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Strike 1 - Late Strike 2 - Liar Strike 3 - Loser

It's not a crime to tell your clients Easter is important to you and your family, most would understand why their return will not be finished.

I told this client of mine at 589% of poverty level last year that he would not qualify for APTC. But he knew this insurance guy, BBFB (blah, blah, frikkin blah, per Possi). We have an insurance agent here who has figured every single one of my clients' income incorrectly in "helping" them, and every single one has paid back the subsidy. I didn't want my client taking his return to this guy (or someone else) and being told, "OMG, if she had only told you to put $100 in an IRA..." I have a tremendous aversion to criticism. That's the size of it. For your client, a $6,500 contribution to an IRA would get him down to 386%. A $5,000 contribution would get him down to 399%. My client wasn't even close to being in a position where an IRA would help. I didn't want anybody to be confused about that. Plus, I used to be a Math teacher and it bothers me not to see the real number. A lot.

well my clients need training by your clients! Mine do not think I need to sleep - they say I guess you will not be getting any sleep..

I agree with Catherine. There are enough folks here to help with Drake questions and Drake support is nothing less than phenomenal. I am an ex-ATX user and during my time with them, never did they answer the phone in three rings. When it was Sabre and William and the others were there, the support was good so I want to give credit where it is deserved. When I left them, I have not looked back and in no way regret the change. Don't waste your time on the third party resellers to save money. Been there and done that and wish I would have just switched to Drake and been done with it. The only one I tried for one year that was halfway decent was Tax Slayer Pro. But...they did not have some of the forms I need. So, why chance it, go with something that others recommend that is solid.

I would report the shortfall on 5329 and not pay the penalty. Request abatement. If this is the first year of the RMD the case is stronger, plus looking at the calendar for December 2016 and Jan 2017, 12/31 fell on a Sat, 1/1 was Sun making 1/2 a legal holiday where all the financial institutions were closed, so if he called too late in that last week of December then it is plausible that it wasn't transacted until 1/3/17...at least that is a somewhat reasonable explanation for what could have happened.

Need to check out related parties. When you take out assets of the corp. doesn't it go out at FMV as a sale? So I would think Corp A would report sale of building at FMV gain and then Corp. B would pick up basis as FMV.

Our insurance company warned us that we should get a signature from clients that they understand that going on extension without paying in now means they will get penalty and interest and that has caused more time messing with more paperwork. We have always had clients on extension who don't care about p&i, and just pay later. And of course, we have clients that just don't have a clue yet where they stand. (Sad, I know. We take all kinds here....)

Bingo!

Such cases don't know, understand, or care about any of the regulations and/or obstacles mentioned. He's interested in making money, period! Everything else (including you) is just white noise to him. They will present you with new facts as you proceed (sometimes invalidating what you've just done) depending on what they consider your "need to know." It would be a good idea to suggest H&R Block, say they have a large staff, you don't, and it's too complicated to get involved with now or later. In the event you do go through with it; I predict a bitter fight about your fee.

Good old NY. Submitted sample forms (to get approve to print them from our software). All fake data except our address and name. Sent it to their forms approval person. Was approved. Was also dunned for not paying the taxes shown on the fake data submitted to their substitute forms department. Clearly they want a bite if the apple when any sort of nexus might be claimed.

Gift tax return needed for a client who gave his son $$ towards a house down payment. He also paid off the son's student loans - directly TO the lenders, not the son. One loan was in his (dad's name); the other one was in son's name. Do those amounts count towards gift? I know that education costs paid directly to a school do NOT count towards the annual gift exclusion, but seem to remember that loans DO count. But what if the loan is in dad's name? Seems like he just paid his own loan off in that instance. TIA! (Side note: why to the gnarly questions *always* come up in the last week?!?!)

yep - thats where our friends have their cottage. Nice little town.

That would be a good trick and it would be interesting to see how he would pull it off. I hope you are not preparing his return the way HE wants you to. I would insist on preparing the return by the tax code and not the client's convoluted understanding. Be careful, and check the circular 231 code of ethics. You know what is right and wrong here. As I see it, only one way to prepare the return. He doesn't qualify for the exclusion and that is that. I wouldn't concern myself with whether the service closely checks this or not. I just would not be part of the gamble. Just my 2.5 cents worth.

Yes, the five year look back starts on 7/15/16 so you are correct that in this case would go back to 7/15/11. You may count the number of days of personal use from 7/15/11 coming forward to when he moved into the new home and divide that by 1825 to arrive at the percentage of the $250K he is allowed, or you may use whole months divided by 60 months. He would need 730 days or 24 months during the look back period in order to utilize the full exclusion, and he must not have excluded any gain from another residence during that period.

I think the way it is worded is that it has to have been his principal residence for two of the last five years. If he filed a resident Virginia return for 2013, 2014, 2015, and 2016 it would have only been his primary residence for one of the last five years. I think. If he filed part-year for 2013, then maybe but i am still doubtful. I don't think that 1 1/2 is the same as two.

The difference is paying it to the government or paying it to yourself. It's true the dollar figure may be the same, but the benefit changes to one that she will some day get back.

What Rita said. It's like when we force print Schedule A to let the client know we did put in every donation, tax, unreimbursed business expense, medical mileage, etc., but the standard deduction is more generous for him.

I keep a primer in the folder of my only client (now ex-client) folder with RRB: blue section - box 5 - social security benefits = report on line 20 of tax return green section - box 7 = gross and taxable amount of pension (akin to boxes 1 and 2 of a regular 1099-R) Also, look to see if there is Tier II. Exclude a portion of the Tier II, using the simplified method Hope this helps, Lynn

You are familiar with no-where's-ville! I work in Wellsville. We have friends who own a cabin on Chautauqua. I love going out on that lake. I will look for See-Zuhr House next time we are out there, but I think I remember seeing it because of the name. So we live about 45min or so from Chautauqua - maybe an hour. We live in Bolivar, and would travel to Olean, Salamanca - the old Route 17, which is now 86.

I use this site for Iowa. There are also alot of other states available. https://beacon.schneidercorp.com/ Alabama Arkansas Florida Georgia Illinois Indiana Iowa Kansas Kentucky Michigan Minnesota Missouri Nebraska New Hampshire North Carolina Ohio Oklahoma South Carolina South Dakota

Rita...yes, line four was $11,770. Just curious, why would you override for his copy? Grace and Deb...I included a IRA contribution of $1,500 to see if that would change anything...it doesn't. If I went up to $4,000 in increases the refund by $600. So not sure it makes sense for her to make an IRA contribution but I'll offer it to her anyway. I really appreciate everyone chiming in!

My client and her sister inherited a cottage in Norway many years ago. They sold it last year and paid tax in Norway. I know this is a taxable event for her. The sale goes on Sch D. Then, the 1116 will reflect the net income from the sale and the foreign tax paid to Norway. I am filing an extension for her because it's too late for me to get her done before deadline. I haven't done a sale like this in all my 20 years. I'll hum a chant, burn some incense, and pray I do this right! hmmmmmmmmmm The good news is that with this sale, she also moved her Norway savings account to the US, so no more FinCEN.

It appears that 8615 is still required for the twins. For #2, they are required to file because unearned income is greater than $1,050.

I have 20 returns yet to do. 9 of them are corporations, 1 a decent size 990, and the other 10 moderately complicated 1040s. My extension list is at 66 and growing. Everything that comes in from here on out will be extended. We should be done completing returns and working on extensions by Tuesday. We are well positioned for the four day weekend I have been so looking forward to since January 2nd. The office will close at 6:00 p.m. on Thursday and re-open at 8:00 a.m. on Tuesday the 18th. And it will be blow and go for two weeks when we return to get the quarterly payroll reports done.

I have spoken with him again. It just keeps getting better. He now says they are technically married and have been for many years but that they have never lived together. The LLC was created for the sole purpose of buying, selling and holding the mortgage on this one property. There is no other property and no other income from any source. The property was not rented. All in all it looks like a pretty stupid move to me - they bought the house for $150K and signed a mortgage (him as managing member) and then sold it to someone else the same week for the same price. The only difference is the bank is charging the LLC 4.5% on an ARM and he is charging the purchaser 5.5% on a fixed rate mortgage. Just stupid in my opinion. This guy may not be the smartest cookie in the batch, plus when he came in today he was groaning and carrying on and finally said he was having terrible cramps and asked to use my bathroom. He is quickly elevating himself to least favorite client status! Kentucky doesn't require you to even list the names of members when you form an LLC - only an organizer and registered agent. The wife is listed as a member on the annual report which is filed with the secretary of state - and only the name and business address is required on that filing.

We have already polled our clients and will be filing extensions on Monday. I always do them a week early, and then go back to cranking out returns. Every year there are a goodly number of folks who get put on extension but then file on time. And every year, there are folks whose returns are ready for pickup, who end upon extension because they can't get here in time or don't mail back their 8879's in time. I finished up this week by doing the payroll tax filings for March and Q1 for my business and the one remaining in-house payroll client. Everyone else is on online do-it-for-me payroll. That has been great. Money shows up, and all I do is download quarterly reports and occasionally adjust a w-4 or add a new employee or inactivate a newly-former employee.

I have been lazy about looking for new software. but I think this is it.

Re: ATX This is it for me. I have stuck with you people through all of your problems with the software and all of your customer service glitches for 20+ years, but being turned over to a collection agency when my credit card on file was up to date and the problem was on your end and now finding out that I was LIED TO about the pricing is the last straw!!! The most recent post from the ATX Board about this subject. I will be leaving too !

usually it's that cute little Shih-tzu in my picture waking me up. He's 8 years old now, and barks in the middle of the night if anyone gets up or - god forbid - the cat walks by. and sometimes he likes to go out on his leash at 2 am. but what really killed me last night, he woke me up to let me know the cat wanted to come in. i sleep through the cat scratching at the door, and I like it when he ignores the cat too, but my fussy little boy couldn't stand it until I got up and went to the door and let the cat in at 3 am last night. only to bark at him when he walked by the bedroom a few minutes later. Ugh! in my next life......nothing that eats or poops.....or talks or barks or meows......

next saturday - that is. this saturday will be a long one....

Perhaps your client could contribute to an IRA, if eligible, and get out of paying back the APTC. You don't have to add back the IRA contribution to calculate Modified AGI. It won't take much of a contribution to get back to say 399% of MAGI. I've done this a few times and saved the client a lot of money. Grace

They shouldn't have legally been able to form an LLC without each member having an SSN or ITIN. Also, the LLC couldn't elect S-corp with a foreign owner. That leaves partnership or disregarded entity. Were these two individuals married at the time of LLC formation? In general, H-W LLCs can elect to be a disregarded entity. I'll post a link to a topic that I remember on this subject from a while ago. Anyway, the question in my mind on this ultimately is this - If the ex-wife is not sharing in the profits, gains, deductions, and losses, is there really a partner relationship at all, or is this a disregarded entity to be reported solely on your client's return based on that fact alone? Is the installment sale the only reportable item or was the property rented prior to sale, are there other properties involved? Maybe you don't need this, but here is the link to the other topics:

Also, lest your client thinks they were "so close," you can point out that the highest number for that % line is 401. I'm guessing line four was 11,770. If so, the household income as percentage of federal poverty line is actually 441%. I had one that was 589%. I overrode the form and printed it for his copy and then restored before filing.

I threw a blank extension form at my crappy neighbor who literally pounded on my door yesterday. The neighbor who lets her two pit bulls run around off leash. Good riddance.

Yesterday I had a client offer me to pay extra to prepare his personal and corporate tax return because he has to leave out of town and won't come back until the end of May, I said great, it should be ready by the time you come back

When the rant starts? "We can go have a beer and discuss that after April 15th, but for right now? You owe this..." Rich