Archive for the ‘home equity debt’ Tag

Back to Basics Part XXII – Form 6251 – AMT

Posted September 4, 2015
Filed under: Back to Basics | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
* Leave a comment

Originally published in the Cedar Street Times

September 4, 2015

AMT, or “Alternative Minimum Tax” was enacted in 1969 in response to a disturbing report by the Secretary of the Treasury that 155 taxpayers with adjusted gross incomes over $200,000 paid zero tax on their 1967 tax returns.

In its simplest form, AMT is a separate taxation system with its own set of rules that runs parallel to the regular tax system.  You are supposed to run the calculations under both systems, and if the AMT system says you owe more tax than the regular system, then you pay the incremental difference as “AMT.”  That incremental difference shows up as additional tax on Line 45 (2014) of your Form 1040.  The calculation of AMT is summarized on Form 6251 and accompanying worksheets, as well as AMT versions of traditional schedules.

The irony of the AMT system is that most of the loopholes it was originally designed to prevent, no longer exist, and it has become a tax that affects the middle and upper-middle class more than the wealthy, yet we still have it and all of its complications.  Today, those who are subject to it, despise its existence, and not many people fully understand it, tax practitioners included.

For people still preparing returns by hand, AMT is an absolute nightmare since many of your other schedules have to be calculated a second time using AMT rules.  For instance, depreciation rules differ between the AMT system and the regular system, as accelerated depreciation methods are generally not allowed.  This means you have to keep an entirely separate set of depreciation schedules just for AMT.  And to make matters more complicated, California does not conform to all of the Federal AMT rules either.  So now you end up with four sets of depreciation schedules – Federal regular, CA regular, Federal AMT, and CA AMT.

I do not think I have ever seen a hand-prepared return done correctly when AMT is involved.  (Actually, in the last ten years, I do not think I have seen any hand-prepared returns done correctly!)

So when do you hit AMT?  It depends.  AMT is calculated on taxable income under about $185,000 at a flat 26 percent rate, and income over that mark at 28 percent.  There is a $53,600-$83,400 AMT exemption amount depending on filing status.

Compared to the regular system, the standard deduction is thrown out (meaning itemizing is your only option), your normal exemptions for yourself, spouse and dependents get the boot, as do many itemized deductions such as state taxes, real estate taxes, mortgage interest on home equity debt (if the funds were not used to improve your home), unreimbursed employee business expenses, tax preparation fees, investment advisory fees and more.

As mentioned before, depreciation methods are not as generous, also ISOs and ESPPs have less tax-friendly rules, investment interest can be hacked, and a whole bunch of other specific differences that apply to certain situations.

Since some people will have more AMT adjustments and preferences than other people, there is no set dollar threshold that will trigger AMT.  That said, I feel that I rarely see it for a Married Filing Joint return with under $100,000 of adjusted gross income.  It also starts phasing out for people with high incomes.  The top AMT rate is 28 percent, but has fewer deductions than the regular system.  Besides a handful of lower brackets, the regular system also has 33, 35 and 39.6 percent brackets, but with more deductions.  At some point, however, the higher tax rates outweigh the additional deductions and the regular system results in more tax than the AMT system. You may pay no AMT once you get to $600,000 or $700,000 of income, depending on your AMT adjustments.

People in AMT that are employees often feel trapped, especially those in the sales industry that are used to generating a lot of deductions from vehicle mileage and other expenses their employers do not reimburse.  It does not matter how many unreimbursed expenses they come up with, they will all get thrown out in the AMT system.

For people that flip back and forth between years of AMT and no AMT, there can be a minimum tax credit generated by the AMT you paid that can be helpful.  If you paid AMT in one year, and the next year the regular tax system is higher than the AMT system, you can get a credit against your regular tax to the extent of the difference between the two tax systems limited to the credit amount generated by certain deferral type AMT adjustments/preferences.  Got it?  Just trust me, sometimes it can help!  There are also sometimes when flipping can be a negative…fairness is not always the result of our tax system.

The best news we have had about AMT in recent years was that in 2013 Congress finally legislated an annual inflation adjustment for the AMT exemption.  For years Congress was in a habit of passing an AMT patch in late December or January to make up for the fact that the exemption was not inflation adjusted, and would return to 1993 levels if nothing was done.

Tax professionals were biting their nails some years wondering if it would happen.  The impacts on middle class Americans would have been tremendous, and many were oblivious.  I read estimates in 2011 that 4 million taxpayers were subject to the AMT, but without a patch that number would have swelled to 31 million!  I can remember running scenarios for a family making around $100,000 and realizing they would have a surprise tax bill of an additional $2,000 or so without a patch.

The form itself is only two pages.  Part I is a summary of all the adjustments and preferences that differ from the regular tax system, to arrive at Alternative Minimum Taxable Income (AMTI).  Part II deals with calculating your AMT exemption, your Tentative Minimum Tax (tax calculation under the AMT system), and then the AMT itself (the amount your Tentative Minimum Tax exceeds the regular tax system amount).  Part III is a supplemental calculation that feeds into Part II when your return includes capital gains, qualified dividends, or the foreign earned income exclusion.

If you have questions about other schedules or forms in your tax returns, prior articles in our Back to Basics series on personal tax returns are republished on my website at www.tlongcpa.com/blog .

Travis H. Long, CPA is located at 706-B Forest Avenue, PG, 93950 and focuses on trust, estate, individual, and business taxation. He can be reached at 831-333-1041.

Back to Basics Part IV – Even More Sch. A

Posted November 28, 2014
Filed under: Back to Basics | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
* Leave a comment

Originally published in the Cedar Street Times

November  28, 2014

In this issue, we are continuing our discussion on Schedule A – Itemized Deductions.  Prior articles are republished on my website at www.tlongcpa.com/blog if you would like to catch up on our Back to Basics series on personal tax returns.

The third section on Schedule A covers deductible interest you have paid.  For most people the big item here is the mortgage interest on their principal residence.  You can also deduct mortgage interest on one other personal residence as well.  A lot of people assume that if the interest shows up on a Form 1098 that it is deductible.  Contrary to popular belief, that does not determine deductibility.  People with rental and personal properties, for instance, that refinance and pull money out of one property and put it into another are especially at risk of having made a major mistake.

The home mortgage interest deduction requires the debt to be secured by a qualified home and have been used to acquire, construct, or improve the home up to $1,000,000 of debt and up to $100,000 of additional debt for any purpose.  Assume someone refinances a rental property and pulls $200,000 out of it to buy a personal residence.  The interest on the $200,000 is not a rental property deduction on Schedule E because the funds did not go into the rental property activity.  It is also not deductible on Schedule A as home mortgage interest because the debt is not secured by a qualified personal residence – it is secured by the rental property!  Oops – nondeductible personal interest!  There are some work-arounds to this, but they are not always easily accomplished, and the problem is more likely to be found in an audit when it is too late.

Another common problem crops up for people on personal residences who take out a second loan, open a line of credit, or do a cash-out refinance and do not use the cash to improve the home.  This portion is called home equity debt.  You can only deduct the interest on up to $100,000 of total home equity debt.  Anything beyond that becomes non-deductible personal interest, and would need to be tracked properly.  If you later refinance your primary loan and the home equity loan into one loan, the character of the debt remains the same.  This means you have to keep track of the portion of the debt that is home equity debt versus acquisition debt that comprises the one loan.

Other deductible interest would include points paid during a purchase or refinance.  Often these are not included on the 1098 and you must look to the escrow closing statement to pick them up.  New purchases allow 100% deduction of the points in the year purchased.  Refinances, require amortizing and taking a portion of the deduction each year over the life of the loan term.  Private Mortgage Insurance (PMI) used to be deductible as interest, subject to limitations, but is not currently slated for a deduction in 2014.  Investment interest is another item that falls into this section of Schedule A.  A simple example would be borrowing money to invest in the stock market – like a margin loan.  However, investment interest expense is only deductible to the extent that you have investment income (Form 4952).  So, if you paid $1,000 of interest, you better have made a $1,000 of investment income, otherwise the excess gets suspended and carried forward for the future.

The fourth section on Schedule A deals with gifts to charity.  Volumes have been written on this topic!  Gifts to charity must be made to qualifying organizations for U.S. tax purposes.  There is a 50 percent of your adjusted gross income limit each year regarding regular donations to charities.  There are also 30 percent and 20 percent limitations for donations to certain types of organizations and types of property donated.  So if you gave a very large gift, it could get suspended and carried over to the future.  There is generally a five-year carryover limit, at which point any remaining deductions would be lost.

All donations must have substantiation, no matter how small.  Cash donations under $250 must be substantiated with a properly worded letter from the organization, a cancelled check, a bank statement, or a credit card statement.  Cash donations over $250 require a letter from the organization.  Noncash donations have a lot of rules.  Every noncash donation requires a receipt from the organization.  Noncash donations over $500 require the filing of an 8283.  Noncash donations over $5,000 require a qualified appraisal as well.  It would be in your best interest to ensure you have properly planned when making (or anticipating to make) a donation over $5,000.  The $5,000 threshold is cumulative throughout the year for similar items.  This means that many trips throughout the year of donating to the local charitable thrift store of household goods would retroactively require an appraisal to claim over $5,000.  And it is hard to appraise items you no longer have!  As you can see there can be much to consider.

You can deduct out-of-pocket charitable volunteer expenses such as uniforms or gear necessary for the volunteer work.  If you travel on your own dime overnight, and you have substantial duties and very little personal activities, you may be able to deduct airline tickets, meals, lodging, etc.  Volunteer excursions that are not away from home overnight do not qualify for meal deductions.  If you use your vehicle for charitable purposes you can deduct the mileage at 14 cents per mile, or track gas and oil expenses.

A few things that are definitely not deductible but are commonly misunderstood by individuals as well as by small charitable organizations: 1) gifts to needy or worthy individuals –  even if you give to a qualified organization be sure you do not earmark your donation for a particular person or family, or your deduction is not legitimate ,  2) gifts of your time or services – like the artist trying to deduct a self-created painting at “fair market value” – you can only deduct hard costs such as the canvas and paint costs.  Since you never included in income and paid tax on your services, you cannot take a deduction for them,  3) charity raffles, bingo, lotteries  4) charitable auctions or other donations to the extent of the value you received in return – such as paying $75 in a charity silent auction, but you get a $100 gift certificate – no deduction allowed.  Or the local public radio station sends you a set of CDs they value at $100 in return for your $125 donation – you only get to deduct $25.

In two weeks we will continue our discussion regarding Schedule A.

Travis H. Long, CPA is located at 706-B Forest Avenue, PG, 93950 and focuses on trust, estate, individual, and business taxation. He can be reached at 831-333-1041.