Taxes

[judecorp]

We decided to talk to an actual accountant this year because we had some tax-type questions about things like the house we bought, the sale of my dad's house, and what kinds of things we could deduct as medical debt. She charged a bazillion dollars, so now that I know what to do about the house stuff I can totally take back over. It's not like I'm going to have to deal with another dead dad house full of museum-quality crap (thank goodness), so things should go back to being straightforward.

Because I itemized deductions for the house, I was able to deduct all of our medical costs from Operation: Frankenbaby. To look at the costs was staggering. $3500-ish on sperm alone. That's maddening.

At least I take some satisfaction in knowing that while the Feds won't recognize our marriage, I can stick them with the bill for our babymaking.

Comments

[whuffle.livejournal.com]

Heh. It pleases me to know end to think of the IRS getting the bill for little franken-august! Hope your taxes were kinder to you than ours...

[judecorp.livejournal.com]

Well, we usually WAY over-deduct from our paychecks because I am paranoid about owing money. I owed money for years and years in college and stuff because I wasn't making much money and had too much interest income from some accounts my grandparents had in my name. It was always stressful.

However, I would have owed some major, major money if I hadn't ended up deducting the medical stuff in addition to the house closing costs. (Since Jen and I have to file separately with the Feds, we had to decide who would get the house.)

Instead, it worked out okay.

[whuffle.livejournal.com]

Good for you. After last year, we started having additional money deducted from our paychecks on top of the normal married-filing-zero taxes. Still not enough. I really don't get it.

Hmmm. Our accountant never mentioned deducting the closing costs from our purchase of a home. He asked us about the taxes we'd payed for the one month we owned the house before the year ended, but he never brought up the subject of closing costs....

We've been on the fence about filing for an extension. I might advocate that we file for the extension and insist that the accountant we've been working with hand off our files to one of the other partners. So far, I have been very unimpressed by his work. Truly. And this is coming from someone who did her own taxes, with help from my mom the book-keeper, during a time when I was self-employed and had a hell of a lot more complications than I do now.

[judecorp.livejournal.com]

Did you pay points up front? Points can be deducted because they are, in essence, "up front interest." Not the other closing costs, just the points.

[whuffle.livejournal.com]

Ah. See, we didn't pay any points on our mortgage. So I guess that lets us out of being able to deduct closing costs... Damn.

[judecorp.livejournal.com]

Awwh, snap.

[siercia]

After last year, we started having additional money deducted from our paychecks on top of the normal married-filing-zero taxes. Still not enough. I really don't get it.

Since I'm assuming y'all are filing jointly, I'd suggest that this might be the issue, if you have a disparity between your two incomes. Your employers withhold from your checks based on your perceived tax bracket, based on your salary. So, (with totally hypothetical numbers)if you're in an 18% tax bracket, you get ~ 18% withheld from your check. If M is in a 25% bracket, he gets ~ 25% withheld from his check. Combined, you're more likely to be in the 25% than the 18% bracket, meaning that you are being underwitheld, even with the additional withholding you're doing (likely enough to cover the marriage penalty, but perhaps not this twist on it). The fact that you also have additional income from your contracting could be affecting this as well.

[jodied.livejournal.com]

Dead Dad House!

That should be a band name. And who would have ever thought sperm could be so expensive?

[judecorp.livejournal.com]

You can be in my band!

And yeah, sperm is c-r-a-z-y. The place we bought from was like $350/vial and we went through, umm... lemme think... 9 of them? Plus overnight shipping. Plus sperm storage.

It's big business.

[artjax.livejournal.com]

tell me about it. we're on vial 10.

[judecorp.livejournal.com]

Ugh. There should be a money back guarantee.

[scirocco.livejournal.com]

I TOTALLY woulda let you had some for like... $50 a vial. I'm THAT nice.

[judecorp.livejournal.com]

Your wife might say otherwise. :)

[scirocco.livejournal.com]

OK, she might wanna charge $75, I guess....

[siercia]

Nah, I'm pretty chill =)

[lemur68.livejournal.com]

$3500-ish on sperm alone.

Man, I'm really glad I know the context of this.

[judecorp.livejournal.com]

Maybe you only THINK you do. ;)

[gimmeapony.livejournal.com]

You know I'm dying to make some kind of crass comment about hauling my bedsheets into the CPA, right?

[gimmeapony.livejournal.com]

Also this makes me very, very happy:

"At least I take some satisfaction in knowing that while the Feds won't recognize our marriage, I can stick them with the bill for our babymaking."

[judecorp.livejournal.com]

:)

[judecorp.livejournal.com]

Please do. :)

[antiopa.livejournal.com]

Priced per ounce, sperm costs more than gold. At least, I read that somewhere.

We came up just short of having spent enough to deduct medical expenses. (It has to be a certain percentage of your income.)

[judecorp.livejournal.com]

Thankfully I don't make much income. I guess it's one of the "perks" of being a social worker. I hit that 7.5% like NOTHING.

[afullmoon.livejournal.com]

We finally own lexi outright. I just paid off our final adoption bill and take great joy in knowing we can claim adoption expenses next year on our taxes.

[judecorp.livejournal.com]

Yeah... we are going to do the whole second-parent adoption thing even though I'm pretty sure I can put Jen on the birth certificate because we are married. But I want to cover our bases for other states and who knows what will happen in THIS state.

Did you HATE going through the adoption process? I'm kind of dreading it on principle.

[afullmoon.livejournal.com]

On principle alone it sucked but everyone involved tried to make it better for us. Our lawyer did her part for free because she hated we had to do it in the first place. The social worker have is a 50% discount because she didn't agree with why we had to do it. It took forever and was tedious but the relief it gives me is sooo worth it but the anger that we had to do it is still there.

[judecorp.livejournal.com]

Oh, that would be nice. I hope we can get lots of good discounts!

[twomomsarebetterthanone.wordpress.com (from livejournal.com)]

we're about to hit the $7,000 mark in sperm buying. i want to r.i.p. my hair out. that's just sperm alone- never mind all the other crap that comes with ttc. i feel like i am supporting a child that i don't have. argh.

yea for getting your taxes under control!!!!

[judecorp.livejournal.com]

You are using identity-release sperm, right? I know that costs significantly more as well. Ugh.

We decided against it. I would have liked our kid to be able to know but we just didn't have the money.

[twomomsarebetterthanone.wordpress.com (from livejournal.com)]

yes we are using id release and it is ridiculously more expensive. we've got our reasons for doing it, but it sure is a pain to pay so much more.

and...in response to what you said. the two of us should get together with the two of you SOON! let's chat soon and make a date!

[judecorp.livejournal.com]

Yes! A date!

[growinginwonder.livejournal.com]

All you need to do now is become a minister of some kind, or get Jen to, and then you can ... declare your house is a parsonage and get even more deductions!

[judecorp.livejournal.com]

Well, Daedalus is a minister in the Universal Life Church. Does that count?