I’m back with another expensive LIFT mistake.
I’ve got to make this one kind of quick because it’s been one of those days.
I’m sick, my daughter is sick, I took my son to check out a new school and he wanted me to stay with him the whole time and now I’ve got to run my dog into the vet because he’s got the runs all over my carpet.
Did I happen to mention I am launching a new business tomorrow on top of all this?
Ah, such is life, right? I’ve learned that success comes from how you handle times like these.
So, hey, do me a favor and if you haven’t yet signed up for my call tomorrow, do it now. It’ll make me feel better that I haven’t done everything I possibly can to promote this call today.
Ok, now before I run my dog to the vet, let me share a little story with you that suggests to me that a lot of you are making some big mistakes when it comes to your taxes and living the corporate lifestyle.
This is one of the primo benefits of being a business owner and an area where I made plenty of my own big mistakes.
2006 was the first year I hit a million dollars of revenue, yippee! But, I didn’t plan well at all and come April of 2007 I had an UNEXPECTED 6-figure tax bill. Yes, true story.
I had to take out a loan to pay those taxes.
What’s really sad is that if I had planned in advance, I could have cut that tax bill in half.
Live and learn. Expensive lesson that one was. I don’t want to see you have expensive lessons like that!
Then, last week I was out with a friend of mine who had come to visit and he bought a couple of gifts for two of his employees. Each gift was about $20.
After he paid, I saw him tell the cashier to toss the receipt. Fortunately, I caught him in time.
“Don’t toss that receipt! Those are business gifts. Keep the receipt. Write your employees name on the back and what the gift was and give it to your bookkeeper to deduct at tax time.”
You can deduct gifts up to $25 per person per year. And sure, it’s ONLY $25, but I’ll tell you what, every dollar counts.
Why give the government any more than you have to?
This is just one of the MANY ways you may be overpaying on your taxes and not taking full advantage of living the corporate lifestyle.
We’ll talk more about this tomorrow (Thursday) on my free call so register here.
And hey, let me know what specific questions you have about living the corporate lifestyle.
I’d love to hear and the comments are a great place to talk about it. Don’t be afraid. It’s time to start doing business with your eyes wide open and bring these issues into the light.
2 Comments
I just got back from my CPA. Who by the way I love! I learned so much.
Here's something, she asked if I had any charitable donation of STUFF. I said not this year. I pretty much freecycle everything now. It is just so much easier. But I told her about all the graphic design books and mags I freecycled. Charity wouldn't take them anyway. It was my lifetime collection. Good stuff. $100's if not a few thousand dollars worth of fab resources. I was so excited to get an email from a high school design teacher who wanted my great stuff for his classroom. Done. His!
Come to find out I could have written it all off. All I needed to know was his full name and the school he taught at, along with a record of what I gave him. Well, I know what I gave him, but I don't know the other important stuff. So, if I am lucky maybe I can find an old email. Doubtful. We'll see.
I just got back from my CPA. Who by the way I love! I learned so much.
Here's something, she asked if I had any charitable donation of STUFF. I said not this year. I pretty much freecycle everything now. It is just so much easier. But I told her about all the graphic design books and mags I freecycled. Charity wouldn't take them anyway. It was my lifetime collection. Good stuff. $100's if not a few thousand dollars worth of fab resources. I was so excited to get an email from a high school design teacher who wanted my great stuff for his classroom. Done. His!
Come to find out I could have written it all off. All I needed to know was his full name and the school he taught at, along with a record of what I gave him. Well, I know what I gave him, but I don't know the other important stuff. So, if I am lucky maybe I can find an old email. Doubtful. We'll see.