The IRS Deductions Blog

Posts Tagged ‘expense’

Question: Medical Tax Deductions ?

I know you can claim any amount of medical costs that exceed 7.5% of your gross income but – does that medical cost include the amount of money that is taken out of your paycheck each month from your employer to pay for health insurance. I looked on google a lot but havent seen anything that specifically says that it does. (although i assume it does).

Also on the same topic, i know you can claim the cost of modifying a car to accomidate a wheel chair. i.e. adding a wheelchair lift or ramp. But lets say you dont have the car yet and buy one that allready has a ramp/lift. Can you claim the entire cost of the 40,000$ van? HA! i assume not. But if not how do you figure the cost of the ramp/lift part of the car to claim just that part? (without getting audited the following year). Thanks – hope someone knows more on this than I.

Answer: 1) Generally, No. That amount usually comes out of your paycheck “pretax” so you have already received the tax benefit. In the highly unlikely event that it is deducted after tax, then you could deduct it.

2) Entire cost? No. However, you can deduct the difference between what the ramp installed van cost and what a non-ramp installed van would have cost.

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Medical Massages – TaxMama.com

Question: Is home equity mortgage interest deductible for home office expenses?

The money was used to pay off credit cards. I am still paying on the home equity loan. If I do a home office deduction, which I qualify for in every way, can I use the home equity loan interest as a deductible expense?

Answer: Be careful with that, its not really worth to pursue it. You can get caught and then have problems with IRS.

The amount you talk about is so small, you shouldn’t bother really.

Items on Amazon Right Now for Deductible Interest Expense:

Energy & Natural Resources

Jeffrey Lynne, P.A. United States: Energy Finance Districts To Accelerate Retrofits And Green Job Growth

Collecting Holly Berries Video

Question: Bennefit of having debt on home?

I own a home in NC and have no debt against my primary residence. I would like to purchase a second home in SC. The cost of the home will run about $500,000. I have cash for the purchase but I also understand that from an after-tax standpoint, I might benefit from having some debt against the house if I am able to deduct the interest expense. I want to know the maximum amount of debt I can take out and have the interest be deductible. I am also thinking about borrowing against my margin account to purcahse a more expensive house.
Please advise.

Please list where in the Internal Revenue Code Section your information comes from and also cite an court cases you reference to or use.

Answer: The total amount you can treat as home acquisition debt at any time on your main home and second home cannot be more than $1 million ($500,000 if married filing separately). This limit is reduced (but not below zero) by the amount of your grandfathered debt (discussed later). Debt over this limit may qualify as home equity debt (also discussed later

Publication 936

http://www.irs.gov/publications/p936/index.html

http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/html/uscode26/usc_sec_26_00000163—-000-.html

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RHB Research lowers VS Industry fair value, reduced to market perform

KUALA LUMPUR: RHB Research Institute has lowered its indicative fair value for VS Industry to RM1.27 from RM1.36 based on unchanged target CY10 price-to-earnings ratio (PER) of 6.0 times and downgraded its recommendation to market perform from outperform.

Question: Are credit reports, credit scores and credit monitoring services a tax deductible expense?

I am interested to know if the IRS will allow us to deduct our expeneses in these areas. If so, then I believe that more people would be interested in checking their credit reports and scores for accuracy or even monitor them. Of course annualcreditreport.com is free, but monitoring services and credit scores cost money, which may stop many people from checking their credit information more than once a year for each credit bureau. Thanks for your help.

Answer: The IRS does not allow a deduction for personal expenses like this.

Items on Amazon Right Now for Interest Expense Deductible:

RHB Research lowers VS Industry fair value, reduced to market perform

KUALA LUMPUR: RHB Research Institute has lowered its indicative fair value for VS Industry to RM1.27 from RM1.36 based on unchanged target CY10 price-to-earnings ratio (PER) of 6.0 times and downgraded its recommendation to market perform from outperform.