My spouse recently negotiated a raise. However there are various reasons that it would be much better if they are not "officially" making the higher amount (internal resentment at the company, being a too obvious high cost item, etc). The company is happy to just take over our tuition payments for the amount of the raise. Is there any way to accomplish this legally? Can it not show up on his paystub, but we still declare it and pay taxes on it? Thread in Slack Conversation

Someone in my household (trying to protect the guilty!), based on mistaken information, accidentally made a transaction that triggered realized capital gains of $2866 in a UTMA. Child has no other income. What is the cheapest and easiest way to file federal and NJ state tax return for this? I don't want to spend a lot of money, It's only going to be a few dollars in taxes...Is it best to add to my tax return? Does it matter if we plan to use freetaxusa?

can someone explain to me the tax ramifications of doing backdoor roth contributions if I've also got a traditional IRA? I'm trying to make sense of this but I'm having trouble

I'm trying to decide between a 529 or a ugma/utma account . Right now I put away for my kids in a standard brokerage account invested in an index fund. I was thinking that I will most likely need that money to pay for things that are probably tuition related and certainly before they reach the age 19. And so is thinking of stopping to contribute to the standard investment account in contribute instead to one of these accounts which will make the capital gains tax free. I will definitely have education related expenses at my expected time of withdrawal. Is there any reason to choose one over the other

Free resource / Webinar by @kind-nightfall-62444

I'm paying 17% of taxes off of my side job income. 15 federal and 2 local. Any tactics to lower that?

I just realized that my largest income source (44K) is not withholding federal income taxes on my paychecks. Gemini/googling suggests that to avoid penalties and interest for under withholding taxes I should make a large withholding on my last paycheck of the year equivalent to at least 90% of what I'll owe this year (I'm not sure how to calculate that) or 100% of what I paid last year, which is probably the lower number. Is that box 24 from last year's taxes? Does that sound right? Anything else I should take into account?

Iv'e maxed out 401k this year , and just learnt I cant contribute to ira (non roth) due to income limitations this year , are there any other tricks to lower taxes for this year ?

i saw a post about saving SE tax , i wanted to hear eveyones thoughts

I contributed to an IRA account on Friday, and just now I realized that I'm over the contribution limits for a traditional IRA. What do I do at this point? (the traditional IRA account is pre existing, a mix of previous 401k and traditional IRA funds from the past, don't know if that affects the solution here). What should I do?

I see people joining lotto pools. I'll leave aside my thoughts on playing lotto in general and the fact that people only get interested when we cross the marketing-scam number of $1B. I assume the pool means as many tickets as people are purchased and if any ticket wins, everyone splits (please correct me if I'm wrong). How does this work from a tax perspective? Can multiple people actually claim it? My assumption is not, so one person legally gets the money and pays the taxes. Is the agreement for the after-tax value? My impression is that these pools are heimish, and all is good when they're not winning, but if a pool wins, and there's 10s of millions of dollars on the line, out come the lawyers and a massive legal battle. Unless people have solidly written contracts for these pools? All academic. I know the odds. But I'm curious if anyone knows the answers

(feel free to move if this is not the right channel)... Does anyone have a recommendation for a yashar accountant, particularly one that is experienced with handling a kollel stipend? (To be clear, NOT looking to start a conversation here on how it should be handled, I will leave that up to the accountant 🙂 )

“Starting in 2026, the canceled loans will count as income, which could trigger a tax bill or impact eligibility for other tax breaks.” https://www.cnbc.com/2026/01/01/student-loan-forgiveness-taxes.html

There's no way that's okay

I sold stock in August of 2025 and I am pretty sure that I paid taxes when I sold. But I can't find that on my statement from my broker. And my tax software wants to charge me taxes for the gains. Where would I find that I paid the taxes at selling?

Does anyone know if the NYS inflation refund check is federally taxable? Reddit doesn't seem to know, there are two schools of thought and no consensus on which is correct. Wondering if anyone has any official answers or any guidance from tax professionals

To my understanding the IRS has not made a decision regarding taxable status of the NYS inflation check.

What's the best way to go about filling taxes for my kid's UTMA accounts? They each have dividends and capital gains (from tax gain harvesting). I was told they each need their own return filled, and my tax preparer is willing to do it for $75 each. Should I just do that? (Turbotax charges $99 if there's capital gains from selling stock)

are freetaxusa paid support options worth doing?

I never finished my 2024 tax return, I had extended and paid but did not file. Now when filing with freetaxusa it is saying that I need an IP Pin or to mail it in instead. Are there other options ? Can a preparer file it for me without a pin?

I'm thinking about contemplating possibly maybe doing my own taxes this year. I have 2 w-2’s, a business income, some 1099’s from investments, and parsonage income. Would love some advice about if this is doable for someone who doesn't know what they are doing. Is there a really user friendly software? Should I just stick with a professional?

After finding out i owe around 14k in taxes this year... I have learnt my lesson and will be requesting more tax withholding from paychecks in the future.

Hi quick q - while discussing with Claude it suggested using a sep-ira to counter-act the self-employment taxes due on #parsonage. Has anyone seen this as a strategy before?

Is one required to give maaser on a tax return? Considered to be regular income since these tax amounts were deducted when calculating maaser initially?

I'm trying to finish up my taxes with freetaxusa but I am running into an issue I want to fill out form 8995 to carryover qbi losses from previous years, however ftusa only generates that form if you fill out the schedule c, but I had no income or expenses in the tax year so I left the schedule c mostly blank. Now it does not let me continue unless I delete the schedule c, but that will take the 8995 with it

If you moved to a new city last year be sure to check on their policies. Spent some time in Pittsburgh and was unpleasantly surprised to find out I have to file a municipal tax return!

My taxes were extended for 2025: On m1 finance it is coming up as 14K taxable in my traditional IRA (I contribute backdoor- but for 2024 I did it between Dec and April of 2025 so it looks like 14K even tho it was only 7K. My accountant told me to speak to m1 which I did, they told me to file form 8606 last year which obviously that's too late- basically thy were not so helpful. Any advice for this?

I'm wondering if there's a way to use a 529 to pay for Yeshiva tuition, in New York. I know that New York doesn't recognize K-12 as a qualified expense, so if you withdraw from a 529 account for Yeshiva tuition, you have to pay taxes on it, plus a penalty. What I'm seeing though, is that that only applies if it's a NY account that you took a deduction for. If it's an out of state account, though, there's no penalty (but you'd still pay NY taxes on the growth). I'm also seeing that it's possible to open a 529 in another state. The only downside would be a lack of state tax deduction (which is actually an upside here, since the NY deduction is what causes the penalty). Would this make sense to do as a way to at least get a federal tax deduction on Yeshiva tuition? Is there anything I'm missing here?

For 2026 I'm going to have some side income on 1099s that will be filed on a schedule c. What are the line items I should be tracking that can be expensed against it? Internet, phone, AI subscriptions. And how do quarterly estimates work when you are already withholding against your W2, do you still need to make payments?