We bought term life insurance policies for our kids. Relatively cheap, and something to put into place for the young adults.
Just got taxes done today and pleased. Feel like I lost weight and took a refreshing shower. So hate doing the taxes.
Oh wow!!! Way to go, SOS! This calls for a major celebration. I despise doing the taxes. I do not mind paying them, but filling out all that stuff⊠Even with electronic forms, something does not import right, something crashes⊠Yuck.
I have the opposite feeling after doing taxes than SOS does, even when just compiling records for the accountant (which is the worst part). I feel sick to my stomach, fat (because I needed junk food to get me through the misery), I have a headache and just feel really cranky. Takes awhile to recover. Itâs not the paying of the taxes, as most has already been taken away, itâs the grind of the numbers.
I was successful getting one kid to do the ROTH IRA process. I havenât decided if Iâm going to do it for the second kid, or say if he canât take the ten minutes to open the account, I donât need to worry about it.
We finished our taxes yesterday. Yeah! Iâm one of those people who lets the govt use my money and almost always gets something back. I know itâs foolish, but if I get a âbigâ amount back I will save it or do something constructive with it, but if it goes to my checking account, somehow it disappears.
Fed return on turbo tax isnât taking, so I changed the AGI for last year to the original amount (not the amended
amount) to see if that change makes it accept electronic. Otherwise I am out of ideas - maybe let turbo tax âfindâ the AGI.
Just got DDâs W2 TODAY. Business owner is a neighbor. As soon as our return âtakesâ electronic, I can get DDâs done to get her state and federal tax money back in her hot little hands. She is glad she is a few years away from being FT âadultâ - I told her the federal tax bracketsâŠ
Got a letter from the IRS today.
Apparently Iâm one of the people whose information got hacked in the âGet Transcriptâ fiasco! Yay me! Theyâve added a âmarkerâ to my tax account to help ensure no one else successfully files a phony return with my information (which someone tried last year, but they put my DWâs ssn first so the IRS bounced the e-file and I had to mail a paper return). Very helpful of them.
Anyone filed a Form 14039, Identity Theft Affidavit? Looks like I need to file one.
At least I donât owe any moneyâŠ
Yes @notrichenough a few years ago someone used my DDâs info for claiming exemption etc. So we had to do the IRS affidavit (that was the form #) for her which she needed to sign (we realized when accountant couldnât send in electronically and they found out her SS# had already been used). It is pretty simple form. Then every year you will get a new Identity Protection Personal Identification Number (in our case for DD) that you need to have on the tax return for that yearâs return. I just found out with Turbo Tax that I have to type in IP Pin in their top right search box and then you can get to a screen to enter it in - otherwise the electronic federal return will bounce back without the IP Pin (and the state return will bounce back due to federal bounce back). It took me a while to find that out, which was frustrating, but now I know how to search for things on Turbo Tax that donât automatically pop up.
I redid 5 years of tax returns. I lent this guy money for 5 years. Many years later, I was long gone from the scene, it was discovered the guy was running a ponzi scheme. He wasnât for real. Kind of like a Madoff case. I was sued.
I settled the case. It was one of the most difficult decisions I have ever made in my life. I thought there was a very very high probabilty I was going to win the case. Maybe 98 to 99 percent. However, if I lost, I could have been in trouble.
Most of the people I know involved in the case have not settled. Intellectually, I probably did not need to settle. I donât like to make emotional decisions, I was a financial professional once, 
but âŠI just didnât want to deal with this case anymore.
This case could go on for several more years.
SoâŠI settled. I thought if I settled, I would have closure. ButâŠthat didnât really happen. I gave back the income I made many years ago. I paid taxes on that income. I wanted those taxes back because I did not make the money. Getting those taxes back is complicated. This stuff does not happen everyday.
I had to hire a tax attorney. I talked to my CPA who was very unsure about how to go about getting the taxes back. I started working on the process of getting my taxes back. I had my old returns. Luckily I did not throw them away. New returns were made up. I learned a lot more about tax returns and I did know some stuff before.
My attorney said very few people in the country know how to handle this. Very few CPAs have ever done this. The returns are going to be kicked out by the IRS and done by hand.
I mailed the returns. Nothing happened. I did not hear from the IRS for months. So I called them. I was told, âWhat returns? We donât have your returns.â
This was a little disconcerning so I had my CPA take care of it. A couple of months later, my cpa was told by an IRS agent that she sees 2 pages in the computer system. My return is 200 pages. 
The agent said, âSend everything againâ.
I canât swear here but you get my drift. I sent everything again last week. I was tracking the return receipt today. I go to the mailbox and I see a skinny envelope from the Treasury Department. This canât be about my trying to get my taxes back. Itâs too soon for the IRS to have processed the return I just sent. The IRS only has two pages.
I opened the envelope and there was the check. I got my taxes back. I guess my return was somewhere. Just not on the computer.
I like the IRS.
Now I hope for some closure.
What does this have to do with retirement? Maybe a lot. But thatâs for later. This post is long enough.
Itâs about retirement because you know know instead of guessing. Good job.
so how are you going to invest that return, @dstark?
@dragonmom, thanks. I think you are right.
@doschicos, my short term answer is âŠthe money will probably be invested in some mortgages. My money is pooled with others and we fund mortgages for people that donât have good credit, or are new to the area, etc.
So for example, 10 investors might put up $40,000 each, on a $400,000 mortgage. on a house that is worth $650,000. We might get 7 percent a year or until the borrower pays us off or sells the place.
Slightly longer term, my wife wants to give the money to the kids. Not just this tax money. More money than that. Doesnât want to wait until we are dead.
Iâm thinkingâŠ
One⊠I want to make sure our money doesnât run out.
TwoâŠI do have an ego. I feel good to have some money. I donât want my assets to go too low here. I am not like those people who can never have enough. I am nothing like that. If I was, I would have more. But then I would be unsatisfied.
I am sure we can find a balance somewhere. This just came up.
Deciding when and what to give to our kids is an issue for some of us. The lucky ones.
Good for your wife with the soccer. Weâve also talked about passing money on by helping out the kids at some point but weâre still paying tuition now. And then there is the balance of preserving our own financial well-being for possible outlier events and not wanting to provide any disincentive to a robust work ethic in our kids. A little scrimping and struggling can be a good thing in a younger person, I think.
Your investments are much more rarified than my own, @dstark, but then I donât have to refile 5 years of tax returns and talk to attorneys. Iâm a lot more plain vanilla. Well, maybe mint chocolate chip. You seem like a rocky road type of guy.
@doschicos, I agree with your first paragraph.
I agree with your second paragraph too.
I donât know what the heck I was thinking in my younger days. I should have just bought the s&p 500 index.
What a dummy I was.
I do like rocky road ice cream. I have been eating a lot of chocolate malt ice cream these days.
I have a feeling youâre doing just fine. And you have a lot more interesting stories to tell on CC and at cocktail parties than you would if you had invested in the S&P index. Youâre probably the most interesting man in the room.
You have been a resource for some of us financially (way beyond my simpler investments).
Reading along with your rocky road has taught me a lot.
Oh yeah, dstark would like that one⊠
Okay, how many men do you have in the room? And if your husband (or significant other) is in the room right now, you are in deep, deep, trouble!
@doschicos, you would be surprised. There are some interesting people around.
I do have a story about a small investment gone bust, but I canât tell that story and I am not going to on a pm either.
I have my boundaries.
I realized after I typed it, âGee, that sounds kind of flirtyâ ; Haha. Not intended that way, I promise! :">
Besides, if @dstarkâs wife can play soccer with people 15-20 years younger than herself, she can kick my butt.
Funny, doschicos. Well, if it makes you feel better, any man in my room right now would also be the most interesting (and only) man in the room. And since Iâm on a layover in a hotel room, and would never have anyone in my hotel room except for my husband, they would also be the most punched in the face, and kneed in the groin person in the room. 
@doschicos, I didnât take it that way and I wonât.
Your posts are great. No worries.
@dragonmom, thank you very much. I appreciate what you wrote.