So the numbers are in, and they’re as expected for Tax Season 2006.

My wife and I will get $1,850 back on our Federal returns, and another $550 back on our State returns.  I expected we’d get a healthy refund this year due to the fact that we ended up paying estimated taxes in 2006 due to the fact that we owed money on our 2005 taxes due to a large capital gains sale on some stock I sold.

Evidently, if you owe the government more than $1,000 in a given year, they strongly suggest that you pay estimated taxes based on your current …

Yesterday, I spent the entire morning and a couple hours into the afternoon organizing our taxes.

I separated everything we have into three groups:

The Oil Company
The Rental Property
Personal Taxes

Note that since the oil company is an S-corp and the rental unit is not held in a corporation, both of them funnel into our own personal tax return.

I organized everything in a “Summary Report” listing all the major activities, and adding up all costs for each possible category.  In effect, there should be no reason for my CPA to even whip out his calculator.

On my first year, I’m showing about a …

After last years healthy bill from my CPA, I vowed to do more this year to cut down on the amount of time needed to do my taxes. Last year, I basically stuffed all my information into an envelope and said “here ya go…”. $800 later I was at the post office mailing off my return… and my additional check to the IRS…

This year, I’m trying to organize my tax information for easy review.

In this effort, I came across a great 2006 Tax Organizer that asks the important questions required for filling out the tax documents.

You can see and print an example …

Last night I pulled out my “Rental Expense Receipts” folder and started sorting them out so my tax preparer wouldn’t have to. A money saving effort on my part.

I turned to the good ‘ole IRS for some guidance on how many categories I need to establish, and what I can deduct and what I can’t.

Turns out, there are just 3 categories: Repairs, Improvements and “Other”.

According to the IRS, a “repair” keeps your property in good condition. It doesn’t materially add to the value of your property or substantially prolong its life. Repainting your property inside or out, fixing gutters or floors, fixing leaks, plastering, and replacing broken …

My last installment of 2006 quarterly taxes are due next week. And I can’t say that I’m thrilled. Not at the fact that I owe taxes, after all, if you owe taxes you must have made money. I just don’t like spending money.

Due to my revenues from the oil company and the fact that it’s an S-corp company, along with the fact that I sold some stock two years ago for a $7,000 profit, Uncle Sam wanted his share. With a >$1,000 federal tax payment, the IRS also wants to make sure you don’t owe so much all at one time for next year, so they …

I had my 2005 taxes done by a local CPA and she did a fairly decent job.  It’s the first time I’d ever had my taxes done by someone else, and did it ever cost me!

I ended up owing the Federal Government about $900, and the local state government about $600.  On top of that it appeared that I need to pay estimated taxes, so I mailed in about $300 worth to cover the first quarter this year.

Then comes the expensive part.  I owed the CPA about $1,300 for preparing my corporate and personal tax returns.  Ouch!  But hey, the corporate returns are over my head, so I suppose it’s money well spent… or so I thought.

I was down visiting relatives this last weekend, and found out that I could have had a …

When I bought my first rental property, I knew that the money I put in to fix it up would have an effect (i.e. they’d be a deduction) on my taxes for this year.

What I didn’t realize was that I could deduct the travel expenses going to and from the property while I was working on it.  Stupid me!

The property is about 20 miles from my house, and considering the fact that I was working on the property for about 28 days in January, I failed to record a lot of mileage that could be used for tax purposes.

I’ll have to go back and see if I can piece together …

2005 turned out to be a really bad year for my personal taxes.  Those darn capital gains killed us!  All in all, it will cost us several thousand dollars to take care of our tax responsibilities, including paying the tax preparer and the first installment of estimated quarterly payments.

It’s not that I can’t pay my taxes, I just don’t want to.  It’s hard to part with a large chunk of money when you don’t feel you’re getting your moneys worth in return.  Last year I paid for a bunch of congressmen to grill professional athletes about the effects of steroids and how rampant they are in major league baseball.