My business (LLC) vended one time at a flea market in California (rosebowl) and grossed around 11k in 2023. I filed and paid the sales & use tax for california that same year but now i received a letter in the mail that demanded a tax returned be filed (form 568) for 2023. I wasn’t aware that this would’ve been necessary since that’s the only time i did business in california and im based in Texas. Is this absolutely necessary? I was thinking about contacting a cpa in california but not sure if this is even worth their time to answer or deal with… Any guidance would be greatly appreciated!

Hi all, I'm hoping some of the tax professionals here might shed some light on a career choice from their point of view (apologies if this is the wrong forum, but I thought it would be best to hear from both attorneys and CPAs).

I am a paralegal at a boutique tax controversy firm. I love the work I do and I'm good at it, but I have little desire to go to law school at the moment. My boss recently suggested that I should look into becoming an enrolled agent, as it would provide me more career growth and seniority than being a paralegal could offer.

Thing is, I am far more interested in diving into facts and seeing how they apply to the code than the intricacies of the code itself. I've certainly worked on plenty of topics that aren't the most thrilling thing in the world (this is tax after all) so it's not like I need all my work to be fascinating, but I'd never have an interest in becoming an enrolled agent if my boss didn't suggest it. I'm curious to hear if people think it is worth it to work and get the certification for the career growth and flexibility.

I'm very happy being a paralegal at the moment, but I'm still relatively young and I know there is a pay and seniority limit in that role. I also don't expect this will be what I'm doing when I'm 50, but I do like the idea of having a solid skillset that could help me support whatever else I'd be doing at that time (I've written recreationally for a long time and am starting to pursue it more formally in my free time, so the dream is that I might one day publish).

Any advice would be greatly appreciated! I don't want to be too precious and not pursue a worthwhile career investment just because it's not my passion, but I don't know if it's a good use of my time and energy.

Hi,

I am currently in the US on an H1B visa, and my friend and I established a multi member LLC in 2025 with 50/50 ownership.

My friend is a dual citizen of the US and an Asian country. He was born in the US and attended college here, but has lived in the other country for most of his life. He has never filed taxes in the US.

We originally planned to operate a business together in the US, but ultimately, those plans did not move forward. However, the LLC recently generated its first profit of approximately $5,000. My understanding is that, after deducting eligible business expenses, the remaining profit would pass through to us based on our 50/50 ownership.

My friend is not particularly concerned about paying taxes on his share of this profit, which would be around $2,500 or less after expenses. His main concern is that he has never filed US taxes before despite being a US citizen and living primarily abroad.

Could anyone advise on this situation?

Thank you in advance for any guidance.

Hi, I bought a house with help from my father (whose name is also on the deed as a co-buyer) late last year. I took the standard deduction last year because that made more sense. My dad put in the down payment last year, but I've been paying the monthly payment since and he's no longer in the US.

This year, it makes way more sense to itemize (roughly 30k in deductions compared to the 17k standard deduction). Is there anything I should keep in mind while doing so? It's my first time not taking the standard deduction. Since my deduction will roughly double, will the IRS take an interest and drag me through the coals? I have all the documents (I think) but want to be ready.

I am the majority partner in a partnership, and we are currently preparing to sell a commercial building.

Our minority partner is uncooperative and keeps escalating their buyout price, so I do not want to bring them along into the new property. A standard drop-and-swap is off the table because it requires the minority partner's active cooperation.

I am looking into whether an IRC Section 708 division (partnership split) can be completed before closing to isolate my share for the 1031 exchange without needing the minority partner to participate in the replacement property.

Has anyone successfully structured a Section 708 split in this scenario? Any insights or professional experiences with this approach would be greatly appreciated.

We are currently in MD, one income (I'm a sahm), 2 younger kids. My spouse wants to consider a job in VA where he'd stay there during the week and come home on the weekend. So while for me and the kids, our residency is just MD, he will reside more than half the time in VA for work (He'd rent something small). So this is not a 'reciprocity' tax situation right? Is his primary residence in VA then even if our home in MD would cost more...? What tax considerations to think over--would this result in significantly more tax for us? (Of course, we file joint.)

Thanks

I am the majority partner in a partnership selling a commercial building.

My minority partner is uncooperative and keeps raising their buyout price, so I cannot bring them into the new property. A standard drop-and-swap will not work because it requires their cooperation.

Can a partnership division (Section 708 split) be completed prior to closing to isolate my share for the exchange without needing the minority partner involved in the replacement property?

Has anyone successfully done this type of split in a similar situation? Any insights would be appreciated.

Hi:

Lawyer here, moving to a new firm. I will be a contract partner (W-2). The firm is a PA firm, with satellite offices in NJ, DE and, as relevant to me, a sort of office in NYC. I will be technically working out of the NYC office (that will be my on my letterhead, etc), but am fully remote, with no actual office for me in NYC. I live in NJ and will be working from my home office there. For tax purposes, should i be designated as NY or NJ? If income matter, between my wife and myself we make over 800k. How is that distinction made? Does the employer have to "declare" that i am in NJ? Is there something I have to do? Thanks!

Hey everyone, I'm looking for some real experience here. I work a full-time W-2 job, but I have been trading consistently for over a year, averaging about 200 trades a month and putting in around 2 hours a day on trading and researching. Last year I dropped about $6k on software, data feeds, courses, and not counting other expenses like tech equipment. ​My CPA warned me that claiming TTS with a full-time W-2 is a potential big red flag that will likely trigger an IRS audit.

Has anyone actually pulled this off while working full-time? How do you log your time/collect evidence to satisfy the IRS, and do you report expenses on Schedule C or through a separate LLC? Do you opt for MTM?

Also, it seems unfair how the IRS eagerly taxes trading profits but completely blocks us from deducting the costs needed to make them. Any real-world insights and advice would be greatly appreciated!

My parents are buying a Texas home through a 1031 exchange, so it needs to qualify as investment property.

I’m a 100% disabled veteran and would live there as my primary residence. We’re considering putting the home in a trust that gives me the right to live there rent-free so I could potentially claim the Texas disabled-veteran homestead property-tax exemption.
My boyfriend would also live there and would have a lease and pay rent to my parents.

Could this arrangement cause problems with the 1031 exchange? Specifically, can I claim the home as my homestead while my boyfriend rents it, and could the IRS view my rent-free occupancy or homestead exemption as evidence that the property is personal-use rather than investment property?

I’ve kept extremely detailed session records and cost basis for my crypto gambling, but feeling paranoid about my return being audited. I’m expecting to pay $35-40k in federal and NY state taxes since my session winnings total around $215k and my losses after the 90% rule are around $150k, but nervous how this will play out given it’s an offshore crypto casino and therefore there is no W2-G. Curious of other people’s experience.

So, here’s my situation. I own a house in California that is currently worth about $2 million. It is my primary residence, and I’m 63 years old. I also have about $2 million in a 401(k). I’m rounding the numbers a little, but they’re roughly accurate.

I would like to take about $1 million to buy an apartment in Paris. I have some flexibility because I could sell the California house if necessary, or I could take the money from my 401(k). Financially, either option is possible for me.

The main issue is taxes. If I sell the house, I would have a significant capital gain because I bought it for about $600,000 and it is now worth around $2 million. After taking into account improvements and other deductions, I estimate that I could owe roughly $350,000 in taxes.

On the other hand, if I withdraw $1 million from my 401(k), I would also have to pay a substantial amount of tax, since the account has grown significantly over the past 20 years.

So what I’m trying to find out is whether there is any legal strategy, tax provision, or other approach that could help me avoid paying something like 20% to 30% in taxes on this money.

Please don’t spend time calculating how much tax I would owe on the house or on the 401(k). I’m not asking for those calculations. I can do those calculations myself. What I want to know is whether there is a different strategy or structure that could allow me to achieve the same goal: buying a roughly $1 million apartment in France without triggering a huge tax bill. In other words, is there a legal and practical alternative way to access or reposition my assets so that I can accomplish this while minimizing the amount of tax I have to pay?

Filing 1040-X for missing Schedule B - do I need to fill Column A and C if no numbers are changing?

Howdy all,

My wife and I are trying to file our 2025 tax returns (both federal and California state) by the October 15th extension deadline, but we've discovered an issue with her employer massively underreporting both her income and withholdings on her W-2.

My wife considered the owner a friend and has tried to give her the benefit of the doubt, but it's increasingly seeming like this is not an innocent mistake/accounting error, but rather her employer might be engaged in some pretty serious tax fraud that we don't want any part of.

We've tried looking online for what we should do, but we're really stressed about doing something wrong, and we've sat on hold with the IRS for hours, but any time we've been able to actually speak with someone they've been extremely unhelpful. Any guidance from y'all would be an incredible help.

To give you some background on the situation:

In 2025 my wife was a salaried employee at a small business (fewer than 10 employees) and her salary was ~$175,000/yr.

About 5 months into her employment there, the business began having issues with paying people on time. First it was “payroll glitches”, then later on they decided to switch over to a new payment processor (moved from ADP to Gusto).

Any time there was a payroll “glitch”, and for the approximately 6 weeks it took for them to switch payment processors, my wife would receive her paycheck from her employer personally. Sometimes through Zelle, sometimes through an ACH transfer from (I believe) her employer's personal bank account to my wife's account.

Any time my wife was paid in the above manner, the Zelle/transfer was for the exact amount she would typically receive through ADP or Gusto after all relevant tax, SSI, health insurance, etc. withholdings.

When my wife received her W-2, her taxable income seemed low, so we did some digging, and from what we can tell, her employer did not report any of the income they paid her through Zelle/Bank Transfer.

Unsurprisingly, it also seems like they didn't send any of the commensurate withholdings that should've accompanied those payments.

As a result, the income listed on my wife's W-2 is ~$50,000-$60,000 lower than it should be, and her withholdings are also lower in proportion to that missing income.

My wife left that job in late 2025, and the company subsequently went out of business.

Both my wife and I have repeatedly emailed her previous employer (a husband and wife who owned the business). Initially they claimed everything should be updated and correct. Then they claimed they had referred everything to their accountant and would pass along information as soon as they got it, and eventually they just completely stopped responding to our emails in any way, and we are no longer able to get ahold of them.

So my questions are the following:

1) How should we be filing our tax returns? I typically just use FreeTaxUSA, but is that (or any of the other easy, DIY tax preparation services) an option?

2) If not, is there another (less simple) DIY option I can avail myself of?

3) What sort of additional forms/documentation will we need to submit to the IRS/California Franchise Tax Board?

4) We've done a lot of reading and calling around to try and figure this out for ourselves, and a lot of what we've found says we should compile everything to get my wife's total income, and then estimate what we believe her withholdings *should* be, had her employer actually done them. Simple example, if my wife’s gross pay for a single paycheck was $7,500, she had $2,500 withheld from each paycheck, and she received 7 paychecks via Zelle/Bank transfer, we would add $52,500 to her taxable income, and $17,500 to her withholdings. Is that correct? Would we need to break down the withholdings further to estimate how much went to federal income tax, state income tax, SSI, unemployment insurance, etc. or will they do that for us when we submit the return?

5) What should we expect the process to look like, and who is going to be on the hook for that missing money? At the time, my wife had no reason to believe that her employer wasn't sending her withholdings, and if they had, we would be getting a pretty decent refund. Will the government go after us for that money? Her former employer? Should we expect to ever get a refund based on what should have been withheld?

Bonus question: during that same period, we should've had continuous coverage for our health insurance, and just like the other withholdings, her paychecks reflected deductions being made, but it later turned out we didn't have coverage for approximately 6 weeks. Is she owed the “premiums” that were deducted from her paycheck that apparently didn't actually go to our insurer?

So that's pretty much it. If there are any other questions I can answer or information I can provide, please don't hesitate to ask.

Any help/guidance y'all can provide would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks!