GTKY: tax return poll (non-clicky)

iluvmylab · February 2012

Have you filed your taxes yet?

DIY or H&R Block?

Electronic or paper?

Are you getting a refund?

Care to share how much?

Do you have plans for how you will spend it? Or will you save? Or both?

Do you have to pay in?

Care to share how much?

Edited: sorry! meant to say refund!

Chargersgrl33 · February 2012

DIY or H&R Block? DIY through Taxact. I worked at the IRS for 3+ years handeling the audits....don't use H&R block! They do not assist when it comes to audits!

Electronic or paper? Electronic

Are you getting a return? Yep

Care to share how much? $4681. Not bad with not owning a house:)

Do you have plans for how you will spend it? Or will you save? Or both? We split it down the middle. DH gets half and I get half. I plan on saving most of mine.

Do you have to pay in? Nope

Care to share how much? N/A

iluvmylab · February 2012

Have you filed your taxes yet? yes

DIY or H&R Block? DH did it, he's an accountant so I guess he knows what he's doing!

Electronic or paper? electronic

Are you getting a return? yes

Care to share how much? about $3000. Thank you LO!

Do you have plans for how you will spend it? Or will you save? Or both? we are going to put new tile floors in our kitchen and entryway

MrsT2008 · February 2012

Have you filed your taxes yet? nope..waiting to get the last couple of forms (they still get sent to my ILs for some reason, so DH is getting them from his dad this weekend)

DIY or H&R Block? DIY - TurboTax

Electronic or paper? electronic

Are you getting a return? should be

Care to share how much? don't know yet

Do you have plans for how you will spend it? Or will you save? Or both? we'll save it I think - to kind of replenish our acct after the unpaid part of my leave

Do you have to pay in? not this year

Care to share how much? n/a

awillis13 · February 2012

iluvmylab:
Have you filed your taxes yet? Yes

DIY or H&R Block? DIY with TurboTax

Electronic or paper? Electronic

Are you getting a return? Yes! Thank's T :-)

Care to share how much? $4100 from federal, another $1300ish from state

Do you have plans for how you will spend it? Or will you save? Or both? We are going to finally get a real bedroom set, and a dining table for our dining room. We might treat ourselves to a nice night out (we LOVE this really expensive steakhouse but we only go for special occasions and we usually save up because it will probably be at least $300 for the 2 of us...). The rest will go in savings.

Do you have to pay in? Nope

Care to share how much? NA

Lexie Marie · February 2012

iluvmylab:

Have you filed your taxes yet? Blah- no not yet.

DIY or H&R Block? Last year H&R, this year...an accountant?

Electronic or paper? Electronic!

Are you getting a return? Probably not... my husband does real estate on the side and I do my photography on the side and last year we owed

Care to share how much? not sure hopefully not a boatload (owed that is).

Do you have plans for how you will spend it? Or will you save? Or both? If we got a return I'd first dance around like a little kid on Christmas, and then second we would probably save it or put it toward's our basement we are in the process of finishing.

Do you have to pay in? N/A

Care to share how much? N/A

lageorgiapaperie · February 2012

Have you filed your taxes yet? Nope, we're actually still waiting on one of DH's 4 W4s (is that what those tax form thingys are called?), it might have been mailed to his parents.

DIY or H&R Block? My dad is an accountant so he'll do them for us

Electronic or paper? We'll try to do it electronically, hopefully we won't have problems like we did last year (b/c of my name change after we got married) and have to send it in

Are you getting a return? I can't imagine that we wouldn't

Care to share how much? No idea yet, but hopefully more than last year! Between fed and state we only got about $250-300 back last year

Do you have plans for how you will spend it? Or will you save? Or both? We haven't discussed it

Do you have to pay in? Again, no idea, but I highly doubt it

Care to share how much? n/a

tosh24 · February 2012

Have you filed your taxes yet? No, in Canada the deadline is May 1st.

DIY or H&R Block? DIY

Electronic or paper? Electronic

Are you getting a return? Always do!

Care to share how much? Usually around $3000-3500

Do you have plans for how you will spend it? Or will you save? Or both? We do both.

Do you have to pay in? Never

Care to share how much? 0

Kelly1109 · February 2012

Have you filed your taxes yet? No - but will send them to our accountant soon - we have all our paperwork

DIY or H&R Block? We pay an Accountant - its someone DH has used for years and definitely comes in handy having someone we trust do them as we are pretty complicated!

Electronic or paper? Not sure whatever the Accountant does

Are you getting a return? Not sure. Usually we do but this year DH cashed in a bunch of his work stocks & made a LOT in bonuses, so I *think* we might owe....

Care to share how much? Not sure yet.

Do you have plans for how you will spend it? Or will you save? Or both? If we get a return it will pay off bills (we bought a 4 wheeler for our cabin that we still owe money on)

Do you have to pay in?

Care to share how much

Happily Overwhelmed · February 2012

iluvmylab:

Have you filed your taxes yet? Nope. We decided to "break up" with our lawyer after he handled our home sale. The guy usually did our taxes so now we're on the hunt for someone new to make an appointment with.

DIY or H&R Block? Neither. There's no way I'd trust either. I want someone to stand behind us if an audit ever came our way. In the past I've owned my own business. After this year it won't be so complicated so maybe we'd try them on our own?

Electronic or paper? Usually electronic

Are you getting a return? I'm doubting it. In 2008 we took that government loan for first time home buyers. The deal was they give you $7,500 towards the purchase of your first home. In return you have to pay them $500 each year after 2 years until the $7,500 is paid off OR if you sell your first home before it's paid off you have to pay the IRS that lump sum. Yep, sold the home! So we will owe the IRS $7,000 this year. I'm PRAYING to nearly break even though between LO and DH paying in so much.

Care to share how much? N/A

Do you have plans for how you will spend it? Or will you save? Or both? IF there was anything to spend (which I doubt) it would go to either our real estate taxes or other bills. Last year was a big year for us between moving, having a baby, etc. We've gotten slightly behind and DH and I are spending the next 6 months focusing on bills so we're debt free again.

Do you have to pay in? Most likely...

Care to share how much? I wish I knew

indomesticbliss · February 2012

Have you filed your taxes yet? No, still waiting on 1 form

DIY or H&R Block? Turbotax

Electronic or paper? electronic

Are you getting a return? yes

Care to share how much? So far, about 2500 From state and federal combined

Do you have plans for how you will spend it? Or will you save? Or both? No clue, probably add to the kiddos 529 plans

We will also owe in VT because we owned a rental property in the state for part of the year. It's weird getting a check back and sending. In a check. I think we will owe about $300

Julia_JJ · February 2012

iluvmylab:
Have you filed your taxes yet? Nope

DIY or H&R Block? TurboTax, so DIY.

Electronic or paper? Electronic

Are you getting a return? Everybody gets a return. Don't know if I'm getting a refund yet.

Care to share how much? n/a

Do you have plans for how you will spend it? Or will you save? Or both? Save. Pretend like we didn't get it.

Do you have to pay in? n/a

Care to share how much? n/a

rachbenn2007 · February 2012

DIY or H&R Block? DIY with Turbo tax, but we might take it to CPAElectronic or paper? I hope to do electronicAre you getting a return? yesCare to share how much? over 10kDo you have plans for how you will spend it? Or will you save? Or both? We'll spend it on the house and we want to buy a travel trailer to start going on family vacationsDo you have to pay in? noCare to share how much? n/a

uncharch7 · February 2012

No waiting on 1 w-2

Turbo tax

We're getting a refund of $3600 from federal, $800 from state according to the nimbers already entered, which should be pretty dead on. A return is what you file.

Ours is going to savings.

Moozilla11 · February 2012

Have you filed your taxes yet? Sure did

DIY or H&R Block? DIY

Electronic or paper? Electronic

Are you getting a return? Yep

Care to share how much? A little over 9k

Do you have plans for how you will spend it? Or will you save? Or both? We paid 2 months ahead in bills and we both are keeping $500 to spend on what ever we want. The rest goes into savings.

chantico23 · February 2012

Have you filed your taxes yet? Yes

DIY or H&R Block? DIY

Electronic or paper? Electronic

Are you getting a return? Nope. We try to keep it as close to $0 as possible, because I'd prefer to have my money throughout the year instead of letting the government borrow it. Well, we didn't realize we wouldn't qualify for the child tax credit, so now we owe.

Care to share how much? N/A

Do you have plans for how you will spend it? Or will you save? Or both? N/A

Do you have to pay in? Yes

Care to share how much? $1188

MissBHaven1024 · February 2012

Have you filed your taxes yet? Yes, we filed the other day

DIY or H&R Block? Turbo Tax

Electronic or paper? E-file

Are you getting a return? Yes!

Care to share how much? $5200 and some change

Do you have plans for how you will spend it? Or will you save? Or both? We will put some in savings, but we are also taking DD#1 to Disneyland or Hawaii (she votes for Disney, I vote for Hawaii) for her birthday this year, so we will use it for that also.

Do you have to pay in? N/A

Care to share how much? N/A

emd2887 · February 2012

Have you filed your taxes yet? No

DIY or H&R Block? DIY

Electronic or paper? Electronic

Are you getting a return? I think so (this is my first time doing the taxes-DH usually takes care of it so it's all new to me)

Care to share how much? See above

Do you have plans for how you will spend it? Or will you save? Or both? We'll use it to pay off some of my student loans

Do you have to pay in? This question makes me realize that I probably am going to need DH to help me do the taxes as I have no idea what this means!

Care to share how much? Again, see above

beka0404 · February 2012

iluvmylab:
Have you filed your taxes yet? Nope, we're waiting on a K1 statement (investment stuff)

DIY or H&R Block? DIY via H&R Block website

Electronic or paper? Electronic

Are you getting a refund? Yes, surprisingly. We normally pay in.

Care to share how much? Not sure of the final numbers yet.

Do you have plans for how you will spend it? Or will you save? Or both? My husband gets a year-end bonus at work so we're going to combine the two and pay off some debt and then buy a new truck to replace my ol' 190k miler.

Do you have to pay in? No, but we normally always do. Normally five figures. So not awesome.

chrlyr · February 2012

Have you filed your taxes yet? Yep

DIY or H&R Block? DIY via TurboTax

Electronic or paper? Electronic

Are you getting a refund? Yep!

Care to share how much? Total of about $6,800 (federal and state)

Do you have plans for how you will spend it? Or will you save? Or both? All but $300 is going to pay hospital bills. Gotta love C-sections and NICU stays...

Do you have to pay in? Nope.

Care to share how much? N/A

kylayton · February 2012

Have you filed your taxes yet? Yes

DIY or H&R Block? DIY

Electronic or paper? Electronic

Are you getting a refund? Yes

Care to share how much? $2700

Do you have plans for how you will spend it? Or will you save? Or both? We already got our return and we paid off my husbands car and a credit card. Woohoo!

SaraTF · February 2012

Have you filed your taxes yet? They're done but not filed
DIY or H&R Block? TurboTax
Electronic or paper? Electronic
Are you getting a refund? We owe the fed and are getting a refund from the state
Care to share how much? Net refund of about $400. We alter our withholdings through the year to keep them as close to even as possible. I'm not a fan of lending to the government interest free. DS was born in 2012, so we won't be getting anything for him yet. I'm surprised by how much people get back and why they think that's a good thing. Personally, I'd rather invest that extra money over the year. It is a little bit of a pia to adjust your withholdings through the year, but worthwhile in my opinion.
Do you have plans for how you will spend it? Or will you save? Or both? Save
Do you have to pay in? Yes, but only $200 to the fed
Care to share how much?
Edited: sorry! meant to say refund!

cutcopypaste · February 2012

iluvmylab:
Have you filed your taxes yet?
Yes

DIY or H&R Block?
Online turbo tax

Electronic or paper?
Electronic

Are you getting a refund?
Yep!

Care to share how much?
Almost $7,000

Do you have plans for how you will spend it? Or will you save? Or both?
I bought my new macbook air, paid a lingering medical bill and saving the rest.

Do you have to pay in?
No

Care to share how much?

Edited: sorry! meant to say refund!

lijuan09 · February 2012

iluvmylab:
Have you filed your taxes yet? nope, still waiting on my W-2 from the one job I had for a few months last year

DIY or H&R Block? DIY online - probably TurboTax

Electronic or paper? electronic

Are you getting a refund? dear goodness I hope so

Care to share how much? don't know yet

Do you have plans for how you will spend it? Or will you save? Or both? Assuming we get a refund, we'll put it in savings and use as little as possible to help us get by until I find a full-time job

Do you have to pay in? don't think so

Care to share how much? --

Edited: sorry! meant to say refund!

rockychryslerb2010 · February 2012

Have you filed your taxes yet? - not yet, but everything is completed, just not filed.DIY or H&R Block? Usually DIY, but our taxes have gotten complicated over the last two years and I'm starting to feel less confident in preparing them myself. I think this might be the year we finally pay someone to do it.Electronic or paper? electronicAre you getting a refund? No, apparently we don't quality for the child deduction, which was a surprise to us, so we owe this year.Do you have to pay in?Yes, if we file what I prepared we owe to fed and one state. Hoping I can take it to someone and get a better outcome. Care to share how much? almost 2K to fed and 1K

Rakiki3 · February 2012

Have you filed your taxes yet? Waiting on 1 more piece of information

DIY or H&R Block? DIY

Electronic or paper? Electronic

Are you getting a refund? Yes

Care to share how much? Last year we had almost $5,500. So add in another child, tax credit for putting in Insulation (last year we got a tax credit for the new windows), and this year we qualify for the medical tax credit, so it will be a nice chunk of change.

Do you have plans for how you will spend it? Or will you save? Or both? $1,000 of it will be put to the side for the rest of the electrical for the upstairs, $3,000 to do redo our bathroom, and the rest will go towards paying off bills. Hopefully next years income tax we can use for ourselves or a family vacation.

Do you have to pay in? Haven't had to yet, so I'm assuming no

Care to share how much?

KeyLime81 · February 2012

Have you filed your taxes yet? No, not yet...

DIY or H&R Block? DH is an accountant, he'll take care of it.

Electronic or paper? Electronic

Are you getting a refund? Not sure...if we do, it won't be a lot. Taxes are like a game to my DH...he watches our income throughout the year and likes to tweak things so that we get as close to "breaking even" as possible. We never owe or get back more than $100.

Ricola · February 2012

iluvmylab:
Have you filed your taxes yet? Plugged it into turbo tax, but haven't filed

DIY or H&R Block? DIY with turbo tax

Electronic or paper? Electronic

Are you getting a refund? Nope

Care to share how much?

Do you have plans for how you will spend it? Or will you save? Or both?

Do you have to pay in? Yes :-(

Care to share how much? Around $10k. Eeeeek!

Edited: sorry! meant to say refund!

iluvmylab · February 2012

abarton71809:
Are you getting a refund? No, apparently we don't quality for the child deduction, which was a surprise to us, so we owe this year.

You can't claim your child as a dependent?

chantico23 · February 2012

iluvmylab:
abarton71809:
Are you getting a refund? No, apparently we don't quality for the child deduction, which was a surprise to us, so we owe this year.

You can't claim your child as a dependent?

I think she may have meant the child tax credit (that's the one I meant). As your income gets higher, that credit is reduced. Our income is above the level that qualifies for any credit.

iluvmylab · February 2012

chantico23:
iluvmylab:
abarton71809:
Are you getting a refund? No, apparently we don't quality for the child deduction, which was a surprise to us, so we owe this year.

You can't claim your child as a dependent?

I think she may have meant the child tax credit (that's the one I meant). As your income gets higher, that credit is reduced. Our income is above the level that qualifies for any credit.

Oh ok, that makes more sense. We don't get that either

Qmommy · February 2012

Have you filed your taxes yet? - Yup.

DIY or H&R Block? DIY (well DH)

Electronic or paper? Electronic

Are you getting a refund? YES!

Care to share how much? $5000

Do you have plans for how you will spend it? We are currently researching used mini vans - eek! I'm crossing over to the "un-cool" side!

Do you have to pay in? Not this year! YAY!

Care to share how much? N/A

rockychryslerb2010 · February 2012

iluvmylab:
chantico23:
iluvmylab:
abarton71809:
Are you getting a refund? No, apparently we don't quality for the child deduction, which was a surprise to us, so we owe this year.

You can't claim your child as a dependent?

I think she may have meant the child tax credit (that's the one I meant). As your income gets higher, that credit is reduced. Our income is above the level that qualifies for any credit.

Oh ok, that makes more sense. We don't get that either

Yeah, we make too much for the credit, but I also don't see the dependent deduction (the 3K one) when I do it - which makes me think I'm doing something wrong. I know they know E was born because I put in all his info, but I don't see the deduction in the summary where I would expect to see it. We have to pay the AMT, which I think means we don't quality for certain deductions, and maybe the dependent is one of those deductions? I did it really fast the other night, got p*ssed at it, and stopped looking at it. Once I get over the fact that we have to pay, I'll go back and take a look to make sure I did everything right. If it still says we owe, I might try to see if filing separately makes a difference.

iluvmylab · February 2012

abarton71809:

Yeah, we make too much for the credit, but I also don't see the dependent deduction (the 3K one) when I do it - which makes me think I'm doing something wrong. I know they know E was born because I put in all his info, but I don't see the deduction in the summary where I would expect to see it. We have to pay the AMT, which I think means we don't quality for certain deductions, and maybe the dependent is one of those deductions? I did it really fast the other night, got p*ssed at it, and stopped looking at it. Once I get over the fact that we have to pay, I'll go back and take a look to make sure I did everything right. If it still says we owe, I might try to see if filing separately makes a difference.

Was there an option for how many months he lived with you? You can put 12 and claim him for the entire year as long as he was born in 2011.

ETA: if you are married, it's usually not better to file separately. Unless one of you makes way more than the other.

rockychryslerb2010 · February 2012

iluvmylab:

Was there an option for how many months he lived with you? You can put 12 and claim him for the entire year as long as he was born in 2011.

ETA: if you are married, it's usually not better to file separately. Unless one of you makes way more than the other.

We're stuck paying this for 2011 - https://www.smartmoney.com/taxes/income/the-alternative-minimum-tax-9540/

Which is new to me, so I'm still researching, but pretty sure we can't. I'm married, but thought I'd try it separately because individually, one of us would be able to claim E as a dependent.

And all this craziness is why I'm thinking it might be time to have them professionally done, to see if there is something I'm missing!

uncharch7 · February 2012

SaraTF:
We alter our withholdings through the year to keep them as close to even as possible. I'm not a fan of lending to the government interest free. DS was born in 2012, so we won't be getting anything for him yet. I'm surprised by how much people get back and why they think that's a good thing. Personally, I'd rather invest that extra money over the year. It is a little bit of a pia to adjust your withholdings through the year, but worthwhile in my opinion.

Considering the economy did jack sh!t last year, I don't mind. Even in a high interest savings account, most accounts are at 1% max right now. On a $4800 refund, that's a whopping $26 for the year. I know our investments also did poorly last year (we both lost in our 401ks and IRAs), so I totally don't mind... but those who are more savvy than I am I'm sure did better. Typically I agree with you, but we purposely didn't adjust our withholdings because we didn't know for awhile if we were going to have a 2011 or 2012 baby. We are keeping them the same this year as well, we had too much change last year to get a true feel of where we should be, even with online calculators.

Raelara3 · February 2012

Have you filed your taxes yet? Yea, the day my w2's came in (mine were last)

DIY or H&R Block? H&R block and never again. Mine quailifed for the free promotion, but his (we aren't married yet) because of the baby didn't and they charged us $280 for one extra form.

Electronic or paper? electronic

Are you getting a refund? yea

Care to share how much? we already got $600 back from state (combined), and close to $6,000 from the federal return. It's due any day from now until valentines day at the latest.

Do you have plans for how you will spend it? Or will you save? Or both? I wish I could say we're going to save it but that just isn't possible. My job royally screwed me over when I got pregnant so we still need a lot of things for the nursery plus the bills that piled up while I was on leave.

Do you have to pay in?nope

Care to share how much?n/a