I hope all of you are enjoying your Fall so far. In my home, we got 13 bags of leaves on Saturday (with a lot more to go -phew!). Also, while all things Christmas are not done, we got the tree and ornaments put up on Sunday. Emma refused any Christmas music to go along with it though. Haha
With 2024 closing in on us, I wanted to share a few Year-End Tax Tips and Reminders. We cannot control markets but we can control tax planning and tax savings that are available to us so I want to be proactive in helping each of you plan. With that…
Tax Tips:
- Make sure you are maxing out any tax-advantaged accounts: 401(k)s, IRAs, HSAs, 529 plan contributions, etc. If you are over age 50, make sure you’re doing the additional catch-up contributions on retirement accounts as well.
- Tax-loss Harvesting: If you have taxable accounts with our firm, we are doing this on your behalf. If not, check your Robinhood accounts or other brokerage accounts for any losses to offset gains.
- Check your withholdings: Make sure you paid the government enough this year to avoid tax surprises or potential penalties.
- Consider back-door Roth IRAs or Roth Conversions. For clients, we are pro-active on having these discussions but feel free to reach out if you are curious if either of these make sense in your unique situation.
- Charitable Giving: Make sure you’re doing this in a tax-smart way. Qualified Charitable Distributions from your Traditional IRAs (no tax to you when giving from IRA as long as you’re over age 70!) or give from highly appreciated stock. Again, if you’re a client, we’ve likely talked to you about this but feel free to reach out to discuss further.
- There will be some changes to charitable giving in 2026 but no changes to 2025. Stay tuned, we’ll discuss that next year.
Reminders:
- Make sure you took your Required Minimum Distributions on IRAs. If you’re not sure, feel free to call Angel to double-check but she and I proactively makes sure all IRAs (AND INHERITED IRAs) have met the requirements for the year.
- 1099s: For IRA distributions, 1099s are typically issued/sent out at the end of January/early February. If you receive documents from Schwab electronically, any 1099 will be emailed to you. If you have taxable brokerage accounts, feel free to get on your CPAs calendar but make the appointment for late March/early April. Those 1099s don’t get issued or go out until mid-late February typically but sometimes early March even.
- One Big Beautiful Bill Act (OBBA): How will this impact my taxes for 2025? …. Overall, most people will see a positive impact in their 2025 tax liability from the OBBA, owing a bit less. The exception: those in the highest 37% tax bracket may actually owe a bit more.
As we head into the holiday season, we want to extend our warmest wishes to you and your loved ones. We hope to see you at one of our upcoming events or in the office for an annual review if we haven’t met yet this year. Your partnership and trust mean the world to us—thank you for being part of our MS Financial Resources family.