May - 2024 REMINDERS
May 12 - Mother’s Day May 27 - Memorial Day
H
aving a low tax bill doesn’t happen by accident. The best way to keep as much of your hardearned money away from Uncle Sam as possible is by having a tax planning strategy that you revisit throughout the year. In this month’s newsletter, we’ve got some tax planning ideas to consider as you head into summer. Also learn
several tips to help you change your money habits, ideas to teach your kids about money and banking, and how to protect your digital footprint. As always, feel free to pass this information on to anyone that may find it useful and call if you have any questions or concerns.
START YOUR TAX PLANNING NOW! Keeping your taxes as low as possible requires paying attention to your financial situation throughout the year. Here are some tips for getting a head start on tax planning for your 2024 return: REVIEW YOUR PAYCHECK withholdings. Now is a good time to check your tax withholdings to make sure you haven’t been paying too much or too little. Use this online tool from the IRS to help calculate how much your current withholdings match what your final tax bill will be. Action step: To change how much is withheld from your paycheck in taxes, fill out a new Form W-4 and give it to your employer. DEFER EARNINGS You could potentially cut your tax liability by deferring your 2024 income to a future year via contributions to a retirement account. For 2024, the 401(k) contribution limit is $23,000 ($30,500 if 50 or older); $7,000 for both traditional and Roth IRAs ($8,000 if 50 and older); or $16,000 for a SIMPLE IRA ($19,500 if 50 and older). Action step: Consider an automatic
transfer from either your paycheck or NET CAPITAL GAINS WITH checking account to your retirement CAPITAL LOSSES account so you won’t have to think If you have appreciated investments about manually making a transfer you’re thinking about selling, take each month. a look through the rest of your portfolio to see if you have other PLAN WITHDRAWALS FROM assets that you could sell for a RETIREMENT ACCOUNTS TO loss and use to offset your gains. BE TAX EFFICIENT Using the tax strategy of tax-loss Your retirement accounts could harvesting, you may be able to span multiple account types, such take advantage of stocks that have as traditional retirement accounts, underperformed. Roth accounts, and taxable Action step: Make an appointment accounts like brokerage or savings with your investment advisor to look accounts. Because of this, consider over your portfolio to see if there are planning your withdrawals to be as any securities you may want to sell tax efficient as possible. by the end of 2024. Action step: One way to structure withdrawals is to pull from Tax planning can potentially result taxable accounts first, and leave in a lower bill from the IRS if you Roth account withdrawals for last start taking action now. Please call Another approach is to structure if you have questions about your proportional withdrawals from all tax situation for 2024. retirement accounts, which would lead to a more predictable tax bill each year.