Take ‘bitch of a time’ to mean worse than what is normal for you. So although you may have two homes, three wives, fifteen kids, and a billion shares of several stocks, if that’s what you’ve had year-in, year-out for the past ten years, it’s probably not that hard anymore. But, on the other hand, if you got married, bought a house, and had a kid in the span of a year, well then sucks to be you come April 15th, doesn’t it?
Until this year, my taxes were simple. In school, I just checked the “give me all my fucking money back, you bastards” box, being a full-time student, and all. Then '04 and '05 were also pretty easy, just living by myself in a rental property with one job.
But this year, OTOH, is much more complicated. I had the same job as before until March, then quit that job, moved to a different state, got a temp job for the summer, quit that when I started grad school, and then got a part-time job to pay my bills. So three jobs in two states and a full time student status starting in September. I did do a bit of planning ahead with my last two jobs, though, and claimed a zero for my withholdings, hoping it would result in a decent sized refund. I’m not good with money, so even though it would average out to the same amount of money whether I get it in a big chunk or portioned out, I’ll do better with a big chunk that I can use to pay off my credit card bill that, by spring, will be quite large, I’m sure (text books are freakin’ expensive).
I might just go to an H&R block. Either that or see if I can get my dad to send my taxes to his accountant too.
One compound word - TurboTax. Seriously, the stuff you describe can be done with ease using software once you receive all the forms. Accountants will be more expensive plus you will never learn what is happening for yourself and the part-timers at H&R Block may not give a shit enough to catch all your refunds whereas you can run different scenarios to your hearts content.
Yup, I will. To complicate the matters, here you go:
I was deployed from Jan - June (Tax exemption)
I physically moved on behalf of government orders (Tax exemption, changes in taxable status on three states–MT, GA, and NJ)
I bought and sold stock at a profit (Capital Gains)
I have student loans (student loan interest)
I bought a house (change in taxable status, deductions in income)
All of this combined, I may or may not be under the poverty line in taxable income (thanks to being deployed). It’s complicated, and I can’t predict with even 10% accuracy if I can pay off credit cards.
Tripler
So yeah, it’s been a tumultuous year in RobEnomics.
Last year was my year to get slapped around by the IRS.
I built a house. And paid over $7,000 for a building permit! Then I still had to pay regular property taxes like everyone else.
Also, I rolled about 25K from my tax deductable 401K into a tax free Roth IRA. It will be a brilliant move when I’ve got millions in retirement, but it sure cost me that year. I had to pay taxes on all of it like it was income.
My tax guy also screwed things up so badly that I fired him and didn’t pay him. I found math errors on it. I called to explain and he says “oh, that just sounds like a typo”. He just assumed that I was still living in MA (I moved to NH that year) and that I should pay the 5% MA tax on my rollover without even asking me!
I told my mortgage guy to stop referring people to this clown.
I am married to an enrolled agent. I think my tax pain will once again be limited to her working very long days helping the rest of you nice folks out with your problems.
My part in tax preparation is to walk around wringing my hands, rending my clothing, and crying “Woe!”. When the Ms gets it all figured out, I spend a half hour cursing the government for runaway spending, and all the rich fat cats getting tax breaks. I’m proud of my role.
Taxes are always a bitch. Good years, I can get them done in a couple hours and a bottle of wine. Bad years stretch over multiple nights and multiple bottles.
Wow. That’s kind of my dream husband. Can do my taxes, cooks, bartends, gardens…
Well, we bought a house late in the year; only made house payments in November and December; is it even going to be worth the bother to itemize or whatever?
Other than that, hubby and I are good; same jobs for 5 years and no savings or retirement funds or anything fancy like that.
I can’t agree with Shagnasty more. $20 at Wal-Mart, you can do your taxes in less than an hour, discover more deductions than Imelda Marcos triple or more your refund and have an audit risk less than winning 12 lotterys on your birthday.
My brother works for Block, so I see what kind of idiots they hire. His idea of “outside the box thinking” is pulling your dick out before pissing.
Gotta agree with everyone in here on the software route. If you haven’t tried this yet, I gotta wonder what rock you’ve been living under!
I also gotta say that you cracked me up in your OP with the “Give Me All My Fucking Money Back, You Bastards” box, bouv. I really miss that box. Where the hell did it go?
Question for Vorlon … whose vehicle are you being reimbursed for mileage on? If it’s yours, that’s way low. It’s like 45 cents a mile now!
A-freaking-men. I speak from experience on the “give a shit”. In high school, I worked at an H&R Block as a “processor” (behind the scenes - did photocopying and assembling of returns that the trained preparers had put together). I had zero training in tax law. I have a distinct memory of catching one rather significant error that anyone with a week’s worth of training should NOT have made. And the preparer in question had several years’ worth of experience.
TT should easily be able to handle the stuff described in the original post. The hardest part will be gathering all the receipts for the move, and of course making sure the various jobs know where to send your W2s.
Last year’s return was more complicated. We had a stock sale early in the year. Then we had income from my mother’s estate that was taxable in her state ¶ but not at the Federal level (different rules on how losses could offset gains), so I had to file a PA return as well as a Virginia return. A couple years earlier, we had a house sale that had to be dealt with. Turbo Tax handled all that OK.
Probably the most complicated I had was in the early 90s: I was working in New York City while still being a resident of Virginia, so I had to file NY city and state returns as a nonresident, then file in VA and try to get some of my NY taxes credited toward VA. Screwed it up 3 years in a row. I didn’t use TurboTax back then, perhaps it would have done it correctly.
Marlitharn: It’s certainly worth the attempt to itemize. Any of the software packages should handle your situation. You’ll plug in your interest and property tax figures (don’t forget property tax you may have prepaid at closing, plus of course any points paid on the loan). If they’re not enough to push you into itemizing, all you’ve lost is a few minutes of plugging numbers in.
Tell me about it–there is going to be a ‘Come to Jesus’ meeting with managment about this. As it is, after writing off the mileage, I’m makeing less than your average bum on the corner. Good thing Mrs. Vorlon has a teachers job…
Oh yeah. This year:
I worked for about two days in my work-study (ie, financial aid) job in New Mexico.
Moved back east, lost full-time-student status.
Worked about a week at a grocery store in NJ.
Worked for several months for a the feds in PA.
Left the country.
Worked a bit as a temp in Ireland. Paid some taxes there and damned if I know what.
Left that country.
Worked job A in London.
Worked job B in London.
Yeah… Compared to previous years of “here’s what I earned at school, here’s what I earned at my summer job, hooray I’m done”, this is a bitch.
Yup. Two jobs, two states, a move half way across the country, and a marriage 3 weeks before the end of the year. To someone with 1/2 the year as a student with a part time job, 1/2 the year with a “real” job, a move and two states of residence. Not impossible, just a little more complicated than the last few years of single person, one job, one state.
