Devastation in Asheville, North Carolina, caused by Hurricane Helene last September. (Photo by Bill McMannis, CC by 2.0 Wikimedia) I’ll pay our home’s property tax next week, just before the Jan. 31 deadline. It’s an annual tax ritual followed, albeit with differing deadlines, by millions of real estate owners across the United States every year. Some homeowners, however, are more frustrated than usual this year with their current property tax bills. Their homes were destroyed or seriously damaged by a major natural disaster. That’s the case for many property owners in Western North Carolina that were in Hurricane Helene’s path... Read more →
Real Estate Housing
Photo by Pixabay The 2025 federal tax filing season officially starts Monday, Jan. 27. Millions of taxpayers already are working on their returns. Some have even completed them. Most of these folks are in a hurry to get their Form 1040 to the Internal Revenue Service because they are expecting a refund. Many also don’t have very complicated tax situations. Or they think they don’t. But something may have changed in their personal lives that could affect their filings, for better or worse. So before they — or you — hit send on their tax year 2024 filing, it’s a... Read more →
Washington, D.C., is no stranger to severe winter weather, as this photo of snowbound Dupont Circle in 2010 shows. Snow and frigid temperatures are putting a damper on next week's presidential inauguration. (Photo via Wikipedia) Donald J. Trump’s second inauguration is Monday, Jan. 20, but not as originally planned. An Arctic Blast next week across much of the country, including the Washington, D.C. area, means the official swearing in ceremony will be moved indoors, to the U.S. Capitol Rotunda. The change obviously is a disappointment for many of the Trump supporters who traveled to the national capital to witness the... Read more →
The Internal Revenue Service will start processing 2024 tax year returns on Jan. 27. Millions of people will file then, or before, getting their forms into Uncle Sam’s tax queue. But to file a complete and accurate Form 1040, you need all the information that form requests. That’s generally income statements like W-2s and 1999s. But there are many other documents that have tax-filing relevance. And most of those aren’t require by law to be sent to you until the end of January. So, most of us are just going to have to be patient for a couple more weeks.... Read more →
Saying "I do" also means saying hello to some tax changes in your new wedded life. (Photo by Jakob Owens on Unsplash) The end of each year is a good time to reflect on what happened the previous 12 months. For most of us, that includes some good events, some sad ones, and some still shaking out as we’re about to enter a brand new year. Many of these changes also could affect our taxes. So, as a bit of year-end preplanning, here are six ways that the Internal Revenue Code shows up when we encounter personal and lifestyle changes.... Read more →
Will this higher cost across the country be enough to convince lawmakers to revise the $10,000 state and local tax (SALT) federal tax deduction cap? Before the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (TCJA) of 2017 was enacted, I’d spend this time of year deciding whether to pay our home’s annual property tax bill by Dec. 31 or wait until its due date of Jan. 31 the following year got closer. It wasn’t just a cashflow decision. It also affected our tax filing. Or did, as I noted, before the Republican tax reform bill limited the amount of state and local... Read more →
Photo by Mick Haupt on Unsplash The 2024 general election is over. Finally. Now we sort through the results to try to determine how what we did on Nov. 5 will affect us. The election of Donald J. Trump to a second term, along with Republican control of the Senate and likely the House, will likely simplify a lot of federal tax questions in 2025, the final year of many individual Internal Revenue Code provisions in the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017. But as noted back on Oct. 26, tax questions, not just candidates, also were on ballots.... Read more →
Photo by Brett Jordan Here’s a subject line you never want to see in your email box: There’s a problem with your tax return. But that is what’s happening to some taxpayers. No, it wasn’t from the Internal Revenue Service. Uncle Sam snail mails you a tax notice with questions about your filing. Rather, it was an email from TurboTax to its users with the subject line — CRITICAL NOTICE: Regarding your 2023 TurboTax return And here’s the message — Hi there, We’re contacting you because there might be an issue with the accuracy of your 2023 tax return. Due... Read more →
Photo by Julentto Photography on Unsplash International travel is a dream for many Americans. Some enjoy their jaunts so much, they decide to move instead of just vacation abroad. A foreign relocation means many changes. But one thing doesn’t change. U.S. citizens who live and work abroad still owe U.S. taxes on their income. Thanks to Uncle Sam's reliance on a worldwide tax system at the individual level, the U.S. Treasury gets a piece of your earnings regardless of where in the world you make it. There are, however, some tax provisions that can help U.S. workers in other countries.... Read more →
Photo by Element5 Digital on Unsplash Tuesday, Nov. 5, is election day. The hubby and I already voted, and if you’re like us, you can’t wait for all the politicking to be over. The incessant calls, emails and snail mail material extends beyond the candidates. In several states, and at local levels, too, voters will decide ballot initiatives. So, this weekend’s Saturday Shout Outs go to recent coverage of the referenda, with, of course, a focus on taxes. The first shout goes to Ballotpedia, which reports that 159 statewide ballot measures were certified as of Oct. 24 to appear on... Read more →
Photo by RDNE Stock project A home of one’s own has long been part of the traditional American Dream. Nowadays, though, some say it’s a nightmare trying to join the homeownership ranks. So, of course, as we head into the last few weeks of the 2024 election, candidates at all levels also are focusing on housing. Vice President Kamala Harris, the Democratic presidential nominee, has proposed tax breaks she says will increase the housing supply, which should lead to lower prices. She’s also promoting a first-time buyer tax to help buyers get into those homes. Using the tax code to... Read more →
Americans have always been a peripatetic group. And we relocate for many reasons. Jobs are a big move motivator. Some people want to be closer to (or farther from) their families. Weather also prompts people to relocate. So do taxes. “For many years, policymakers, journalists, and taxpayers have debated the role state tax policy plays in individuals’ and businesses’ location decisions,” writes Andrey Yushkov, a Senior Policy Analyst with the Center for State Tax Policy at the Tax Foundation, at the tax policy nonprofit’s website. The Tax Foundation has analyzed annual data about who is moving — and where —... Read more →
A few years ago, when housing prices here in Austin kept climbing, the hubby and I hired a company to protest our annual real estate appraisal. That assessment is used to calculate just how big our property tax bill will be. Other factors, such as local tax rates and certain exemptions, also come into play. But if your house is deemed to be worth a whole lot of money, and you’re not planning on selling it for or near that amount, then a generous appraisal will cost you property tax dollars. So, we hired a firm with time and experience... Read more →
Vice President Kamala Harris, Democratic presidential nominee, revealed some of her economic plans in a speech Friday, Aug. 16, in Raleigh, North Carolina. (Screenshot of X-Twitter video) Vice President Kamala Harris rolled out her presidential campaign’s economic proposals Friday in a roughly half-hour speech in Raleigh, North Carolina. They included a federal ban on alleged corporate price gouging on food products, ways to help people buy their first home, and financial help for families. Much of Harris’ assistance would come from tax breaks, some of them familiar fiscal tools, both enacted or previously proposed by the Biden Administration. New tax... Read more →
A view of some of the vast acreage of Big Bend National Park in Brewster County, Texas. (Photo by Kay Bell) This summer, millions of people will visit national parks, forests, and wilderness areas. While the folks who live in near those sites appreciate the associated increase in the local economy, they also pay a price. Land owned by the federal government is generally not subject to taxation by state or local governments. But those jurisdictions still cover services for the tax-exempt U.S. acreage within their borders. Much of the expense is borne by counties that pay for road upkeep,... Read more →
Our annual property tax protest has been filed. Not by us. We finally hired a company to take care of it. But the hubby and I and our neighbors are not the only ones concerned about property taxes. So are the government officials in charge of levying and collecting them, albeit for different reasons. Property tax problems: Real estate taxes are the primary financing source for city, county, and other local governments. Tax Foundation analysts found that in fiscal year 2020, property taxes comprised 32.2 percent of total state and local tax collections in the United States, more than any... Read more →
Elizabeth Magie portrait over her The Landlord’s Game board. (Photo: Wednesday’s Women) Rent or buy? Taxes are a part of the equation when making that crucial property decision. Taxes, or rather a specific type of tax, also was the impetus for a real-estate-based board game that morphed into (or, some would say, was appropriated by) what we now know as Monopoly. The game of property purchases and their rental rates when placed on prime gameboard landmarks has remained popular since its launch in 1933, thanks in part to hundreds of licensed spinoffs. And while Charles Darrow, an unemployed salesman in... Read more →
The Internal Revenue Service IRS is expected to process more than 160 million individual and business tax returns this filing season. Through March 15, the IRS had received nearly 71.6 million individual returns. Some taxpayers probably put off filing in the hopes that the Tax Relief for American Families and Workers Act would be enacted by Tax Day. Several of its provisions could help both personal and business filers. Whether that will happen is still unclear, as the tax bill that cleared the House has hit a lot of speed bumps in the Senate. Other taxpayers, however, aren't that concerned... Read more →
Photo by Nareeta Martin on Unsplash Moving to another country for a job involves a lot of changes, but one thing stays the same. Thanks to our worldwide tax system for individuals, as a U.S. citizen you remain a U.S. taxpayer, regardless of where you live. That makes you responsible for filing federal tax returns on your overseas earnings. Uncle Sam, however, does provide some tax breaks to his citizens living and working abroad. They get more time to file, with a June 15 deadline. And thanks to tax treaties, globally peripatetic taxpayers also get certain foreign earned income exclusions... Read more →
Expensive homes are subject to higher mansion taxes in 17 locales across the United States. (Photo by Daniel Barnes on Unsplash) A couple of weeks ago, I blogged about growing opposition to higher taxes on expensive real estate in Los Angeles and Chicago. So naturally, a recent Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy (ITEP) piece on these so-called mansion taxes caught my eye. Local mansion taxes have been around since 1982, notes ITEP local policy analyst Andrew Boardman in his article for the Washington, D.C.-based nonprofit. However, the momentum for them has built in recent years. Nearly all of today's... Read more →