Some things in life you should DIY

[harrycalahan]

And most things I do but I’ll no longer do my taxes. This was my first year using a cpa. He found out I made the same mistake twice the last two returns. Cost me roughly $3-4k but will get amended. His rate is roughly 2.4% of my return and worth every penny. I know a good cpa in Griffin if anyone needs him.

 

[MuleShoe]

Best money you ever spent is on cpa. I’ve been using one since 1989 and never will do my own. I have all my expenses written totaled and put down on legal pad and take it and all my retirement, work and investment dividends and she charges me $160.00 dollars to file them. I itemize and have farm and a part time business that is included with this.

 

[The Old Jaybird]

Best money you ever spent is on cpa. I’ve been using one since 1989 and never will do my own. I have all my expenses written totaled and put down on legal pad and take it and all my retirement, work and investment dividends and she charges me $160.00 dollars to file them. I itemize and have farm and a part time business that is included with this.

You are getting a hell of a deal. That's very cheap.

 

[spencer60]

Honestly, unless you have complex tax situations, programs like TurboTax work just fine. I've used that since 2002 and I can usually do my state and federal in an hour or so unless I haven't gotten all my documents together beforehand.

Now my taxes are pretty simple, a W2 and maybe some stock trades. Bought and sold a home on one year as well. If you have rental income or have a lot of complex securities you *may* be better off with a CPA, but a lot of them make mistakes and miss things as well.

The nice thing about tax programs is they have seen millions of returns and know all the common (and uncommon) problems. They are also constantly updated with the latest taxes for both federal and state.

They can take some patience. I always have TT walk me through every category, even though 80% of them don't apply but I try to be thorough.

I did get audited one year, and TT got all the docs requested by the IRS together for me and the whole thing just went away. Pretty sure the IRS just didn't want to mess with a company that probably knew the tax code better than they do.

 

[BEREZKA]

The gay bs of "we know how much money you made, but we need an excuse to extort you for filling out this paper wrong"
Some "free" country

 

[GodBlessTheUSA]

The local hospital pays our group corporation, that then pays my corporation, that then deducts those legal expenses, and then my corporation pays me.

I pay all the quarterly taxes, but have a CPA do the final yearly work. And I try to do all the calculations so that I don't owe the IRS and they don't owe me a "refund". I'm usually very close.

During Trumps first term congress and his admin passed a small business law that I knew nothing about. My CPA was able to get us a hefty refund that year based on the conservative "let's help businesses " laws.

Worth every dollar to me.

Also, historically and anecdotally, most small businesses and self employed people who do their own taxes have more "issues" with the IRS than those that use a professional tax preparer. YMMV.

 

[buellbrewer]

And most things I do but I’ll no longer do my taxes. This was my first year using a cpa. He found out I made the same mistake twice the last two returns. Cost me roughly $3-4k but will get amended. His rate is roughly 2.4% of my return and worth every penny. I know a good cpa in Griffin if anyone needs him.

pm your contact CPA. I used one for the 2nd year and ended up paying way more than the last 30 years and she charged $650 to do it. Was thing about going back to TT.

 

[David and Goliath]

Our CPA charges $125. He is moving to Flowery Branch if anyone wants his number.

 

[Talos]

First year for me using a CPA as well. I never wanted to because Turbotax was free. Until last year when I had a 1099, then they charged me $45. And I entered a new tax bracket so I owed. It's nice to know that $48K a year is apparently too much money for a single guy to have. My CPA was able to find workarounds to get me a return this year. She charged me $125. Trump can't abolish income tax soon enough.

 

[drsmile]

No way I could do my taxes. When you own businesses, the tax code is way to complicated to manage your own taxes. This is in and of itself reason enough to simplify tax codes and laws. The first requirement of any tax regulations should be that they are simple enough that a high school graduate should be able to do them. I pay a CPA 5 figures/yr to manage my returns - what a crime!