I need some year end tax tips

 

Year End Tax Tips for 2012

What do you need to know about your taxes before December 31st? There are a number of tax changes happening in 2013, and you should know when you want certain income to be taxed. Finding a good tax professional will be more expensive right now since it’s the holidays and it would be a rush job, but it may save you quite a bit come April 15th.

Ok, so what can you do personally?

From Year End Tax Tips on about.com:

There are basic year-end tax planning techniques that can be utilized to successfully manage income taxes. Year-end tax planning techniques include:

• Accelerating or deferring income.
• Accelerating or deferring expenses that can be used for tax deduction or tax credits.
• Taking advantage of any tax provisions that are scheduled to expire at the end of 2012.

All of these strategies have one factor in common: the timing of income and expenses. Accelerating means earning additional income or incurring additional tax-deductible expenses in 2012 rather than in 2013. Deferring means pushing additional income or additional deductions to 2013 rather than 2012. To the extent that income and expenses can be moved from one year to the next, these tactics can be utilized to optimize a person’s tax liabilities between the years 2012 and 2013. Year-end planning is about finding the right year in which to earn additional income or to spend money on more tax deductions. For the most part, income earned in 2012 is taxed in 2012, and deductions incurred in 2012 are deductible in 2012.

And here are tips for Year End Tax Planning for Investors on about.com:

• Check Your Default Cost Basis Reporting Settings in Your Brokerage Account
• Consider Re-Balancing Your Portfolio By Tax Type
• Selling off Losing Investments
• Sell off Winning Investments
• Pairing Losses with Gains
• Deferring Losses until Next Year
• Deferring Gains until Next Year
• Tax Planning with Capital Loss Carryovers

Additional Resources:

1. IRS Tax Tips
2. Kiplinger Slideshow of Recommendations
3. 8 Tax Tips from TurboTax
4. H & R Block End of Year Tax Tips

Since it looks like the world isn’t ending today due to the Mayan Apocalypse, you might as well do some planning and see how you can save yourself some money come April 15.
Do you wait until the last minute or do you start planning your taxes right away?