Ohhh how I love me some Taxes!!! Just got 'em back...
Getting $6k back from the G. to the O. to the V. Comma T.! That's one hefty sandwich if you ask me ;) And yeah i know - I gave an interest-free loan the entire time and it's not "free" money as I like to say. But i wouldn't give up this feeling for jack.It seriously feels like the first time i ...uhh.... made nice w/ a young lady friend ;) haha...okay, maybe not *that* good, but still on the list of Top 5 methods to make me smile! And to think I could be so lucky to receive such amount every single year..man.....makes a brotha shed tears, ya know?
So now we have the happy problem of DOING something with it all. Shall we pay off some debt? Sock it all away? Split it up? I think the plan is to do some of each:
- The Mrs. will get $2,000 to do as she pleases. This will probably go towards her future mortgage portions and/or college fees if I had to guess. I'm trying to get her to blow $100 or $200 on some new clothes and accessories (one of her favorite "wishes" to do), but I doubt she'd be up for it these days.
- Mr. J. Money will also get $2,000 to do as he pleases! And you wanna know the first thing I'm gonna do w/ it? Pay off the rest of my auto loans @ $1400! Not even gonna give it another thought either - just gonna pay it off like a pull of a band-aid ;) I already know i'm gonna miss the hell out of it, so figured I'll suck it up first thing. And for the remaining $600? Throwing it in my personal savings account and forgetting about it. I'm all about hoarding cash these days (as you may have noticed from my non-bday $ spending)
- The "house savings" will get about $1800. If you recall, this is the account where all leftover money goes after all bills and expenses are paid for every month. We use it as a budget-fixer on the months we go over, as well as a fund for anything extra we wanna do like upgrades to the house or vacations and what not.
- And the rest ($170) will go to our CPA. Definitely costs more than filing them ourselves, but totally worth the stress avoided & other niceties that comes along with it ;) Not to mention the support we'd receive if we're ever audited - which I think we're actually safer from since we USE a CPA? Not 100% on that one, but I'm sure it has some truth to it.
Labels: free money, money management, taxes
posted by J. Money at
7:18 AM
25 Comments:
Ours already came and went to the credit cards - and those zero balances are real pretty to look at.
Are you planning to adjust your withholding now that you know how much you are off on your taxes? I adjust mine as closely as I can and I'm glad that I do. For example California is broke and not paying refunds, I'm glad I owe them a little this year. I should net $200-$300 back and I'm putting it towards a new computer.
I got back $1,400 so I opened up a CD for $1,500 at 5.12% so I can earn more from it! I feel that I am close on withholding and that amount is not bad. Getting back $6k would be fun but geez... you know the whole story of it all, and with your mad budgeting ability I think you could save even if it did come regularly.
@444 - yeah they are! good job knocking that stuff out...sometimes i really hurts, but totally worth it in the long run :)
@Miss M - Not paying out refunds? wow i didn't even know that was possible. I don't know if i'll be adjusting my withholdings or not to be honest with you. I already claim like 5 or 6 myself, so if we do we'll prob. just have the mrs. claim some more - although she's not making all that much anyways being in Grad School. One of the main reasons we get so much back besides the mortgage is when i get large bonuses at work. For whatever reason they're taxed wayy too much than they're supposed to be, so at the end of the year i get a lot of it back. But considering how the economy is now, i doubt I'd be getting much of a bonus at all this year. So that also prompts me to leave the tax stuff as-is ;)
@Philip - nicely played, sir! and yeah i def. wouldn't have a problem saving it each month, but i'm not lying about how freakin' awesome it feels getting that one lump sum every year. It really makes a difference on how you feeling during this time of the year - esp. when it's all cold and nasty out ;)
We are still trying to find a CPA. It was my husbands task for the week but he's been sick enough to visit urgent care- fun times. I have done a bit of estimating and I think we'll be in the $4.5-6K range due to the interest free loan. We may each get a few hundred for fun but the rest will go towards a car for the Mr.
Wow, good haul! Is that for the two of you, or just you? If the latter, are you getting a chunk of her refund, too?
I'm itching to file my taxes, but my workplace tends to wait 'til close to the last minute before mailing out the slips. I still haven't made plans for whatever refund I'll get -- maybe top up my RRSP (Cdn equivalent to, what, a 401k?) or open one of the new tax-free savings accounts (kind of like a Roth, or so I'm told).
I'm with you 100% on getting a tax refund. I love me some refunds!!! We got back $10,500. Yay! I love it. We put it all in savings thought. We normally pay off some debt but not this year with the economy like it is. If my husband gets laid off I will want the cash around.
I figured out we are losing about $8 a month in interest on our "free loan to the government". I'm ok with that. You are losing even less since you got back less. (have some kids... then you will get back even more!)
I'm of the "Don't give the government a free loan" camp, normally, though goodness knows I could use some extra shekels! I have absolutely NO idea how mine will turn out, but have an appointment next week, so hopefully I will hear then.
i haven't got around to filing yet although it's on my to-do list! i'm hoping to get a good chunk back, around $2000 I think, though i'm slightly worried about what my partner will have to shell out (he did quite a bit of contract work this year.) he put quite a bit into RRSPs so hopefully it's enough that he will not owe anything. fingers crossed, anyway.
I love getting a tax refund. I am always so scared getting my taxes done. I am sure that one year my accountant will tell me I owe $1000+ so every year I am petrified and so far (knock on wood) I have gotten money back instead.
J-I like your breakdown on where the money will go. I think we would split the $$'s 50/50 between family vacation (got to stimulate that economy) and paying down the car debt.
I am keeping my fingers crossed for this years verdict :)
Holy Granola that's a lot of cash! I like getting windfalls, but I'd rather just keep my own money. Not even so much because it gives the government a loan, but because it's easier to plan for what to do with it and you know how I like my budget plans! I really hate waiting to find out how much I'll get back.
I got 1300$ back this year. I used $546 to pay back some money I had taken out of my EF for an ER visit last year. I put $500 more into my EF, and the rest I spent on myself: new tennis shoes, light weight jacket, odds and ends at Target, new blouse, new dress and scarf!
Congrats J. - must be a wonderful feeling knowing, that among other things, that pesky auto loan will soon become history!
Wow 6k! That is sweeeeeeet :)
I usually do my own taxes (single, no home ownership, no kids, etc), but this year Ive got some investment income I dont really understand how to deal with.
I need to either figure it out or figure out how to find a good cpa.
Wow, so oddly enough I got my State's $ already refunded into my account this morning! Talk about quickeness, Sheesh. I literally mailed the signed documents back to my CPA last wed., so it really only took 2-3 business days. man....gotta love that! I wonder how long it would take to get the Federal? i bet a good month.....although they do surprise me every year ;)
Some responses:
@sara I - sucks for your man, i'm sorry :( but that is a nice chunk of money!!! I think it's great you're not gonna just go out and blow it all like i'm a fraid some would.
@bigasssuperstar - that was our total amount in from one filing - as a married couple. if it were just mine i'd keep it all!! muahhhh ha ha...nah, not that mean. I hope your work finally gets their ish together and sends it over to ya! i *hate* waiting for that sorta stuff. And yup - your RSPPPpppVV thingie is the same as our 401ks ;) Not sure of the tax-free savings account one, but it was funny cuz i got all kinds of excited reading about that somewhere and went to go find one here until i realized it was a Canadian thing. Oops.
@Ashley @ Wide Open Wallet - hot damn that's sexy! $10K+? Whew girl good for you all. I think saving it up is totally fine w/ the economy being the way it is - you could always pay down debt at any time...much easier than if you paid something off and then changed your mind ;)
@Dawn - Shekels?! haha...haven't heard that one in a while. Good luck @ your appointment!
@Saver Queen - Oooh yeah, good luck to him too! $2k ain't bad either, i'd take that anyday.
@SAHM4now - i hear ya about being scared, even though our interest payments and all rise every year, i still get scared myself....the mrs. usually DOES owe every year, so this is a nice change for her :)
@Slinky - Yeah, that's understandable. I guess in a perfect world i'd like to know way ahead of time, but since this ain't perfect, i'll take the way it currently works ;)
@Jessica - wow, you already got it all back? you are a quick little one.
@Broke Bettie - You betcha! And i know i've probably told you every time i'm on your blog, but i LOVE love LOVE your blog name. always makes me smile!
@dollar incense - you know, i've been told it's somewhat easy, but i'm not one to take the chance so CPA would def. get a call from me :) Maybe they can teach you this time, and then you can continue doing the rest?
Oh man J, it's good to be Canadian this year methinks. That Tax-Free Savings Account is rocking my world!
I took out a small RSP loan last week to push myself into our lowest federal tax bracket, so I'll get an even nicer chunk of change back than if I had just stuck with my regular contributions. I will use the return to wipe out the RSP Loan (which equals next to no interest paid). HA HA! I love working the system!!!
Plus this is the first year my company offered an opt-out of the pension plan. Oh snap if I didn't jump all over that, now they stuff the money that would go to a pension in an RRSP account for me. So that increased my annual contributions and will help out the refund as well.
My bf will be getting a hefty return this year since he started school full-time and is still working part-time. Those tuition right-offs should give him enough back to buy the MacBook he needs for school.
I love tax season!
I try to owe under $1k. I haven't even crunched numbers yet but I think I'm dead on again.
Way to go PirateKitty!!! Exciting as hell :) And very impressive that you know now to get it worked out like that Living Almost Large, i'd never be able to figure it out.
Ask me in a month, after I do it for real. I typically at the end of the year do an off the cuff estimate. If I'm wrong I'll be bitching either way. Hopefully I'm not too far off.
That's great! We haven't done our taxes yet, but CA is giving out IOUs anyway.
I think you must have got a piece of the $16K I sent to the gummint in early January -- and I've got another $5K due by April 15.
Since starting a business nearly 4 years ago, I HATE taxes. And if most other folks in this country owned a business and had to write big checks to the gummint, I'm guessing there would be outright revolt. ;-)
haha, well then THANK YOU! I'm pretty sure i'd hate taxes as well if I owned my own biz :)
Good to see this, as I'm still in the deciding boat.
I got ~$2800 from the Feds and $350 from NYS.
I put $2200 into my EF, part of that was to replace what I raided earlier this month (knowing refund was coming) for car repairs. I think #350 state may go to my Roth -- bt I'm not sure about the balance of federal. Perhaps some to student loan. It's the only debt at a sig rate (6.5%) and like others above would rather hang onto cash (Citibank Ultimate Savings Account at 3%) then pay down something locked in at 2.9% in case something changes job wise.
i know, it's def. hard deciding w/ the way things have been hitting lately, but i'm just glad we are bringing it in rather than letting it go! whew...the COOL thing about socking it away in savings is that you can always decide to apply it to debt or into stocks later ;)
Yep - or decide to throw at student loan. I'm all about the liquidity at the moment
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