Table of Contents
Tax season is here again, and lots of people start the process in December, here’s why we recommend starting in November instead. When going through the process, feel free to use the top 10 tax deductions we recommend for interior designers. You can find out why we recommend hiring a professional to file your income taxes here.
Get started early this tax season
Although filing begins in the first month of next year, we recommend our clients begin preparations as early as November for a few different reasons. Those of you that filed last minute the previous tax year will probably know most of the reasons for this recommendation already. Don’t forget that if you’d like to file your own taxes, the IRS has guided tax preparations available for free here.
Don’t stress during the holidays
December is the time that people take vacations to visit family, shop for loved ones, and celebrate one of the many different holidays in that month. December may actually be the busiest and most stressful month of the year, why add to that stress by starting your tax preparations in December as well? When you start in November, you can have the majority of your work done before the stress of the holiday hits, and while everyone else is running around trying to get everything sorted, you can be at home spending quality time with the family.
Reduce the possibility of error
During December, worrying about taxes on top of the holiday stress can quickly lead to an abundance of stress and a lack of time, both of which can lead to mistakes in your filing. If there’s one thing we’re certain of, it’s that the only thing worse than tax season is an IRS audit due to errors in your filed taxes.
When preparing your taxes, you want to be sure to take your time in order to maximize your deductions. You don’t want to have to make adjustments later on because you forgot to add your mileage deduction or a specific project’s sourcing cost.
What should I do to make my tax preparations easier?
If you plan to file taxes yourself, we highly recommend a few different things that you should use throughout the year. The first is a subscription to some sort of system to monitor your costs and income. Some of the tools people use include QuickBooks and Xero. We highly recommend QuickBooks and sell discounted subscriptions to our clients. Using a system will make sure you have a place to add your expenses at the moment it occurs, which will save you the time of trying to recall them later on.
The second thing we recommend is a tool to monitor your mileage for visits to your client. QuickBooks has this built into the mobile app, so it monitors your driving and you simply mark it as personal or business later on. If you’re not using QuickBooks, you can search your App Store for mileage tracking apps, there are some free apps available that will let you keep track of business trips for tax season.
If you feel like doing your own taxes gives you too big of a headache and you would rather pass the burden on to someone else, feel free to contact us.
