JohnH

I think tying it to some dubious medical purpose is over-thinking it, and probably would fail the laugh test in an audit. But I don't think it's necessary to go there in the first place. This is a chair, period. The fact that it has a massage feature is irrelevant, unless maybe that adds thousand of dollars to the cost. How much does the massage chair cost, anyhow? Most of us use chairs that have piston tubes that allow us to adjust height of the chair and/or spring mechanisms that allow us to adjust the resistance when we lean back. Those features aren't really "necessary", since we could just use a wooden chair with no adjustments, or maybe just a hard plastic chair that only costs $20 at K-Mart. So where exactly is the line drawn with respect to what's deductible? Besides, I'll bet the chair that the auditor sits in at his/her office to write up the audit report cost many times what the massage chair would cost, and based upon how the government throws money around, it might NOT even be any more useful than the $20 plastic version.

Well, not the way I read it. If "they paid the caryring costs" means they paid all the payments & incident of ownership, AND if they paid all or part of the down payment, then they are equitable owners. They would be eligible to deduct the property taxes & interest, and MIGHTY be able to use the Sec 121 exclusion if there were a gain large enough for it to matter. But the adiditonal info Catherine provided pretty well put that line of reasoning to bed.

I agree. If he has a desk, he needs a chair. I don't think the massage feature will qualify or disqualify it as a business deduction. Surely an auditor wouldn't compare what he paid for it against an Office Depot $59 special. Last time I visited a lawyer, I'll bet the chair he was sitting in cost more than all the furniture and desks in my office. I doubt he was worried about losing the deduction in an audit.

I got some clarification from an "Employee Benefits" forum I stumbled upon a couple of days back. I'm still digesting the info, but it seems there is a subtle difference between "one employee" and "one participant". I haven't sketched out all the code sections and such because at the moment I'm just trying to get a definitive answer for a specific situation. But I've come to the conclusion that I'm adding apples & oranges on this whole issue. There are requirements related to benefits, and then there are requirements related to ACA - some of them intersect and some of them come close to contradicting one another. One thing has become clear (I think). A Health Care Sharing ministry is not an insurance plan. So even though a participant in a qualifying HCSM can escape the ACA penalties on their personal return, the ministry they work for cannot exclude the HCSM payments from gross income on their W2, even if it's a "single participant" employer. Doing so can expose the employer to the $100 per day penalty. It would be wise for any church or non-profit to heed this warning. I've also read that there has been at least one bill introduced in Congress to provide some relief to this mess. Nothing has been voted on and who knows what the final outcome will be once the sausage is made. But in any event this may not be over.

Joan: Yes, claiming the Sec 121 exclusion would be the ideal outcome. I didn't go there because Catherine called it a small gain, coupled with the fact that the whole situation might be shaky anyhow. I think even the "beneficial owner" matter might be in jeopardy if the kids didn't pay all or part of the down payment, even if they made all the loan payments & upkeep of the residence. So depending upon how that played out, it might be worth foregoing the Sec 121 exclusion in order to hopefully avoid IRS deciding to take a closer look and potentially invalidating 3 years' worth of interest & property tax deductions on the kids' returns. Of course, the decision depends on how much the "small" gain really is and thus how much tax is at stake in total. Catherine clarified things when she said mom is OK paying the tax. In this case I think I'd just treat it as a second residence, report the gain on Schedule D/8949, and call it a day.

How about this? Report the sale on the 8949, then zero out the gain in the adjustments column with a code "N". The kids can then use the same purch date and sale date as mom on their Schedule D + 8949, reporting the gain as the selling price with zero basis. This means no one gets the benefit of the principal residence exclusion, but at least the ones who benefitted the most pay the taxes. It's a bit of a stretch, but might be OK. If an audit ever occurred, everybody could settle up with one another if IRS takes a different position on who should report the gain. I'd probably do it this way only if the kids do meet the "beneficial & equitable owner" test.

I keep getting confused (not very hard to do) on this issue of Medical Insurance and/or MERP when there is only one employee. I've seen advice on some forums that suggests it's acceptable to continue the MERP and to pay the Med Insurance while excluding both from income in that situation alone. Based upon what Mike, JJ, and Rita are saying, I take it that this advice is dead wrong.

My post addressed the Financial Advisor industry itself, irrespective of whether or not your post was tongue-in-cheek. In any event, I couldn't make any money as a FA because the extent of my advice is always to say "Here, read this - http://www.vanguard.com/bogle_site/lib/sp19991016.html "

Personally, I've always considered offering financial advice to be an inherent conflict with tax preparation services, an insurmountable ethical breach. (But then I also think it's unethical for banks to offer brokerage services, so I guess I'm just too old-fashioned in this area.) On the other hand, I see so many instances of people getting ripped off by financial advisors that I want to do something to help them. I've settled on telling them that I don't trust anyone who is paid to give so-called financial advice, and to point out that over 85% of financial advisors can't even consistently beat a simple low-cost total market index fund. (If it weren't for "survivor bias", the figure would be even higher). I urge them to read John Bogle's work in this area in order to learn that the "financial advisor" industry is a huge scam. Sadly, most won't do the simple math, nor will they take the time to learn the basics. And so they keep coming in with these statements clearly designed to obfuscate the facts & hide the reality that their financial advisor is looking out for nobody but himself.

Glad to hear it was something simple.

That's what I was thinking. Client has a card from IRS and has the presence of mind to call the tax preparer, but just happpens to "leave the card at the office". I'd be inclined to tell them to not worry too much about the visit since they didn't seem concerned enough to communicate to me all the relevant info. I suspect the client knows more about the reasons for the visit than they are letting on. It will become crystal clear on Monday.

Good point, Jack. About all one will be able to do is point to it and say "There it is. Yep, it's wrong."

I did find this interesting title on the Church and Clergy Tax Guide site, which I now have on order: "The Enforcement or Return of Donors' Designated Gifts - Feature Report" I think that's going to give me some pretty good guidance on this issue, so thanks for the suggestion.

Thank you Margaret, Catherine, and MAS. I do think it's important to keep in mind that this is a non-profit ministry, not a tax-exempt church. So there are reporting requirements and representations to be made on the Form 990. My initial recommendation was to suggest to the donor, in order of priority: 1) retain the credit to apply to a future trip; 2) convert the gift to "undesignated/unrestricted"; 3) designate for another purpose; 4) request a refund Anything in 2, 3, or 4 implies that the donor did not relinquish control of the funds and therefore calls into question the deductibility. That could in turn jeopardize the non-profit status in an extreme reading of the rules. However, the fact that the category of "temporarily restricted" funds exists would imply from a common-sense standpoint that some degree of input from the donor is acceptable when the initial purpose cannot be achieved. This differs from the issue of returning undesignated contributions, which is an absolute "no-no", other than in a few extreme situations. There are court cases involving situations where the organization willfully violated the intent of the donor, and the donor demanded a refund, but that sort of thing is not in play here. This involves committed donors who each contributed and/or raised $3K or so of support specifically to participate in the mission trip. It's important to insure that they are treated fairly as a matter of good stewardship, acting with integrity, and not stepping outside the bounds of acceptable practices for a non-profit. I was surprised to find that ECFA didn't have specific guidance that I could find on this matter. I'm checking out Margaret's recommendation to find what "Church and Clergy Tax Guide" has to say on the subject, and also subscribing to another service as well.

Thanks KC. That was helpful, but I'm still researching several avenues, both tax-focused and also non-profit specific. It's surprising how little definitive info is out there regardiing this issue.

A valid 501(C)3 organizes short-term mission trips overseas. These are not disguised vacations - they are valid mission trips. Volunteers raise funds from third parties and also give personal funds toward paying their individual travel/lodging expenses and in-country group overhead for the team. The gifts are treated as tax-deductible "temporarily restricted" gifts. All contributions are assigned to specific trips and all donors are easily identifiable. Due to political upheaval in the host country, a mission trip must be canceled in the interest of safety of the volunteers and also safety of the in-country hosts. Can the organization return the gifts to the donors without jeopardizing its non-profit status?

Looks like the future's going to include increasing incidences of data breaches and an IRS stretched so thin that their own personnel struggle to figure it out and fix the problems.

He would have probably gotten away with it if he hadn't tried to marry that good-looking golden retriever who lived in the house down the street.

Yeah, who cares about speed when you're selling your time? Data entry speed is a tiny part of the equation. (Anybody can type fast). Startup, backup, updates, macros, and maneuvering around in the program all form the total picture. It's obvious to me that you never mastered Drake's capabilities.

He probably recognizes that once you switch to Drake you're very unlikely to come back. The more you learn about Drake the less likely you are to settle for an inferior product. Superior performance eventually wins out. And even though there's already a price differential that favors Drake, I suspect the pricing margin will widen even more as time goes on.

Well said.

I think JJ laid it out very well. I personally take a different approach to many of my church and ministry-related financial decisions when compared to my business decisions, and I can understand how a person engaged in full-time or bivocational mministry might make similar distinctions. Over-simplification of life decisions and proof-texting really don't address some complex issues related to lliving under a secular government and at the same time applying one's faith in a meaningful way.

I went back and re-read the 4361. It actually states that the applicant objects to any form of government assistance for death, disability, old age, retirement, medical expenses, etc, (a list which just happens to include Social Security). So that slams the door shut on Medicaid for the applicant with respect to the declaration. And anyone who submits the form for financial reasons or any other reason is committing perjury. But as KC pointed out, that doesn't mean our government actually pays any attention to things like this when handing out the money. http://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-pdf/f4361.pdf

The Audit Techniques Guide for Clergy lumps SocSec, Medicare, and Medicaid into the same category when describing the exemption. And since Medicaid is a part of SocSec, that would lead me to believe it affects the minister's eligibility. However, I could be wrong on that and I can't imagine the minster's decision would automatically affect his/her family. Also, even ministers who have filed Form 4361 cannot exempt themselves entirely. Any non-ministerial income they receive is still subject to SocSec tax and they will be entitled to SocSec benefits upon reaching retirement age. None of this addresses the fundamental question, which is that by filing Form 4361 the minister is saying he/she is opposed to any form of governmental assistance/insurance. It isn't a financial decision - it is supposed to be a decision based on principle and conviction. So if the filing of the exemption is genuine, then the issue of requesting Medicaid assistance should never arise. Interesting question, though.

KC - you should change the title to "Palindrome Week"