Posted: 1/24/2007 6:36:34 PM EDT
| My tax person retired. I have often wondered how good Turbo Tax is. For the price, $49.99 it is almost better to just pay someone else to do the work? |
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ive done www.taxact.com for the last 2 yrs.. worked fine for me minus the $49.99 charge. |
| does the cheap version from wally world give you free state also? I looked at the online version and it seems easy, but looks like the cd-rom version may give me a free state filing. Does the cd version leave crap on your pc? Does it install itself or does it just run off the disk? |
No state--but my state has it's own online version that takes about ten minutes to complete. It is a fairly large program that installs--then uninstalls after you are done, and just leaves a tiny file of stuff to make it faster next year. Subsequent years go MUCH faster as it "remembers" what you did by "importing" the data from the prior year. Depreciation, employer(s), 1099s--all that stuff is remembered and things go much faster because of it. ETA: IIRC the Basic version does have the option to d'load the state portion for about ten bucks. Don't beat me if I'm wrong as I never paid much attention to it for the reason mentioned above. The expensive version is for businesses--not a regular W-2 employee. I have numerous business expenses (schedule C, etc.) and it's all in the Basic one. |
I know you can do five returns once it is installed. I'm not sure if it can be installed on multiple computers or not. IIRC they do something so you can only e-file from ONE computer, or somesuch. |
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Quoted: My tax person retired. I have often wondered how good Turbo Tax is. For the price, $49.99 it is almost better to just pay someone else to do the work?[/quote] Around here $49.00 won't get you shit... I started using TurboTax 12 rears ago when my CPO died...Haven't looked back. here. |
I also do NOT try and get creative with my deductions either. YMMV.
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How much time do you spend doing it? I spend about 15 mintues answer a few questions from my accountant and I'm on my way. He sends a packet every year for me to put things into and then I send it back when I get my w-2, set up a appointment and then I'm done. $125 How much time do you spend doing Turbo tax? |
I do the same, for about the same price. My accountant is great! He uses TurboTax Professional, and used to be a income tax consultant for Symantec. He's saved me more than I have paid him. |
Your accountant that you are already using all year? or just for taxes. If just for taxes, that's a little on the high side depending on which bells and whistles you need to get figured in (which btw the program has included). If for normal all year business purposes and he already has most of your information and then spends 15 minutes inputting it into a tax program? I dunno is he worth $500 an hour? Unless you have a lot of screwy things happening, you don't need a professional. Hell they aren't that hard to do even on the forms for most people. |
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I've always used TurboTax's online free e-file thing (and somehow always manage to find the state one offered free, too. Damn, I'm good.). Granted I'm 20, I've been using it for 4 years, and it's been free every time, and I've always gotten my returns. Yay free! |
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Whether or not you need a tax accountant (CPA) to process your tax return depends. Just any old preparer won't do. For many people the online tax preparation is easy enough, and the people that benefit most are those who are not in need of tax planning (wealth builders, etc). If you have a business and you are intent on building wealth you would be well advised to find a CPA to assist you. In the years to come you will need the planning aspect in order to avoid paying too much income tax. For instance, many people are going to be squeezed into the alternative minimum tax because the AMT is not adjusted for inflation (is that making you scratch your head?). This is just one example of why whether or not you need a preparer is dependant upon your particular situation. Lower income types that have w-2 wages only and some schedule A items are probably safe with taxact.com or some similar site. Hence, we know now that the important part of tax preparation is actually the planning phase. Once you commit to certain transactions without the benefit of planning, you have bought it, friend. CPA Ric |
As I posted above, my tax accountant has saved me more than I've paid him. I almost got hit with the dreaded AMT one year. By digging for allowable deductions, we were able to dodge the bullet by $16 worth of taxable income. He's an Enrolled Agent (EA) in the IRS, which makes an audit less likely than if I did my own taxes. The price of the return includes state taxes, and he'll represent me if I do get audited. TurboTax personal will not do that. |
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used it every year for the last 8+ years with no problems. last year i needed something for our business and had to go with h&r blocks taxcut. had all kinds of problems with the return missing forms. took me almost 8 months to get it all corrected. taxcut blows. turbotax is great |
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first off my math skills are not so great so I buy turbo tax and tax cut. Then I do my tax on two separate computers and compare the results. Usually the difference between Turdo tax and tax cut is inly a few cents. both work quite well and so I have only had problems with turdo tax and their tries to keep you from installing it on more than one computer with their failed activate online scheme. 
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| I used TurboTax then switched to TaxCut because it was cheaper and I ended up liking the interface a little better anyways. If your return is simple then they both do as good a job, it doesn't matter much. Supposedly when you efile through TaxCut though you get some kind of audit support in case you do get audited, which is nice to have I guess. |
TaxAct taxact.com is great, and it's cheaper fred |