Dimples' Divine Domain
My journey to financial empowerment.

Here is the info on the new $8000 Home Buyer Tax Credit: *The tax credit is for first-time home buyers only. *The tax credit does not have to be repaid. *The tax credit is equal to 10 percent of the home’s purchase price up to a maximum of $8,000. *The credit is available for homes purchased on or after January 1, 2009 and before December 1, 2009. *Single taxpayers with incomes up to $75,000 and married couples with incomes up to $150,000 qualify for the full tax credit. FederalHousingTaxCredit.com Here is the info that I found that pertains to my situation: Who is eligible to claim the tax credit? First-time home buyers purchasing any kind of home—new or resale—are eligible for the tax credit. To qualify for the tax credit, a home purchase must occur on or after January 1, 2009 and before December 1, 2009 . For the purposes of the tax credit, the purchase date is the date when closing occurs and the title to the property transfers to the home owner. Are ...

I just E-filed my federal tax return. I'll explain why I went ahead and did my tax return instead of waiting until March or April like I stated in my previous post in a second. First let me share a very important piece of advice to take heed of when filling out your tax return: Never rely on information from documents such as your last pay stub or last bank statement of the year to complete your tax return. Wait for your employers, past and present, to send your W-2s and for the banks to mail out your interest statement. I used the last pay stubs of my two past employers and present employer and also used my last bank statement from each savings account to estimate my 2008 tax refund. And because I e-file, I really didn't need to wait to receive my hardcopy W-2s through the mail. Everything is done electronically. But being me, I waited to receive ALL my OFFICIAL documents and do yall want to guess how far off my original $1335 tax refund estimate was?? $872 off!! Now I ...

Its that time of the year again. Tax time! I think this year I will do my own taxes again. One problem that I run into each year is remembering all the documents and information that I need to gather. So this time around I made myself a checklist: - W-2 from Employer #1 - W-2 from Employer #2 - W-2 from Employer #3 - EIN and total amount paid from Daycare #1 - EIN and total amount paid from Daycare #2 - List of itemized deductions and receipts if applicable - Student loan interest amount - 1099-R for 401K distribution from Employer #2 - Information needed to claim 1st Time Home Buyer Tax Credit (gotta buy a home 1st) So far I have everything except for the following: - Information needed to claim 1st Time Home Buyer Tax Credit (gotta buy a home 1st) I probably won't be filing taxes until late March or early April (before 4/15 of course). I also want to wait and see if there will be any new tax incentives from the new administration. Are you ready for tax season? Do you hav...

Yesterday was my first day at the new job. First three hours were spent at HR going through a benefits presentations and creating my employee file. Benefits Summary: Great medical, dental, and vision plan. Only $120 a month for me and my daughter. Even though I have been used to paying zilch on the medical coverage front, the $120/month is a lot better than I thought. Hit the nail on the head here or way off? The company is only offering 2% towards my 401K and there is no additional match. I think I am going to elect to have 0% of my salary applied to my 401K. There is 2.5 months left on the contract which equates to about 5 paychecks. The company's retirement plan only allows roll overs if the account is more than $1000. Any account below that will be required to cash out. Even if I do the same percentage of contribution I did with my old employer (4%) and plus the 2% from the current employer, $840 max would be contributed to my 401K by the time the contract ends. So I...

If you haven't received your stimulus payment yet, then check out the following: WHERE'S MY STIMULUS PAYMENT? The IRS online tools works just like their " Where's my refund? " feature. Just enter the required information and receive an up-to-date status on your stimulus check. I still haven't received my payment yet and I have been seeing news stories of payments being deposited into the wrong accounts. So I used the feature to ensure that I hadn't gotten duped out my moola. My payment should be in by tomorrow morning.

Word has it that the first of the tax rebates will be disbursed starting next week. If you have been stuck under a rock for the last 3 months and have absolutely no clue what I am talking about, here is a little summary: WHAT IS IT?: It is an economic stimulus "payment" from the government. It is non-taxable , won't reduce your 2007 or 2008 tax refund, and will NOT increase the amount you owe on your 2008 tax return. (I don't know why some folks are going around posting that we would have to pay this back. Uh no we won't!) WHO IS ELIGIBLE?: Anyone who files an income tax return with a valid SSN, can not be claimed as a dependent, and have at least $3000 in qualifying income. There are some folks who don't regularly file a tax return that may qualify also. More info here . HOW MUCH DO YOU GET? The IRS website has a nifty calculator that you can use to determine if you qualify for the stimulus payment and if so, how much. WHEN IS MY MONEY COMING? All you g...

My tax refund was deposited into my checking account on Friday. It was like Christmas all over again. For like half a second.....then my mind started going in overdrive on what I was going to do with the money. My refund totaled $2629. Here is what I have done with the money so far: - $500 to my Emergency Fund (bringing the total to $3555.81) - $699 to pay off one of my credit cards - $40 to my FCU savings - $100 on me and sweet pea - $20 on books - $40 on movies - $40 at Burlington Coat Factory That leaves me with $1290. I was going to pay off my Discover card with that but I am holding off on that until I figure out what I am going to do about my car. Single Ma gave me some good advice on a post I did last week on my car situation. I currently drive a 2006 Honda CRV and my monthly car note is $532. I know right!! I would like to trade in my car for something reliable yet less expensive. I am looking into two different options at the moment: 1. Sell my car pr...

I have been really contemplating putting majority of my refund ($2000) into my emergency fund. That would bring my balance a little over $5K. I would then use about $500 to pay down my credit card debt and then use the remaining $129 for myself. It is just a thought I am entertaining at the moment. I know I should probably use all the refund to bring down my debt. I have two weeks to make a decision. Question for my readers: Debt first or savings? Don't limit your answer to my current situation. For anyone dealing with debt, how do you prioritize between becoming debt free and building a sound safety net (i.e. Emergency Fund)? Especially when you have children?

Yeah. I went and did that joker myself. This week has been a busy week and next week will be even busier. I wasn't going to be able to see the accountant I mentioned on this post for another 2 weeks. I already had my information inputted into TaxAct so I went ahead and finished it off. I wish I would have used the deluxe version. I had a refund of about $1442 right before it ran the alerts. After it was done and I answered the questions it popped, up my refund had sky-rocketed to $2629. I used itemized deductions this year instead of the standard (I should have done the same last year) and there were some deductions that I could take that I wasn't aware of (state sales tax, tithes, donations) . Applying those deductions allowed me to qualify for the child tax credit, which it wasn't giving me before. I got the full $1000, hence the large jump. I started the return last night around 10 pm. I didn't wind up finishing it until 1 am (I kept nodding off....lol). ...

Everyone has been talking about Bush's plan to stimulate the economy in the form of tax rebates. I won't go into much detail about this plan. In a short, each individual will receive a tax rebate of at least $300 as long as they earned at least $3000 in 2007. The purpose of the rebate is to encourage consumer spending in order to avoid a recession. Some have reported that the checks will be mailed out by June while others report that they will start mailing out the checks at the end of June due to the tax season. I am not sure which it is. Hit me up with a comment if you know. Below is the Economic Stimulus Tax Rebate Calculator. You can use it to see if and how much of a tax rebate you will receive (thanks to Single Ma ) : I am calculated to receive $600. At first I planned on using the rebate check to pay down my credit card debt but I have two other options to add to the mix. I can use my tax rebate to do one of the following three: 1. Pay down my credit card debt. ...

I did a preliminary run through of my taxes on TaxAct last night. I used their Deluxe version. Currently it has me at a refund of $1172. Definitely not the $5K I was hoping for. Last year I received a tax refund of $3000. But I made $13K more than I did last year. That put me way above the EIC income limit of $34K and I couldn't even get the child tax credit either. *sigh* I am still waiting on a couple of things, hence the "preliminary" run and not an actual one. I am not sure if the few dollars I made here and there from credit card bonuses and survey sites needs to be claimed. I believe the credit card companies "said" they will be sending me a 1099-Misc form for the money I earned from them. I am also going to look into hiring an accountant to do my taxes. Hopefully I can see what number they come up with before I actually give them the go ahead. I must admit that I did not understand some of the questions in regards to itemizing my deductions. ...