The Top 50 Mistakes Practitioners Make and How to Fix Them: Individual Tax and Financial Planning

Address 50 real-life situations in which a taxpayer has pushed legal boundaries to save on taxes. Avoid mistakes in the preparation of Form 1040, and maintain adherence to professional standards of practice.
Highlights

• Individual income tax cases regarding income, adjustments, itemized deductions, and dependency
• The IRS Future State Initiative
• When gifts can be taxable
• Why are manhole covers round?
• Two case studies: one that results in ordinary tax treatment, the other capital treatment
• When a rollover is not a rollover, the Claim of Right Doctrine
• What are the risks with nontraditional IRA investments?
• Alimony issues
• The limits on 401(k) loans
• Form 8938 for reporting foreign financial assets and updated rules
• Trouble resulting from not filing a FinCEN Form 114
• The future of Social Security
• Trying to carry back a tax loss that has yet to occur
• Passive income and the self-charged rent rules
• Meal allowances for police or fire workers on 24-hour shifts
• Itemized deduction over-aggressiveness
• Estimated taxes, the big penalties, and planning
• The good, the bad, and the ugly of early retirement SEPPs
• Things professionals do not like to hear