season officially gets underway today
but the shutdown leaves behind quite a
backlog of unanswered taxpayer letters
and emails
despite this year being far from normal
the tax deadline remains the same it
does there it is we're counting down 76
days 16 hours and some minutes there as
well that leaves you of course asking a
lot of questions joining me this morning
is Tammy England she is an agent with
H&R Block good morning Tammy thanks for
being here so much to talk about we
don't want to confuse anybody so let's
try to keep it as basic as possible the
most common question it sounds like that
you're getting now is associated with
whether or not somebody or a couple
should itemize or if they should just go
ahead and save themselves the time that
that takes and take that higher standard
deduction because it's it's almost
doubled for everyone whether you're
married or single or it's almost double
for every filing status and I think what
people are going to find when they come
in is that they may not be able to
itemize when they have been the last few
years so that said who who should think
very closely about whether or not they
should go ahead and itemize is two
people who live in homes that are valued
more because we're talking about
mortgage interest and we're talking
about property taxes right that's
correct and then generally that is the
most the highest number on the itemizing
schedule is your mortgage interest in
property taxes and so you would want to
look at that those who live in more
expensive homes that pay more property
taxes may be closer to the standard
deduction and be able to itemize so and
let's remind our viewers in case they
haven't looked yet what is the standard
deduction then as you're doing the math
in your head not thinking about sure and
you know your property taxes and your
mortgage interest for married couples
so for married filing jointly it's
24,000 dollars this year Wow and that's
up from like twelve thousand seven
hundred so it's almost doubled and then
for single it's twelve thousand dollars
okay so that's also almost doubled and
then I don't want to neglect those
people who are 65 years or older and and
help me here because I'm not in that age
bracket is this a big change for anybody
who's 65 years or older with this new
system or no because I saw that there's
some increases they they still get the
additional standard deduction for B
sixty-five or older so that hasn't
changed it's just the total standard
deduction has gone up for everyone has
increased okay let's talk about people
who have children okay okay so if you're
married with kids as an example you can
claim more but then there's an age yes
there's the child tax credit is
available for children who are under 17
so they they can't be seventeen by the
end of the tax year so if they turn 17
last year it won't be available for 2018
but it has doubled from $1,000 to $2,000
for 2018 which is part of the new tax
reform law that was passed now is that
age restriction err oh they'll always
there oh it was okay yeah my son is only
fourteen so we're not there yet but I'm
still gonna be paying for him when he's
17 i don't get it any kind of a
deduction for that you'll be paying for
them for a lot longer than that alright
anything else in particular that folks
other than you need to start now and
start early that folks should be aware
of in terms of changes well we want them
to understand that the tax withholding
tables changed last year so they may
have gotten more money in their
paychecks so there may be a little
refund surprise this year their refund
might be a little lower because they got
it every week in their paycheck for last
year yes okay so so are there some
people who did then earn a refund last
year and couldn't get one then this year
or maybe not but it would probably be
smaller but they can do some w-4
planning and maybe increase their
withholding a little bit if they like
getting that big refund so there are
some people at home who do their taxes
on their own because it can be expensive
and they can't afford it maneet it
sounds like they need to really read up
because there's some dramatic changes
there's no copying and pasting this year
absolutely not it's not going to look
anything like last year everybody will
file the form 1040 there's not a 1040ez
or a 1040 a anymore everybody files the
same form and it has changed quite a bit
right so start early Tammy thank you so
much thank you an important information
that affects all of us and of course
we'll have more information on this
year's tax filing deadlines as well as
other things as you may need to know
you can find on our website go to news
for Jax comm slash consumer Bruce