For those of you who read the title of this post and thought “Jay, it’s too early in the year to think about tax planning!”, my response is “some stores already have Christmas decorations out, and it’s not even Halloween yet…isn’t that too early?!” As someone who plans out lunch and dinner while eating breakfast, I say it’s never too early to think about tax planning!
The reality is that you should’ve started thinking of 2017 tax planning at the same time that you filed your 2016 tax returns, in fact, there are instances when you can even plan for the following year, if there are circumstances that you know will be changing, such as a marriage. I’m a big proponent in people knowing ahead of time what the tax consequences will be for certain things, rather than waiting until tax time (when it’s too late) and finding out that there’s a balance due of thousands of dollars. So let’s take a look at a few things to consider, when planning out the rest of 2017.
Withholding and estimated taxes – did you have a large balance due or overpayment on your 2016 tax returns? Did you sell a stock or mutual fund for a big gain? Did you start a new business and are anticipating a big net income or net loss? There are many other examples, but large balances due or large refunds are indications that you paid in too little or too much tax in the prior year. If this is the case and you’d like to get closer to a break even this year, consider raising or lowering your withholding and/or estimated tax payments. Similarly, large gains on securities sales or net income/loss from a new business can have effects on your taxable income, and could be reasons to increase or decrease your withholdings and/or estimates. Think about your 2016 results and anything happening in 2017 that could have more than a minimal impact on your 2017 results, and adjust accordingly.
Alternative Minimum Tax – I could write an entire article just about Alternative Minimum Tax (AMT), but let me just say here that as taxable income rises, there’s a higher likelihood of winding up in the AMT, which could substantially increase your tax bill. You can search for AMT worksheets to crunch your numbers to see if you’ll be there for 2017.
Marital Status – as I alluded to above, getting married (and on the flip side, getting divorced) will have an impact on your taxes. Your tax filing status is determined by your marital status as of the last day of the tax year (Dec. 31), so if your marital status changed in 2017, think about how that will affect your taxes. And if you plan to get married or divorced in 2018, you can start planning now for the changes next year.
Gifts – any taxpayer can make a gift of up to $14,000 per tax year to another taxpayer. Property that is generating taxable income to you can incur less tax on that income when it’s gifted to somebody in a lower tax bracket, which is why parents will make gifts to their kids. So consider making gifts to family members (or your favorite CPA, ha!)
Ordinary income vs capital gains – interest income (such as bank accounts, CDs, corporate bond funds) is taxed at your marginal income tax rate. Based on current tax law, that rate can be as high as 39.6%. If that same income was “qualified dividend” income, the tax rate on that income would be 15%, which is the same rate as long-term capital gains (for those in the 39.6% top ordinary tax bracket, the rate is 20%). So for somebody in the top marginal tax bracket, converting ordinary interest income to qualified dividend income would halve the amount of tax charged (20% vs 39.6%). Similarly, when considering selling appreciated securities, if the security is held a year or less (short-term), the tax will be at the marginal tax rate, while long-term gains (over a year) are taxed at the 15%/20% rate. So if your holding period is nearing a year, think about holding it a few more days, to get the gain taxed at long-term rates.
These are just a few ideas to consider, when planning out the rest of the year’s taxes. If you want to do some tax planning before the end of the year, but think it’s too complicated to do, remember to ask your favorite CPA (as in Jay the ___) for help!
Jay E. Reiner, CPA 