The days of the calendar year are vanishing quickly, but there still may be some last-minute strategies that business owners can use to lower their 2019 tax bills. Here are five to consider: Postpone invoices. If your business uses the cash method of accounting, and it would benefit from deferring income to next year, wait [...]
With the dawn of 2020 on the near horizon, here’s a quick list of tax and financial to-dos you should address before 2019 ends: Check your Flexible Spending Account (FSA) balance. If you have a FSA for health care expenses, you need to incur qualifying expenses by December 31 to use up these funds or [...]
Many people dream of retiring early so they can pursue activities other than work, such as volunteering, traveling and pursuing their hobbies full-time. But making this dream a reality requires careful planning and diligent saving during the years leading up to the anticipated retirement date. It all starts with retirement savings accounts such as IRAs [...]
Do you have investments outside of tax-advantaged retirement plan? If so, you might still have time to reduce your 2019 tax bill by selling some investments – you just need to carefully select which investments you sell. BALANCE GAINS AND LOSSES If you’ve sold investments at a gain this year, consider selling some losing investments [...]
Many people want to pass assets to the next generation during their lifetimes, whether to reduce the size of their taxable estates, to help family members or simply to see their loved ones enjoy the gifts. If you’re considering lifetime gifts, be aware that the type of assets you give can produce substantially different tax [...]
If you hold a business-related debt that’s become worthless or uncollectible, a “bad debt” deduction may allow you to cut your losses. But there are a few hoops to jump through. BUSINESS OR NON-BUSINESS? Business bad debts generate ordinary losses: non-business bad debts are reported as short-term capital losses. The latter can be used only [...]