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Indian_Pale_Male t1_je7g1lx wrote

Reply to comment by one-eye-owl in My husband and I owe 22k in taxes but we only made a combine total of 75k by one-eye-owl

I suggest you find someone else. I’m a tax accountant. Even if you had $75K gross income with no withholdings as married couple and lived in the highest income tax state, you wouldn’t owe more than $20K. Either that person sucks at tax, or there isn’t enough information

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one-eye-owl OP t1_je7h0ut wrote

thank you so much, I'm going to ask for my paper work back and then plug it in online to see.

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patrick_schliesing t1_je7ywhn wrote

TaxSlayer has been a good easy one for me

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dirtydayboy t1_je823pz wrote

There's also taxfreeusa.com as well

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Physics_Prop t1_je87pzw wrote

the proper link is https://freetaxusa.com

Free for federal, so free in Texas. Very good even with a moderately complex tax situation.

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UnfinishedAle t1_je89zm1 wrote

I just switched to this for this year from turbo tax and my god I can’t believe I’ve used TurboTax all these years..

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Deep90 t1_je8bhbi wrote

I freaking hate TurboTax.

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Besides their lobbying, its also pretty much impossible to figure what forms their pages correspond with. If you need to fill out a 1099-MISC you can't because turbotax wants to be helpful and it knows best.

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Shadefeaster t1_je8p0gn wrote

They are pretty much all to blame but the real reason is because taxes are based on your word and ambiguity. The rich don't want a flat tax, they want their lawyers and accountants to cost less then their taxes so they can lie their way out of it. The only ones that get caught are the poor that can't afford them.

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awkrawrz t1_je8m3zk wrote

Do they auto pull in investment data of all my trades? Bc that is the biggest doozy and benefit for me to use other services I'm already familiar with doing that.

If so, I'm switching to this next year. I'm so tired of paying to do my own taxes, but I'm not rich enough for a CPA.

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nelsonnyan2001 t1_je8mrgo wrote

Depends on your 1099 and how well your brokerage formats that data. Seems like FreeTaxUSA uses some proprietary backend to soup through your 1099 forms. The "auto-import" function can be spotty but should work fine for 99% of W-2's.

Schwab's 1099 import worked fine for me, YMMV.

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awkrawrz t1_je8mu8q wrote

Awesome! Thanks for sharing and I use Schwab do that is good to know!

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nelsonnyan2001 t1_je8n0dw wrote

Sure! Just a heads-up - I don't day-trade and most of my taxable gains were from reinvested dividends from ETF's (and some FAANG exits) so my 1099 was incredibly simple, realistically it would've taken me 10 minutes to fill them out myself, I just wanted to see how well the import function would work.

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awkrawrz t1_je8oo3f wrote

That's good to know! I may give it a try next year just for fun. Worst case I just continue with TurboTax.

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RantRanger t1_je8l261 wrote

If this site is free, how do they make a living?

What is their revenue stream?

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CMD2 t1_je8lu9i wrote

You can file federal for free but you pay for state filings. There are also upgrades you can get like access to live help and audit support.

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CarTarget t1_je8ojly wrote

To answer about their revenue stream: The IRS free file program is a government program that partners with companies to provide free filing options. They also have services they charge for like audit protection but those are optional and just a " do you want this" at the end

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wes00mertes t1_je89of7 wrote

I use this and the URL sounds like such a scam everyone I mention it to (who almost always are using TurboTax) raises an eyebrow at me.

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GregorSamsaa t1_je8kewj wrote

The site has a very simple layout which also kinda gives it a scammy look to it as well lol

When I first met my now wife, she was an avid TurboTax user and refused to believe I was using a legitimate site lol

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Blers42 t1_je8kxjc wrote

I just tell people they’re the first authorized IRS free filer. A google search immediately shows its legitimate.

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MastodonSmooth1367 t1_je8pezb wrote

I know people hate TurboTax here and yes I agree Intuit has problems from an ethical lobbying side, but their product is one of the best out there. I've used free solutions like Credit Karma and did a heads up comparison back in 2019 and 2020. My conclusion was the numbers are the same but TurboTax has a lot more tooltips and help guides if you have questions.

My taxes are a mess now that I don't have time to do it twice to compare, but I think TurboTax is well worth it if you need to go through capital gains, etc and anything a bit more complex than a basic W-2 and 1099-INT/DIV.

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dripless_cactus t1_je8r2t2 wrote

I saw someone comment once that they use a free/cheap service to actually file their taxes (I think it was FreeTaxUSA) but they go through the process on TurboTax to compare numbers. It's a little more work but I thought it was a good tactic since as I recall turbo tax only charges to file-- it's free to use and go through their checks and instructions.

I switched to FreeTaxUSA last year and found it to be perfectly adequate, but if I were less sure about it, I think it's totally worth the savings to find out what turbo tax thinks and then file elsewhere.

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FrankieHellis t1_je859z2 wrote

There is an important question above. OP states they spent savings that was going to be used to open a business. Where was this money? Was it in a retirement account and therefore subject to taxes?

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josephbenjamin t1_je88cxn wrote

It could be because ACA overpayment of subsidy. Would double check the reason. Also, not sure if penalty is involved, and state taxes.

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patrickbabyboyy t1_je84d41 wrote

maybe if they were 1099 and not w2

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Indian_Pale_Male t1_je85b34 wrote

$75K taxable still wouldn't be close. I think the only way they could've gotten to that number would be if, as other people have mentioned, they had to pay back healthcare premiums. Even then $25K might be a bit of a stretch. Most likely, these numbers OP provided are missing a ton of context to really know

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merc08 t1_je8gq9n wrote

There could have been a large medical debt forgiven, which counts as income.

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nelsonnyan2001 t1_je8qw22 wrote

Something to add to my ever growing collection of funny tax edge cases

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bldrmpls t1_je8negj wrote

I don't know all the tax laws by far (which have their own logic--or lack thereof), but I understand accounting. Wouldn't one have to have deducted medical expenses at some point in order for them to be taxable when forgiven?

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merc08 t1_je8phb9 wrote

No, you can't deduct an expense you didn't actually pay. The hospital (or their 3rd party billing) records the amount you owe and if you don't pay then after a while they are allowed to write it off as a lost expense. In doing so, they send documentation to the IRS (and to you) saying that they essentially paid you the amount you owed. It's possible OP got that letter and only thought it was forgiving the debt, without understanding the income aspect.

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Buffinator360 t1_je8ddha wrote

If I'm interpreting what they said correctly they may have overclaimed ACA insurance subsidies so they possibly owe 9k in repayments and penalties?

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LoveBulge t1_je8n1gz wrote

$75k after the standard deduction for Married Filing Joint, is taxable income of $48k. That's like...$5k federal only. BUT if it's $75k of self-employment income and no deductions, then it could easily hit $16k. Toss in state, then you could hit $20k.

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