Tax Tools

Taxes are due in less than a week. This year, I found myself owing the equivalent of a Macbook Air in federal taxes, and in a year that I had a lot of capital loses and no major raise. My problem turns out to be that I'm in a tax bracket where being unmarried with no mortgage and just the normal standard deduction is not the norm. This is apparently common for single people with tech jobs. Normally, in this tax bracket, it is assumed that you will have enough itemized deductions such as a large mortgage interest deduction. But I've never been ready to settle down, so I rent instead of buying a place. Though it was a shock to me how much I owe, I calmed down to realize that it was actually better this way, since I have been earning interest on that money since, and I did withhold more money this year than I owed in taxes last year, so I cannot be penalized. But for those who would rather withhold the right amount, the IRS provides a calculator to determine your withholdings.

Now there are a lot of programs out there to figure your taxes. The most common is probably TurboTax, though it costs $50-100 if you cannot use the EZ form. There are free alternatives out there, but many with a salary limit, making them unusable for those of us with tech jobs. I recommend TaxACT for filing federal taxes. It is free no matter which forms you need and there's no salary limit, though you have to put up with ads on their site. For state taxes, I would say that depends on the state. Some of have very good forms that you can fill out right on their site, while others have less to offer. This is particularly more difficult if you have to file in multiple states, so you're on your own there.