuff, but still - I'm paying you $400 to make mistakes?!

I'm about 92% of the way done with tax prep right now. A few more things to sort and scan, a few more numbers to get ready to plug into the system.

[Deleted]

Dec 28, 2010 18:26:53 GMT -5 blackcard said:

With Turbotax why struggle with anything else. It is so easy.

I agree 100%.

[kristi28]

I have always done mine/ours on paper. Nothing too complicated for us, and with all the forms available on-line, there is no need for me to buy the software.

[ummboutthat]

Jan 2, 2011 1:38:54 GMT -5 @kristi28 said:

I have always done mine/ours on paper. Nothing too complicated for us, and with all the forms available on-line, there is no need for me to buy the software.

exactly!
girlfriend watch the tax prep guy do ours then she tried on her own, for two years, while I went to tax prep guy at $90. Then 3rd year she joined another co-worker at her job and they did better. Then 4th year she did mine ever since. She says we are single, no house, no kids, not in school, no own business, no travel - there is not much a tax prep guy can do, it's easy

[bobosensei]

My taxes are super easy since we take the standard deduction and there is nothing complicated with them. I e-file for free using the H&R Block program offered through DH's work. We literally enter in W2s and wait for interest statements to arrive and we are good.

My grandmother owned an income tax business and I helped her from the time I was very young. So a lot of the common forms she dealt with are familiar to me, but I wouldn't necessarily know all the new tax rules associated with them. However, I would know what to look up to make sure if the rules were still the same.

[TheOtherMe]

Again, I caution everybody who prepares their own tax returns using tax software that unless you have a very simple return, you can go very wrong if you answer just one question incorrectly.

I have also prepared taxes for CPA firms and you wouldn't believe the number of people who come straggling in about September, October for very simple mistakes.

[Deleted]

We have a tax expert do ours, and he is worth every penny.
Our return is so complicated that we end up with a 3" binder full of documentations for our forms!

[emptypockets]

we are retired, take standard deduction, all children grown/gone, so no need to hire CPA anymore.