Proactive Tax Planning
Tax Planning
We will help you minimize your tax bill for the current and future years through tax-efficient investments, maximizing deductions, tax credits, and opportunities for deferrals.
What strategies are there to reduce my tax liability?
General Tax Forecasting
We will help estimate your tax liability for the current year before tax filing season. Given a recent pay stub, your tax return, and any significant anticipated transactions in the year, we can estimate what you’ll owe in federal and state taxes. Taxes are due throughout the entire year (every quarter), and you may owe a penalty if you decide to wait until you file your taxes to pay your tax liability. However, there are various safe harbor provisions that, although still require you to pay your taxes, will avoid these penalties.
The IRS requires self-employed individuals to pay quarterly estimated taxes for their business. Based on our previous tax forecasting, coupled with the nature of your business income and expenses, we’ll help you plan these estimated tax payments accordingly.
As your income rises, you may find that your paychecks withhold too few taxes, especially for federal income taxes. Most companies will withhold only 22% of federal taxes on supplemental wages (bonuses and equity compensation), which is often too low and leaves an unpaid tax liability. We’ll help you adjust your withholding percentages or plan for tax liability to avoid tax season surprises.
Alternative Minimum Tax (AMT)
This is a separate tax system that the IRS uses to ensure you are not taking too many deductions and credits from your standard tax liability. If AMT is calculated to be higher than your regular tax liability, you will have to pay the difference as additional taxes. However, you will be able to receive the AMT paid as a credit for future years when AMT is not present.
Incentive Stock Options most commonly trigger AMT. Although exercising ISOs is not taxable, it is taxable under the AMT tax system.
A few lesser-known causes of AMT are:
- Accelerated Depreciation
- Oil and Gas Properties
- Private Activity Bonds
- Long-Term Capital Gains
Tax Scenario Planning
Such scenarios include:
- Limiting AMT when exercising ISOs
- Moving to a different state
- Buying or selling a property
- Divesting out of company stock
- Volatility in concentrated stock positions
- Maximizing ordinary income and capital gain tax brackets
- Donating appreciated stock with a long-term holding period to charity or a Donor Advised Fund.