thoughts for thursday.

who does your taxes?

thrilling subject.  i know.

tonight i was getting all my paperwork together for our taxes.  i get really excited to do ours.  i kind of feel like ralphie in 'the christmas story'when he was working on trying to crack the secret code in the bathroom.  he couldn't wait to see what the code was.  well, i can't wait to see what my return will be.  i say return because in ALL of the years that we have ever filed our taxes, we've always gotten a good return.  i probably just jinxed myself.  frick.

so, i'm hoping to sit down this weekend and take care of business.  do you do your taxes yourself or do you take them to someone?  do you use turbo tax or something similar?  do you file them as soon as possible or do you wait until april 15?  burning questions, i know.

other thoughts for thursday bloggers include: michelle, denise, heather, jenny, dana, ang, and kristi.

Comments

[Mrs Pop]

We have an accountant do ours. We haven't gotten any money back in the past three years (we've owed money). Tax returns are nice, but in the years I've gotten them, I always was pissed off that I'd loaned the government so much of my money for free.

[Michelle]

Brian does it. I don't usually even see any of it, not even the money. He's all grown up and stuff and uses it for our savings and crap like that. Boring! He knows I'd take it and run though :)

[Amber]

I have an accountant do our taxes. They are rather simple...I should probably do them myself with TurboTax like I did when we were first married. But it's just so much easier this way. I don't even mind that it cost 100 bucks! (well, I sorta mind...that's kinda high? right?!?) Last year the guy left my income off of the return. Big mistake!! We got a nice return and then discovered the mistake and had to send it back. Thank God I had only mentally spent the money!

Anyway. We had our taxes completed this week and so that headache is over. Just waiting on the auto deposit now! :)

[anne]

My husband deals with it. Last year was the first year we had an outside source file our taxes, and I think we'll be doing that going forward.

[Hope]

We used to have someone do our taxes, but he screwed up royally last year so I'm not that interested in having him do them again. We might do them ourselves. Not sure, they're a little complicated.

I usually aim to be within a hundred dollars of breaking even. I'd rather have the money throughout the year instead of getting a big return.

[Lola]

I use TaxAct.com. I'm sure it is similar to TurboTax. I've been using that for about 5 years. And I love doing my taxes. That's the accountant in me, I guess. And I do them right away because we usually get a refund! Yahoo! I started entering my data last night, but gave up because I was so tired. That's what happens when Clayton gets up in the middle of the night. Thank goodness that it is only once per night!

[Nicole]

I used to love doing my taxes, and would start as soon as I received all of my forms in the mail. Now-a-days, I send them to a lady in San Diego who has been doing them for us for several years . . . she specializes taxes for those in the healthcare/law enforcement/EMS field, and always find us every deduction possible. I still prepare all the receipts and itemize everything, she just does all of the formal paperwork and filing. This year I had it all done by January 3rd! Now if all my darn 1099s would just get here, I could ship it all off to SoCal and wait for what I hope is a check big enough to cover a remodel of the kids' bathroom!

[zoe]

we pay to have them done. i don't have the patience to deal with it and by the time i paid someone to watch the kids it evens out.

[sheena]

I am a dork- I LOVE doing my taxes... I use Turbo Tax and there's something exciting about seeing the numbers go up and down as you enter your information...I get anxious once the 1st of the year comes- usually I write a checklist of what I should be getting from employers, banks, etc. and as it arrives check it off so I know right when I'm ready and have everything I need...

[Ang]

I use Turbo Tax and do it from the comfort of my own home with a glass of wine in hand (which may or may not be wise)! So easy and so cheap.. then again I don't itemize anything.

[Jen "t3"]

i'm an accountant and i still have someone else do my returns. i have a lot of weird deduction in terms of going to school, interest on loans, having 3 jobs, it just gets too stressful for me. One year i did them myself and miss some deductions. Thankfully my "tax" accountant found them in time the next year and i got the deduction.

[Kristi S]

I have used Turbo Tax and done it myself for the past 8 years. It walks you through everything. Very happy to do that and it only costs me $69 to file both Fed and MN.

[Leah]

Turbo Tax all the way. I've been using that for about 4 years now.

[Dana Leigh]

I always did my own taxes either on paper or filed electronically but last year I started using Turbo Tax and I think I will use it again this year. My taxes are relatively easy so it's not that much of a chore. I am going to do mine this weekend too. If I'm getting a return, I'll file early otherwise in years past when I owed, I do them early but wait to send it until April 15th. ;) Good luck!

[Denise]

We choose to have ours done by someone else who has their own "tax service" only because I want to make sure it is done right and that we are not missing anything...We usually try and get them done asap! To get it over with. we usually get a good return. And we are scheduled for Mar 2nd.

[kim]

I use TurboTax. And yes, I get SUPER excited. I am a huge nerd. :)

[Ashley]

We always personally go to H&R Block to have them do it. They take their cut right out of our return, so it doesn't actually FEEL like we're paying money out of pocket for them to do it. This year we had them put it right on a pre-paid card, which we can use like a credit card (and at ATM machines) pretty much anywhere. Having them put it on the card costs about the same as having them cut us a check or direct deposit it, so we thought we'd try it. We LOVE it.

I sound like an ad for H&R Block. LOL! Good luck with your return, I hope it's all you'd dreamed it would be! :)