2007 Tax Return - Generous Hope and lifetime credit from uncle sam

By: Robert A. Johnson

Thanks to adjustments in inflation, some educational tax breaks now have a slightly more generous income-eligibility level. In the first two years of vocational school or college, the Hope Credit will be able to help the parents with the cost of higher education provided that the student meets certain requirements. The Hope Credit is worth up to $1,650 per student.

Am I Eligible?

If your dependent child is planning to attend college, you are able to claim the Hope Credit if your dependent child is:

• Enrolled in 1 of first 2 years of college – generally freshman and sophomore years.

• Enrolled in a program leading to a certificate, degree, or other recognized educational credit

• Taking at least ½ of the normal full-time workload for their particular course of study during one academic period in 2007.

• Free of felony convictions for either the possession or sale of illegal substances at the end of the school year of 2007.

• Did not have any expenses that were used in figuring a Hope Credit for more than 1 previous tax year. You are not allowed to claim the Hope Credit if:

• The modified adjusted gross income, or MAGI, is over $57,000 or, if you are filing jointly the MAGI must be $114,000 or more.

• You are married and are filing separately.

Lifetime Learning Tax Credit

If you want to know if you will be able to utilize the Lifetime Learning Tax Credit, you may be able to if:

• Your MAGI is between $47,000 and $57,000 if you are filing as a single taxpayer,

• Your MAGI is between $94,000 and $114,000 if you are filing a joint tax return.

You are not permitted to file a Lifetime Learning Tax Credit because your MAGI is $57,000 or more. It must be $117,000 or more if you are planning to file a joint tax return.

Eligibility

You can usually claim the Lifetime Learning Tax Credit when you are paying qualified tuition and other related expenses of a college education for an eligible student who is your spouse, yourself, or a dependent if you are able to claim him or her as an exemption. You do not have a limit of the number of years for which you are eligible for the Lifetime Learning Tax Credit. You are not able to claim this credit if your tax filing status happens to be married filing a separate return. You may be able to claim the Lifetime Learning Tax Credit on your tax returns of up to $2,000 for not only qualified tuition but also for other related expenses per family. This credit reduces the amount of tax that you may have to pay Uncle Sam.

Eligible Educational Institutions

These eligible institutions are any university, vocational school, college or another postsecondary education institution that is able to participate in various student aid programs that are administered by the U.S. Department of Education

2007 Late Tax Filing

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The additional child tax credit has expanded the income limits

By: Robert A. Johnson

In the last few years, there have been many families with children who received some important tax relief because of an increase of the Child Tax Credit. This is really a Reduction in the taxes that you pay and not simply a Deduction from your taxable income. For the 2007 tax return, the minimum earned income amount that is used to figure the additional child tax credit has been raised to $11,750.

Child Tax Credit

The Working Families Tax Relief Act was passed by Congress in 2004. It kept the Child Tax Credit at $1,000 for each qualifying child through the year 2010. You must stay within the income thresholds of your filing status. You must use Tax Form 8812, the Additional Child Tax Credit, in order to figure out your additional credit.

Claiming the Child Tax Credit

In order to claim this credit, you must use the 1040 or 1040A tax forms ONLY. This credit is limited if your MAGI is above a specific amount. The amount will vary depending upon your filing status.

• Married filing separately - $55,000

• Married filing jointly - $110,000

• All others - $75,000

Additionally, the Child Tax Credit is usually limited by the amount of income tax that you owe as well as owing any alternative minimum tax.

If the amount on your 2007 tax form for your Child Tax Credit is more that the specified amount of income tax that you owe, you may be eligible to claim some if not all of the difference as an “Additional” Child Tax Credit. This may give you a refund even if you don’t owe any tax. On your 2007 tax form, the total amount of both the Child Tax Credit as well as any Additional Child Tax Credit is not able to exceed the maximum of $1,000 for each child that qualifies.

Claiming the additional child tax credit

In order to claim this credit, follow the steps below:

1. Make sure that you have figured the amount of your child tax credit, if any.

2. If the answer was “Yes” on lines 4 or 5 on the Child Tax Credit Worksheet in Form 1040, 1040A or 1040NR instructions use form 8812 to see if you qualify for the additional child tax credit.

3. If you have put an additional child tax credit on line 13 of Tax form 8812, then carry that figure to Form 1040 – line 68; 1040A – line 41; or Form 1040NR – line 62.

Late 2007 tax return filers will face penalties

By: Robert A. Johnson

Chances are if you still have not filed your 2007 tax return, you are going to face some penalties. Even in a case where you have filed an extension you should be aware that you could still be assessed penalties on any taxes owed. The deadline each year is the same, April 15th, except when it falls on a weekend and in that case, the tax filing deadline will be the following business day.

Returns.

The tax code allows you three years to file a tax return if you either do not owe taxes or are due a refund. After three years, you forfeit all rights to any prior year tax refund money owed to you. On the other hand, if you owe the IRS they can go back as far as six years of prior tax returns and under special circumstances, with internal approval, even further.

Penalties

If you are to be penalized you will probably fall into one of these three categories.

1) You have filed your 2007 tax return on time but could not for whatever reason pay all of the tax you owed.- In this situation you will be charged a .5% penalty of the remaining tax due for each month that it goes without being paid. This can increase to 1% of the tax due if the tax remains unpaid after several attempts to collect. If you can show, justification for not paying, the penalty may be avoided.

2) You have a late tax return - If you go past the deadline and file a late tax return, when you owe tax, then you can be charged a late file penalty. Like the above, if you can show just cause, it may be avoided. However if not this is the stiffest of penalties at 5% of the tax you owe for each month it goes past due. This is a 4.5% late file penalty coupled with the .5% late fees. The longer this continues, the more it will cost you as the late fee continues to accrue and at five months, you can owe as much as 47.5%! (4.5% * 5 months + 25% late fee) An important side note: The minimum penalty once you pass the 60-day mark is the smaller of $100 or 100% of the tax owed.

3) You have filed an installment plan for your 2007 return - Even with an installment plan you will be assessed late fees. If you file your return on time and then filed an installment agreement, which the IRS accepted you would then be charged a .25% late fee for every month that you are past due; this is instead of the .5% on a typical late return.

4) No matter which of the above categories you may find yourself you will also have to pay interest on the federal taxes owed. This is generally the federal rate plus 3%. This interest is refigured every three months and compounds daily. The moral of this story is to file on time and pay as much as humanly possible if you owe any taxes. There are many ways to file your taxes each year, CPA, tax preparation companies and online. Be proactive, get your current returns in on time, and file any prior year’s tax returns as soon as you can. If you wait, too long the IRS can file a return for you based on the income information they have on file for you. When this happens, you can rest assured that the IRS will not give you any preferential filing status or deductions.