Year-End Tax Strategies | Main Street Business Podcast

Foreign.

Welcome everybody, to this week's episode of Main Street Business Podcast. My name is Mark Kohler. I'm here with my illustrious host, co host Matt Sorenson.

I like it.

Yeah.

I don't know what that means, actually. Does that mean. I think it's a good thing, but I don't.

Illustrious. It's probably a good definition. Yeah. I mean, I think it's a positive thing. Of course I use words I don't know the definition too all the time. So, yeah, that's good. Welcome, everybody. This is our year end tax strategy show. This very popular show. It's exciting because we love saving money, our clients love saving money. And if there's a tax tip you're gonna miss out on come January 1st, we want to alert you to that. So this is a very, very important show to have pencil and paper handy, make some mental notes, talk to your tax Advisor.

Yeah. In 2020. I know this has been the year that we all want to forget, but don't forget to do your tax planning. The IRS isn't going to forget. And so there's a lot of things we want to highlight to think about before you're in. Not every strategy is going to matter to you, but there's probably going to be a few. If you're a business owner, own rental property, there's going to be a few of these. You're like, ooh, I need to make sure I get that crap done by December 31st. So we're going to highlight a lot of those. And I'm going to say this is Mark's wheelhouse. He's the illustrious one on this topic. That's for dang sure. So. And I'm excited because Mark was even blowing my brain with all these other things to think about that I was like, I wasn't thinking about that. So I'm going to learn some things today.

Well, that's nice. Well, when we do our self directed podcast and show, I'm usually just along for the ride, which is a nice opportunity for me to mention we have launched a second podcast in the last few months titled the Directed Ira Podcast. Very straightforward title. You can find us on Stitcher, on itunes and Spotify. We're recording shows as fast as we can in almost a. What did you say, Matt? It's kind of a progressive format where fundamentals to.

Yeah, we're working up on the basics, so if you're brand new to it, you can start at episode one. If you want to bounce around to a topic that interests you, you can do that and we're doing open forum too. So we're going to start that in the self directed format. So you go to directtodira.com podcast just directed ira.com podcast to learn more and also be able to submit questions there. Yep.

Okay. Well, today's show, let me provide a distinction. This is not our top 10 or top 15 most common tax strategies. This is also not our list of the high income tax strategies. For those with a Biden administration crosshairs on your back list, that's a different one.

Those of you making 400 grand or more a year, that's you have a target already placed on you by the Biden administration. Just so you know, whether or not

you'll be able to pull the trigger or that bullet's going to have any impact, we don't know. But that's one of the platforms of his when he ran for president is the rich need to pay more in taxes. And apparently anybody making more than 400 grand is rich. And if you live in the Bay Area or New York City and you make more than 400 grand, I can assure you you do not feel rich living in a one bedroom apartment and trying to make ends meet with that. But anyway, that's those are different lists. So today is what do I need to think about before year end? Now one other disclaimer. I am so sick of reading year end tax strategies in Fortune.com or Wall Street Journal. You know, sell all your loser stocks and contribute to your retirement account. Oh my gosh, do we have anything better than that? Yes, we do. And so you're not going to get any of that fluff here. I will say, however, if you don't own a small business or a side hustle or have rental property where we can harvest some write offs that the average American doesn't get to take, you're not going to find this list too exciting because you're just a minion. You get a W2 or you get your Social Security check and you just get hit like a bumper car at the county fair. We want you to take control, get out of the ring and have a car that you can really go down the road. And that's the American dream of a side hustle or a side business or rental property. That's where our strategies really have an impact. Is that kind enough, man? Was that an okay analogy?

Yeah. And I think I used to love from one of the very first times I've heard Mark talk about tax planning. This is eons, eons ago. I don't know what an eon is either. There's two words I don't even know the difference is that like, I don't know. I know what a decade and a century are. I don't know what an eons. But let's say eons ago. Number one tax strategy is start a small business. It's not in and of itself. It's a tax strategy. It's a tax strategy that lets you do like a hundred tax strategies. But you have to do that one thing, start a small business to open the door to all these other cool things that you can do from a tax planning standpoint. So if you heeded the advice of number one, and I'm not saying just open the business for a tax strategy, having a business, obviously there's so many benefits to doing that, even if it's a side hustle. But that's who is going to really, really benefit from this list from a tax planning standpoint.

And last introductory comment. No, I've got some jokes and stories I want to tell today, but I want to get to the meat of this. But one other point is when the COVID pandemic hit. It's been estimated this year already that 10 to 15 million Americans have started a side hustle or a side gig to make incident. That's having a small business. These tax strategies will impact you. This may be a whole new world that you're dipping your toe into. Also, before this year, it was estimated one in three Americans have a side business or side income, side hustle or rental property to make ends meet. For example, you go over to Hawaii. I don't think I've ever met anybody in Hawaii that doesn't have a side hustle of some sort, which could include renting a small apartment in their house just to make ends meet, has a very high cost of living. So you may say, well, that's not a business owner. Yes, it is. That's a schedule C, as in Charlie, Schedule E as an echo. Or some of you may be filing formal tax returns such as a 1065 partnership or an 1120s escort. So there's a lot of people out there that need this info. So let's dive into it. Matt, you heard my little list that I had prepared because I wanted to tell you where I was going with this. I'm going to let you choose. What do you think is our first topic? We should kind of talk about maybe cash, the largest net.

The largest net. I mean, can I talk about retirement accounts first? Is that selfish?

Let's not do that one because I love that one. But that's again, that's Wall street and the only ace they have up their sleeve. So let's come out of the gate with something a little more fresh.

Okay, let's talk about the hra. That's one even I've started doing recently myself. So let's talk about the health reimbursement arrangement, not to be confused with the hsa. Still love the hsa, by the way.

Or the fsa.

Yeah, which those are dying, thank goodness, because they kind of suck. But if you work at corporate America that had their tax planning created in 1980, they might still have an SSA for their employees, which is here's the amount of money you can use and submit it for reimbursement. But if you don't by the end of the year, you lose it. So you got one of those employers get your stuff together before December 31st to go get your reimbursement. But if you're a business owner and own your own business, you are not going to do an epsa. You are going to do an HRA, which allows you to take significant more expenses for your health care. So it's different from an hsa. And so many of you may be familiar, of course, with the HSA where I put the money in. Like if I got a family HSA puts seven grand in, I get a $7,000 tax deduction. I can spend it whenever, I can invest it, I can even self direct it, but I get a 7,000 deduction in the HSA. Now, by the way, the HSA is not a year end one. You have until April 15 to do the HSA. The HRA, though, is a reimbursement where you can reimburse yourself for medical you've incurred during the year. And so really what you're going to do is just fund the HRA or essentially reimburse yourself, I should say, by December 31st for medical you've incurred. But you must have an HRA plan adopted.

And just to give some terminology, some of you may be swearing already, an HSA is a health savings account, much like a supercharged IRA for healthcare. It's an account that does not use a reason. You can build it and grow it. The flexible spending account, the FSA flexible spending account is Corporate America. Use it or lose it. Around 2,750 this year. Use it or lose it. But a small business owner, as mat said, is not going to implement those. The HRA is, the key word in that acronym is reimbursement. You're going to create a plan document that allows you to reimburse yourself for all your personal medical. It does not mean that your business is paying for all your medical expenses. That's not compliant. That's not allowed. Now we're not talking about health insurance. We're talking about co pays, deductibles, prescription drugs, eyes, dental, chiropractic, acupuncture. And under the CARES act they added even more items that under Publication 502 you can take advantage of, which includes I think some over the counter drugs, feminine products and a whole kind of a list of new things. They added to it because they wanted to help people get more medical deductions during the COVID pandemic and they've been wanting to throw this in somewhere. The CARES act did it. So you want to go through this reimbursement process now? We have done entire podcasts on the hra. You're going to want to go listen to those. I also have a chapter in my book, the Tax and Legal Playbook. I've got videos on my website, I've got YouTube videos on this. Just make a note that if you want to do an HRA, plan costs around 400 bucks. The break even that's at our office. Our break even point for clients is around 4 to 5,000 in out of pocket medical. It's a different procedure if you're single than if you were married. So you're going to want to study up on it. You may say that's a headache. I don't want to do that. But I've had clients that I met with just a week ago that did in vitro fertilization a year ago in 2019, spent almost $60,000. Their accountant never brought this up to them. They could have written that off in their small business. Unbelievable. I consider it almost malpractice. So if you have over five or ten grand of medical expenses, you're not getting a write off. That can add up. If you're in a 30% bracket or more with Fed and state, I mean that's a 3 to $4,000 tax savings. So that's not chump change. That's a sub day cruise of cruise liners. Ever go back in business? So that's the HRA and you have to do it by 1231. Check.

Yep. And if you're an S corp there and versus sole proprietor, there's a little different procedure. Now all these strategies because the purpose of today is to give you the ideas and enough information and know I Need to chase that one down. Not to give you the whole strategy because like Mark said on most of these, we have an entire one hour show dedicated on these. You can go to the podcast history for. But right now, for the sake of tax planning at year end, what I always tell my clients is we might rattle off 10 strategies. You're not gonna do all 10. There's some people that maybe do eight or nine, but most people are gonna do three or four. But if you're hitting those three or four, you're gonna get some tax planning here done at year end. Now, hopefully there's 10 to 20 tax strategies you should be doing that you've already been doing through the year. But there's these ones again that gotta be done at year end. So we wanna hit those now. Just since we're on the health insurance. I did wanna say one thing. Or on health care, at least. Open enrollment, remember is the period ends on December 15th. So December 15th is the deadline to select a plan. If you want to do an HSA next year, you can set up get an HSA plan for this year in open enrollment. For those that are small business owners with no group plan or, you know, you don't have a plan from a company or anything, you know, you can go to healthcare.gov to do this or your state site, get the HSA plan. Now, if you get an HSA plan, that's for 2021, you can't do the 2020 HSA, but of course it's going to let you do it. The HSA Health Savings Account starting in 2021.

Okay, I love it. So we've checked off two deadlines, everybody. The open enrollment deadline, if you're getting health insurance as a sole proprietor or entrepreneur, and the HRA reimbursement. And keep in mind, we've done a whole show on health insurance where, remember, you don't have to buy it for your employees, but you can still deduct it 100% in your business. That was part of the Affordable Health Care Act. There's so many new acts in the last five years, I'm trying to keep them Jobs act, the CARES Act, ACA or domiciliary. All right, I'm going to throw out the auto deduction. This is a common one again, if you own rental property, you probably would be doing the mileage deduction.

Is this because of all these car commercials that have been coming out over Christmas? Is that why you're thinking auto this time of year?

I actually, I hate Toyota.

Thon is going on now, if I

see another Mercedes with a red bow on it in the driveway, I'm going to, you know, shoot myself in the head. But I just. Oh, it's sick of car commercials. Okay, but here's the deal. If you're a small business owner, a lot of business owners start seeing these commercials going, ooh, ooh, maybe I should buy a new car before you're in. Well, Donald Trump and the GOP lover, hate him. Threw gas on the fire with the auto deduction two years ago. With the Tax Cuts and Jobs act, it is still a raging inferno of opportunity.

Love it.

So again, take the gift. Even if you don't like the gift horse, take it and run. If you need an auto deduction, let me just hit a couple highlights. If you buy an S, let's even back up further. This auto deduction we're talking about is getting the actual write off, not the mileage. You can always calculate your mileage deduction later and write it off. But if you're going to go buy it new, here's the benefit or used. You could buy new or used vehicle before 1231, determine that it's used more than 50% in your business. You can buy with cash or credit. You can put down a dollar and buy it with credit. You can even close on December 31st. And I have clients that call me from the auto dealership and you can verify that you're going to use it more than 50% in your business, that ratio now becomes an actual write off. Amazing. If it's an SUV or a truck or even possibly an RV or a van that weighs more than 6,000 pounds, the bonus depreciation allows you to write off up to 100%. So if you say it's 80% business use, then you can write off 80% of the vehicle on the day you buy it. Even if you put down a dollar and it's used. Huge. Number two, if you're buying an auto that's under £6,000, 90% of us for the last 30 years will just do mileage. Not anymore. With bonus depreciation, I can write off up to $18,000 of that vehicle on day one and then depreciate it over time somewhere. It's up to 75% of it in the first three years, plus fuel repairs and maintenance. As Matt said earlier, the auto deduction is a big topic. We've covered podcasts on that issue. I have a wonderful blog article@markjkohler.com, go over there into the blog search Window type auto. You will love this article. I go through seven rules of thumb on if you're going to lease or buy a mileage or truck or SUV car, blah, blah, blah. Go check it out. If you're in the market, you got three weeks where you could possibly harvest a huge write off. Matt, anything you'd say on the auto?

Yeah. Now keep in mind, a lot of people just do mileage. If you're not in the market to buy, don't go buy. Don't you know, I don't want you just buy a tax deduction. But Mark said if you otherwise are ready to buy, and it's like, well, I might buy in the spring early. We'll buy at year end if it can help for this tax planning. But remember, Mark, this is. We gotta share this video. Remember you did like the GM commercial, like, Mark was paid talent in a GM commercial on, like buying trucks and, like vans for business owners. We gotta pull that. That was pretty cool. That's like five, 10 years ago.

It wasn't that old.

Yeah, the CPA talent actor, you know, very, very. I mean, they went to central casting and they're like, we need an accountant to talk about this. It looks pretty good on camera. We got Mark Kohler, General Motors, gm.

They saw Ben Affleck in the Accountant and mark Kohler on YouTube and said, Go, Mark Kohler. My price per minute was a little cheaper. I'm not sure, but that could have been effective also. I just kind of finally arrived. It was pretty exciting. Today was the day. I walked into the gym this morning to work out, and there was this attractive woman on the Stairmaster and she looked okay. We looked over and then it was the words I've been waiting for my whole career. She goes, hey, this is weird. I'm listening to you on my headset and seeing you in person. And I was like, thank you. Wow, that was a big day for me.

So

I just.

I didn't know your daughter worked out of the same gym as you.

Well, that was when I'm in California. Oh, that's my daughter. Yeah. And it was my daughter. Yeah, we know that's not true because my daughter would never be listening to me on her headphones. That's true. That's true.

Yeah.

Yeah. So rather than work out, I just turned around and left. I was like, I'm done.

Yep.

I was.

You don't need to work out now. Okay.

Okay. You can choose our next strategy next.

I can choose again. Okay, let's talk about paying kids.

Okay.

I love this tax strategy, because there's so many good things to this. I think many of us business owners and, you know, Mark and I are in the same boat here, guys. We are business owners, not just in our law firm and other things. We got rental properties directed Ira, a lot of other companies stuff. We're doing that for business owners. And in fact, my daughter was here last weekend. I sold 1200 books in one order. Okay. And I individually send these out. I mean, I sell books every day, you know, and Amazon fulfills a lot of them. And I send some out. My office we bought on my site, but 1200 books. So guess what? My daughter's weekend was stuffing books into envelopes and printing shipping labels. That's what looks like. And then my other daughter came in, who has been home from school in college and help stuff books. Okay. Now, I love that over age 18. What's that?

You do the over age. 18. 18 and over.

Okay, you want to do over 18 first?

Okay, yeah, 18 over. And we'll hit highlights because again, there's other podcasts on this.

Okay. So if you're 18 or older, like my older daughter here, she will help with stuff like that. She actually helps with my QuickBooks, too. I give her a 1099 at the end of the year. Okay. I 1099 er. I pay her almost 10 grand for the amount of work she's doing. She's always got to do stuff for me when I need it, like the books, stuffing them. And I take an expense from my escort. Okay. I have an s Corp expense, 10 grand. She gets a 1099. Now she picks up that 1099 on her tax return. And as a college student, she has a job down there, but she's in a much lower tax bracket, pays very little tax, if any. And I have a $10,000 expense in my business. And my daughter worked in my business with me, which I love. And she also got to learn that when you work, you make money, right? Like, it's not like you're obligated to come work in my business for free. You know, it's like, oh, when you go to work and you do this in a business, you get paid. And so there's so many benefits to it. I love it. It's a great strategy. Yep, I love it.

And let's put it on steroids. Now that your daughter has earned income, she filed a tax return. She could.

She could go get on her own health insurance, too, actually, here she could put money into a Roth ira, which is what she does, actually. So as long as she knows I pay her over 10, so she can put the full six into a Roth IRA. So now a couple points on just the paying because the year end thing is you're gonna need to do the 1099. Okay. The 1099 for services for someone over 18, your kids over age 18. That deadline's January 31st. Right. When 1099 needs to be issued. So that's what you'll need to make sure you're getting your crap together out here by year end is 1099 is for paying your kids over age 18, under age 18. It's a different process. Yeah.

And I'm going to say 18 and over, because if you had a child that turned 18 in this year you want, you can pay them what's called outside labor up until the day of their birthday, but from the day of their birthday that they turn 18, then they've got to receive a 1099 for those services, which allows. And see, I teed it up for Matt and I thought, you know, you could have taken it to the hoop with a little more finesse. But he just said, well, they could get their own health insurance. This is a big deal because a lot of parents think I'm going to keep my kids on the health insurance till they're age 26. No. Once they have some earned income, they can qualify for Obamacare, number one. Number two, they have earned income, they can fund a Roth ira. Huge. Number three, they're filing a tax return. And we're building them credit at the same time. So when they go to buy their first home or rent the first apartment, they've got tax returns in the system. They should have their own credit card that we're helping them learn how to use on occasion to build up a credit score of over 800. We're also teaching them to how to work. And we're all these little things that Matt mentioned. The list goes on and on. So make sure you listen to the podcast or get into our books and videos on paying children 18 and older under. Now, I'm going to add one last thing to massive. He said you're going to issue the 1099 in January, but you actually have to pay them. You can't say you did. So make sure that you've got to transfer the money. Now, an online transfer is fine. You don't have to do any withholding. You're just going to write a check out of your business. Now, I want to give a disclaimer here, too. If Matt's daughters Came in and worked for three months straight alongside the Rake and file employees and acted like an employee that looked like an employee, he's got to pay her like a W2 just like everybody else. But if they're coming in on a weekend like hired freelance, I need you to come do my books or I need you to come help me with social media or away from college help with this, that or another. Stuffed envelopes. That's cool. A 1099 would be fine. Now the under aging team. This is where things get a little trickier too because the kids need to have their own bank account. I've been helping clients almost every other day for the last two weeks, making sure they're saying the right thing. When they go into Wells Fargo Chase or P of A and set up a bank account without freaking out the manager of the bank and asking for a family management company account so I can pay kids there, they start to nut up. Remember, banks are on a need to know basis. Just get an account for your kids, regular checking account, debit card. I know if they're under age 14 it can be hard at some of the banks. Again I talk about this in books and videos and please do a little bit of research on that. And you do not want to pay them out directly out of an S corporation. We're going to pay them out of a sole proprietorship or an llc. But again, if you're single with single stay at home mom, stay at home dad or working mom and dad with divorce with kids, as long as they're dependent of yours or your offspring, your actual child, you can put them into a payment arrangement where you don't have to withhold suda food if I care. Workers comp. So make sure you know the rules. But you've got to go through the process with an online transfer at the least before year end. Now, can a kid under age 18 have a Roth IRA now?

Absolutely. Kid under age 18 can definitely have a Roth IRA. The only requirement to contribute to a Roth IRA is that you have earned income. Now there's high income people that can phase out and you guys will do the backdoor Roth ira. But for your kids, they're not going to be high income 100,000 plus phasing out. So they have to have some earned income. If you pay them six, they can put in six. Now this now there's. I don't know if you want to get into the standard deduction issue right now though on paying the kids strategy or not, because this is what it

does get tricky we need to say this. Some companies where you're going to some broker dealers where you go to set up the Roth IRA for the kids want to see the earned income proved with a W2. So your little sole proprietorship or LLC that has a rental property might have to issue a W2 to your kids. Now it'll all be zero withholdings, but they want to see the W2. And the IRS computer system might want to verify that this kid with a Roth IRA now has earned income and it matches up with the computer system directed ira. We're not going to have actually force you to produce that W2, but it would be encouraged our service at the accounting firm and you can go to any payroll service to have them get the ID numbers and kick out a W2. The second issue is you can pay these kids up to $12,400 and I'm not recommending you do that for a four year old. Going to find make sure that your kids are doing legitimate work and pay them a reasonable amount and go through the process again. All of it discussed in other videos and podcasts of ours. But if you pay them more than 12,400, they've got to file a federal tax return. Or if they have earned income of over 12,400. If Miley Cyrus at age 10 years old working for Disney had a W2 or a 1099 for more than $6,000 back in the day, she would have filed a tax return. Your kids are in the same boat. They have earned income, but they can still be a dependent on your tax return for the child tax credit.

Dependent.

This is an amazing opportunity to integrate your kids into the business again legitimately and get some awesome freaking write offs. But in 22 states, I've got the table right here in front of me. If you pay your kids more than the standard deduction, let's say in California this year where the standard deduction is $4,700 approximately, then they've got to file a state tax return. That sink in people. So you pay your kids six or eight grand, no federal return. But in the state of California, they want that child to pay taxes on the standard deduction for their earned income over 4,700. So you pay them seven grand, you got 2,300 of earned income there that you're going to have to pay taxes on at the state level.

13.

Yeah. So let me just give a few numbers here. Georgia, standard deduction 4600. California 4537. 4537. Dollars. Arkansas, $2,200.

Geez. Arkansas.

Iowa, $2,080. Kansas, 3000. Nebraska, 7000. Rhode Island, 8900. New York, 8000. So if you paid your kid 10, they'd have to pay state tax on 2, but no federal tax. So you want to make sure you talk to your accountant. And when's the W2 due? In the middle of January. And you don't want penalties for not doing the W2 process.

You.

You just can't next March, go, oh, I should have given them a W2. You're going to have problems. So paying your kids is an awesome strategy. It may cost you a few hundred bucks and some compliance, but it's okay. Deal with it. It's a freaking awesome write off. Matt, anything else to add on kids?

Yeah. No. Just remember now, if you do a W2 paying your kids, you're only doing it to report that there was wages paid. You're not paying just because you're doing the W2. There's going to be zeros on withholdings for Medicare and Social Security and all that FICO stuff. Like, you're not.

You're.

You're not having to pay into that. It's just the process of doing the damn W2. Now, there's a lot of people who don't do the W2 because there's frankly not a penalty for not doing it. And there's different schools of thought on it. Just saying. I know clients have done it many different ways over the years, but particularly if you want to make a retirement plan contribution or if you want to be make sure your stuff's just neat and tidy, do the W2, even for your kids. But just know there'll be zeros in there because you're not actually doing the full bank. Yeah.

And let me throw this out to all you accountants and lawyers that are listening. We have a lot of professionals that follow our podcast. We get ideas. We love it. Thank you for listening. Do not freak out here if you say, well, Mark, a W2 is always required. No, it's not. Oh, it is. Okay. What's the penalty if I don't do it? It's a percentage of the withholding. There is no withholding on your own kid. Well, I should still. Still do it. Okay. But the penalty is prefunctory, which means there is no penalty. In 20 years, I've never had a client audited for not doing a W2 to their kids under age 18. And definitely do not do a 1099, because now you just created Self employment income for a 16 year old, not good. So you know what, people just chill out. There's no penalty. Why are you doing this? You're doing it to check the box to make sure if there is a state tax return due or an IRA contribution that you're going to play with, that you've got the paperwork in order. But other than that, don't stress. So, okay, Matt, are the Roth contributions due by December 31?

Okay, IRA contributions, let's clarify. IRA contributions, traditional or Roth or even SEP are not due by year end. Okay. Your IRA contributions are due April 15. Your SEP IRA technically depends on your company return deadline. But Roth IRA April 15, traditional IRA April 15. Now the solo K though is the retirement account for many of you self employed people that are like, man, I don't want to just put away 6,000 bucks a year in a traditional IRA or a Roth IRA. I want to be putting 10, 20, 30, 40, 50, whatever. I want to throw up to 57,000 a year into a retirement account and maybe do the same for my spouse too and get over 100 grand in the retirement account each year. That's the solo K. We did a show on that just a few weeks ago or a couple months ago. Actually Kevin and I did one. We have a lot of content on that. Now with the solo K though, you must have it set up by December 31st. That means your plan is set up, it's adopted, it's created with the irs. You do not need to contribute yet. You get until the company return deadlines to make your contribution. But which could be March 15th if you're an S Corp, or April 15th if you're sold. Proper partnerships, what's that?

Or with extensions you can even do it later.

Plus, yeah, I mean you could be way up until September 15th if you get the extensions too, or October 15th even. But the plan must be set up within 2020. Now in our office, we're setting them up like crazy right now. We love it. It's a great strategy for self employed people with no other employees besides just spouse or business partners. So Our deadline is December 15th if you want us to get it done by your end. Because we're trying to run everyone through at the finish line here. The irs, believe it or not, does annual maintenance between Christmas and New Year's. Their system goes down. And every year. I don't get it. There's so many things happen by year end when the IRS decides to do their system maintenance. And so it's a tricky week that week. Whether you'll get anything through. So that's why we set April 15th is our internal deadline. Sorry, December 15th is our internal deadline.

Now here's the mistake a lot of people make. They just heard Matt say IRAs contributions are up until April 15th. Roth or traditional SEP contributions, 401k contributions. Or it could even be later next year based on your extensions and when your business returns due. So you think, oh, I can make these contributions next year so I don't need to worry about it right now. That's a mistake. Because if you don't have the 401k set up before you're in, and frankly I'm going to say before the IRS turns off their computer system to do their annual update, because if you don't have an ein for the 401k before the system goes down, then you didn't get a 401k done this year. Now you're stuck with the SEP next year and doing a 401k next year. So the setup is the critical date. And here's cool tips that you'll learn in these other podcasts of our podcast. You can have a 401k at work and a 401k in your side hustle. You may have your spouse in the 401k as well with you. And we're going to come to S Corps and payroll here in a minute. But if you want more write offs than the average six to seven thousand dollars and you want to do more write offs than what they allow you at work with a 401k, then you've got to think about this. And as Matt said, put it on your radar for the next week because after that it's probably not going to happen.

That's a big one though. When we get clients that are particularly new business owners, self employed, or you just start a side hustle and you've done an amazing year and it's been a weird year. I know some of you have been like, man, I got hammered this year. I don't need tax strategies. But some people have done very well and if you've had that great year, the solo K is one of the big items that's like, hey, if you really want to, if you've had great income, you can get a $50,000 plus deduction by doing this one thing.

Now, the people out there with employees, this is not going to be a good option. The deadline for group 401k setup is around September or October and next year we'll be alerting you when that deadline comes around, we can always help point in the right direction. We would love to have a more robust, self directed group, 401k available. Very tricky. There's very few of those in the country, so we're trying to crack the code on that. Stay tuned. But the Solo 401K, where it's just your spouse or you and you're single or kids, that Solo 401K is amazing. And in fact, the Solo 401K includes the business owners as partners. So a solo can be a really broad gathering, if you will, of owners and their families. But once you have any third party employees, you're in the group. Okay, now Matt, because I know I will piss you off if I do it the wrong way, because I usually talk about Roth conversions at year end and it lights up the phone banks at directed IRA and they're having to correct what Mark Kohler said. So will you provide why I talked about Roth conversions a year in, in that one unique circumstance?

Okay, let me talk about just the Roth conversion in general and we'll talk about the backdoor Roth ira. So I've actually talked to a lot of clients the last few months who have had a bad year in 2020 who want to get to Roth. This is the time to convert to a Roth IRA or go from traditional to Roth 401k, because you're going to be in a lower tax bracket. So when you convert money from traditional to Roth, you pay tax on the amount you convert. Now the reason you're going to do that, Matt, I've got $100,000 traditional IRA. I wish it was Roth. Can I do that? Yes. But you're going to take 100,000 into your taxable income to turn that traditional account into a Roth account. It's gonna suck this year. If you're in a lower tax bracket, it sucks less. You know what I mean? But in 10 years from now, you're like, I have a million dollar Roth IRA. Or let's say I have a $300,000 Roth IRA, whatever, or I've got a $300,000 traditional IRA. Guys, when you start pulling money out of this thing, the 300,000 is coming out tax free in the Roth versus 300,000 of income as you're pulling the money out in the traditional. So in the long haul, you're going to be better off generally converting to Roth. Now this is what's dicey right now with Biden coming into office saying he wants to tax high income earners, which is 400,000 or more if you're in that bracket, you may want to be converting now anyways, because you don't want to be worrying about converting next year. And is next year going to be better or not? Even if you do worse, I don't know, you're going to be at a higher rate, typically under if Biden gets his way on his tax money. So that's the Roth conversion in general.

And if I can say, Matt, to add to it, I've done a video, thank you, Luis, on YouTube that talks about the sweet spot of the Roth conversion or the 401k contribution, because and if you just Google, I mean, go on YouTube and type Kohler sweet spot conversion, you're going to find a video that will help you say, okay, once I'm in this bracket, if I convert a little too much, I'm going to make a big jump to a new bracket. So I can only convert this much and really nail it. And it doesn't take a lot of math and a little bit of planning. But you can't do this in February or March or April of next year. You have to do it before December 31st. The old rule was you could convert as much as you want and then undo what didn't make sense in the spring. And it's regrettable that that provision has been removed. That was in the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act. And Biden again says he wants to reveal the Tax Cuts and Jobs act. Maybe that will get that benefit back. To be able to recharacterize, lose the term right now, you've got to say, okay, how much do I want to convert? Now, if you're going to do a backdoor Roth ira, you first have to convert your traditional IRA money. So you may say, well, I'm just going to do a backdoor. But then you get to go do the backdoor Roth in the spring because there's no deadline to do a backdoor Roth. But then come to find out you've got some money that has to get converted first. So I think the takeaway, Matt, if I may be so bold, is to say if you've got traditional IRA money from an old job, an old 401k rollover, think about what's the plan. A Roth always beats out a traditional in the long run. So we generally want to have our clients chunking at that money, slowly converting it to Roth. And once it's all converted to Roth, then they can play the Roth, the backdoor Roth game. So there's some timing involved. Matt, was that okay?

The way I said that, yeah. And I think if many of you are like, I don't have traditional dollars, don't worry. Just do the backdoor Roth IRA for your 2020 contribution by April 15th. Okay? And I like doing mine. I do mine two years at once because I like to do it like in February where I do my 2020 contribution of six grand and my 2021 contribution of six grand. I get 12 grand in there and I convert it all at once back, basically backdoor. Two years worth of contributions. I just do that every two years. That's just easier to take care of it all at once. But if you do have traditional dollars and you're wanting to go backdoor Roth, you've got to do Roth conversion of all your traditional dollars first, as Mark saying. So based on what your tax situation is in 2020 versus 2021, you may want to convert that now rather than waiting till April 15.

Now, we'll come back to a little bit of this 401k stuff when we talk about S Corp owners, we probably saved that for the last. If you're an S corporation owner, there's a lot of little things you need to be aware of. And that's going to be our grand finale of today's show, which will involve some 401k contribution amounts because, well, we'll come to it. So hang tight. Let's talk about something fun here for a minute. I want to throw a broad, you know, cast a large net here and gather all of you into this write off. All of you, no matter income high or low, if you have a side hustle, there's a write off at Christmas time you need to take advantage of. And that's the travel deduction, the dining deduction, the board of directors, board of advisors meeting. When you're visiting with your best friends, family, no family, brother, sister, kids, mom, dad, aunts, uncles, nieces, nephews, whoever you're going to spend a little bit of the holidays with. And I hope all of you have someone special in your life that you're going to spend at least an afternoon or an evening with. Talk about your business, have a little board of advisors meeting. We call this company maintenance. We have a company maintenance program. We'll give you a list of questions to talk about. Share what your plans are for the next year. We love to have one of our first podcasts in 2021. It will be strategic planning. Share what your plan is for next year. Write it down, have a board meeting now. The travel to get to that location is a write off. Even if it's mileage in your car or an airplane ticket or a hotel, we highly recommend you do not stay with family when you do this. It'll only ruin the holidays. Make sure you stay at a best Western or 6. That way you can keep your distance from Uncle Eddie and the family members. That might drive you crazy. That's just a side recommendation, but it is a great write off.

Yeah, it's a good write off. And it's one that you might be spending the money on anyways, you know, and board of advisors is something, by the way. It's very easy to adopt. Some of you are like, well, I set up my company. I didn't do that. Hey, just adopt it in your annual minutes. Easy. We're doing that as part of a company maintenance program. We help you with your annual minutes and make sure that they're done because you do want to have a record that these people are actually involved in my business. It's not just me meeting with Uncle Eddie that has no idea what the hell it is, or he has no connection to my business in any way. Just make it a little official, okay? Take those initial steps. Get them involved in the company minutes.

I wish I could have had a talk with Uncle Eddie. He drove the rv, which could have been considered a business vehicle, all the way to Clark's house for Christmas. And his wife said that he was holding out for a management position. He'd been unemployed, but he had cut down on eating squirrel because it was high in cholesterol. But maybe he still goes out and shoots squirrels and sells them to the locals in his area. That's a small business. Now he has a board meeting with Clark and the family. The grandparents are there. And he sits everybody down and says, you know what? The police have left. Clark's boss is now back home with his wife. We're all sitting around the fire. Why don't we talk about my future business? That's a board meeting. Uncle Eddie could have had a perfect write off.

Yeah. Oh, you wanted Eddie to get the write off, not Clark. Eddie's gonna be. Eddie's the entrepreneur.

Eddie's the entrepreneur because he came, he traveled. See, Clark didn't go anywhere.

That's right.

He would write off the eggnog and some dinner. But really, Eddie is the opportunity there. He's there. Business, work trip. That's right.

I think Uncle Eddie's kidnapping services. You know, I will kidnap your boss and torment them and make you money. You know, help with the negotiation. Now, let's just call it consulting Services to improve your pay, you know?

Yes, yes. Now, if you're one of the one to five people in the history of America in the last few years who have not seen Christmas vacation, you're probably not appreciating this analogy in any way, shape or form. But if you're like most average Americans, you've seen Christmas vacation, do it. Okay, Matt, next write off equipment.

Let's hit DD plan. Just to wrap up, I just want to make one quick note on. Let's say you're like Matt Mark, I mean I crushed it this year. I made 500,000 plus. I want a big deduction. I got a lot of cash available because I made a lot of money this year. 57,000 in a solo K doesn't excite me. I need more. Okay, you got the defined benefit plan or DB pension plan strategy. But again, the plan must be adopted and created, set up before December 31st. And now if you have employees and such, sometimes you can do DB plans. It's going to be tricky to get it done by for 2020, but this is kind of a self employed person with no employees or even business partners. You could be looking to do the DB plan and getting 2020 tax section. We've seen clients getting putting over $300,000 sometimes into these plans to fund them, which creates a $300,000 tax deduction. Now, it depends on your age and your income. It's not just like 57,000 is the max, like the solo kit. It's just cut and dry. There's some determinations on how that works because it's more like a pension plan, but that's the DB plan. A lot more should be said on that. In fact, we'll be doing a podcast episode on that early next year just on how DB plan, cash balance plan. Some of those more high end larger plans can work, which by the way you can self direct, which Matt, I

should bring up the 401H. This is like the health saved account on steroids. And the super wealthy use strategies like this. It's called a 401H plan that can be fully deductible to cover the employee's medical perpetuity, which is you. Now the structure of your business has to be taken into consideration. The defined benefit Plan and the 401k are part of usually a package where you're getting some significant write offs. Now these are for the super high income earners, but we have those clients come call us every day and they're like, I need something more and my accountant hasn't got anything. And the stockbroker, my broker dealer, they don't care. They just want me to harvest losses in my retirement or harvest is my portfolio, which is stupid.

Yeah. So

think of the 401H or the DD plan. If you're looking for a write off of over 2 to 300 grand, that's on your. If that's in your wheelhouse, give us a call. Another one that's. I like how we're bouncing between the high income and just the average business owner. Let's go over to the average business owner again for a moment. Which is really me. I'm kind of a bread and butter main street kind of white trash kind of guy. I like the prepaying strategy. A lot of farmers, I grew up in a farm community. Farmers are classic for this. In fact it can be overreaching. They'll go out and buy crap they don't need. And we don't want to let the tax tail wagon. If you don't need another combine, don't go buy one. If you don't need an SUV or a truck, don't go buy one. But if it makes economic sense, you can buy equipment in your business that can be bonus depreciated. You need to pay for it before you're in. Make sure the check is written and it's paid for and it's out. You know you've shown that you've made the acquisition. In some instances you need to show delivery. Other times you can prepay for expenses where the checks in the mail. For example, you might prepay for rent. You might prepay for any ordinary business expense. Marketing. We always like it when clients prepay legal services. Those go into a trust account anyway. But we're not asking you to send us money. But any of those business expenses you normally incur, write a check, get them out the door, prepay them before year end. If you're going to write a check in the first week of January, write the check before December 31st. The fact that you're going to get that time value of money and the benefit of tax savings and the use of that tax money that you would have sent to the IRS for a whole year could be a really nice strategy.

Yeah. And the IRS has some rules on some of those things. As long as it's used within the next 12 months, which in December, if you're paying it, I mean that could be a lot of things that you get services for over the year of 2021 that you get the expense in 2020. A number of ones that I think are common are insurance. Many of you have an annual insurance premium that you just elect to pay monthly. Just pay the whole year annual policy or go look at where you're at on business insurance policies or even policies for your rentals rent. If you're in a business that has a location to rent, obviously some of your services and things that you receive, get those things prepaid and just make sure you're up to date. If you owe someone money in the business and you've had a great year, you want tax options. Get Everybody paid by December 31st. Look at doing some incentive pay if you have a business owner with employees by year end. There's a reason why a lot of small businesses pay Christmas bonuses and year end bonuses. They're expensing these things at year end and getting those deductions on their, on their returns. So.

Okay, I'm trying to look up. We said this a little bit Matt earlier but I wanted the flexible spending account for those of you that have the user or lose a plan. We referenced that and said if the company's giving you one, use it, don't lose it. I'm trying to look up what the. There's kind of a grace period by up until March 15th that if you didn't use it they usually. And I'm just going to guess people, you want to look into this so you're not caught unaware. So I'm not going to stand behind this. Usually around $750 that you have this makeup or this catch up that you can do with your flexible spending account before year end, I mean before March 15th. So keep in mind that you've got a little bit of a leeway. But I wouldn't say it's no more than $500 to $750 if you don't use it all before December 31st. So look into that, call your employer and say how much can I turn in in receipts before March 15th and can do. Gosh, I just can't find it. Okay, Matt, is it time to go to the S Corps?

Yes. Now, did we talk about equipment? Do you want to mention anything on just equipment besides auto?

That was. Yeah, that was what I was getting to on prepaying equipment. You could do bonus depreciation. Let's just think of some of the things that you might do if you're in the medical profession. You might be buying certain medical types of equipments and MRI units a big deal. But I was talking to a doctor the other day. He's like every little piece of equipment in my office is at least 100 grand. Now it's just a huge industry. If you're in the restaurant business, ho ho, you probably haven't cracked you down again. But let's just use that as an example. You might be buying some ovens or certain fridges or equipment. If you're a manufacturer, there could be equipment. If you're in farming, if you're in our little studio here, if I'm going to go buy a new camera or some lighting or another monitor or this monitor bank behind me, you might want to make a run to Home Depot or Best Buy or Apple store in the last week of the year and get some things for your business. I don't know Matt, what comes to your mind? Anything else that might be.

Yeah, I just think even the general office, you know, you're a real estate agent. The supplies you have, laptop, you know, maybe it's the. For the iPhone 12, you know, I mean just a lot of the basic stuff that are things that you could be actually using in your business that could even be side hustle related are things to just kind of stock up on now. And if you've had a good year and take the deduction in 2020.

Yeah. Trigger cartridges, paper. Go down to Costco, go to Staples, load up on any of that stuff. And if you do have a regular vendor that you pay for things, pay them for January at the end of December. Again, if you've had a good year, you're like, hey, I might as well dump this cash and get a write off dollar for dollar. Okay, the last one is the S Corporation. I think that covered everything on my list except. Yep. Boy, Matt, do you want to kick it off? What comes to mind for you? I've got seven things that an S corporation owner should think about. You choose any and I'll just keep filling in the blanks.

Let me start with the basics. Okay, you need to do a W2 for yourself. Okay, you need to be thinking about that. Now if you're in an S corp, you already know I'm supposed to be doing payroll. I'm doing it quarterly, let's say, and at the end of fourth quarter is when you want to tidy up. What's my total salary going to be for the year? Now it's been a tricky year. Some of you business owners like, hey, I've had a crap year. I'm going to take a little less salary than I was thinking maybe you bumped down your fourth quarter payroll. So if you had a Great year. You might need to bump up your fourth quarter payroll and say, ooh, I was going to take maybe a $70,000 salary. Maybe I got to bump it up to 90 this year because I've had a great year. I don't know where you're at. And there's the Kohler payroll matrix, which is not to be used without the written consent of Mark J. Kohler Enterprises. And is the Kohler payroll matrix. That kind of goes over how to set that. We've got the Power of the S Corp podcast to listen to on how you use the S Corp in more detail. But payroll for yourself now in connection with when you're deciding how much payroll you're going to take.

Okay, I'll hold it, Matt, before you go to the next one, Matt really made two points on my list. This is very important. He said you've got to issue your W2, which includes a W3, and your 941s and your 940. There's this little package of payroll documents that have to be sent off to the Department of Labor and the IRS in January. There's this kind of this. Every payroll company and accounting firm is swamped in January getting 1099 out the door. And payroll, payroll, payroll reports. So what Matt said is really two different things. If you got an S Corp, those reports are due even if they're zeros. There's penalties for not filing those payroll reports. Make sure you engage with the service company to take care of. We provide that service. Nanette is our payroll director. Give a call, see what we can handle. We usually get maxed out on how many clients we could serve during that period because it's very overwhelming. The second point Matt is Matt made was the dollar amount. Those are two different things. You may decide. I'm not taking any payroll. I had a crappy year with COVID You still have to do the reports and there's penalties if you don't. Even if you're shutting down your company, there's reports that have to be done. So those are two distinctions that reports and then the dollar amount themselves. Okay, then, Matt, you were saying there's another decision to be made.

Okay, yeah. As you're thinking how much of the salary to take when you're doing your salary dividend split or salary net profit split here you want to factor in, am I making a retirement plan contribution? If I have a solo K, how much am I throwing in? Am I going to do 19:5, which is the max employee contribution. The employer contributions going on the Company return. Okay, the employer part, sometimes people call it the master. The employer contribution part which is 25% of, of what your self employment income was or W2 is that's going on your company return. But the, the employee contribution needs to be on the W2. Okay, there's a box for it where it's going to get indicated. Even if it's Roth, there's a box for it on the W2 itself. So now you do not technically have to put the money in when doing this on the so on your W2 you'll need to put the money in by the tax return deadline for the company. But you still need to pre plan to know what it is. Like I'm going to do 19.5, put 19.5 on the W2. Just make sure you get it in when you do your actual tax return before the tax return deadline.

Now one of add an amendment to Matt's point is remember you don't have to make the contribution, you just have to make sure the amount is on the W2. And if you have and if you later go, oh I can't put that much in or I want to put more in, you have to amend your W2. There's usually a cost with that. With at least a service provider there wouldn't be a penalty, but there's a cost to it. So you want to go, how much do I want to put in my 401k upcoming year for this year to get the write off that has to be designated on the W2 in box 13. Now that doesn't mean you might know There's a box 12, a box 13. There's codes. I don't want to get in a fight with those payroll experts out there that are like, well Mark, you can put it in this box. I'm just saying they're in that. Those boxes on the W2 where you're going to decide was there a Roth conversion, how much was Roth, how much was traditional. Those are all things that and let me clarify, a Roth conversion scenario is not going to be on your W2. I apologize for saying that. But when you do the contribution on the 401k amount, you may say, well, parts traditional, parts Roth. Well, that has to be designated in the W2. But the contribution, the dollar amount actually put into the 401k bank account doesn't have to be until next year, which brings up health insurance. Health insurance premiums have to be listed on the W2 as well. So I've been telling clients, make sure when you Call your payroll provider. You tell them how much your health insurance premiums were for the year, how much you want to put in the 401k, how much is traditional, how much is Roth, and all that's on the W2. Okay, Matt, next. S Corp Strategies. Do you have anything else you want to add?

You got to decide if you're going to pay your spouse.

Love it. That was mine. Next.

Go ahead. I stole that one from Mark. He told me about that one before we started the podcast. But I'm going to take some credit for it. All right. Now, the general rule is don't add your spouse just to pay them. Why would you add your spouse to payroll? You file a joint return, it's just going to be the same on your taxes, not like paying your kids. Where your kids file a separate return could be in a lower tax bracket. So why am I going to pay my spouse to make a retirement plan contribution for them? Maybe. Maybe I have the solo K and they're going to throw money in the solo kids. Okay. That would be a reason to pay your spouse if they're going to contribute and that you're in the S Corp in particular, which again is the most popular and you should be doing, if you're a small business owner making money, add them on for W2 if they're going to make contributions themselves into the

solo K. And then again, there's a sweet spot here and I tend to make. This is the PG13 portion of the show. I tend to point out that if you're going to search YouTube for the spouse sweet spot, make sure you add coler in the 401k that might come across your screen. So, but there is a sweet spot here because I don't want to pay my spouse too much and pay fica. So usually the dollar amount is around. The perfect amount I think is around 24,000 because then you pay your FICA and then. And it's actually around 23 and then you get the 19 5. So that way the spouse's W2 ends up being 0 if it's your traditional contribution. So the company gets a sweet write off of around $23,000. The spouse gets a W2 for 0. They end up with 195 in their 401k and you still have a matching opportunity next year. So there is a. You got to be strategic on that dollar amount.

Yeah. And I'll say this because sometimes people ask, well, I want to start paying my spouse so my spouse can get Social Security. No, don't do that. Dumb idea if someone told you that. Don't listen to any advice that person gives you, okay? Don't add your spouse just for them to get Social Security. There's a spousal benefit that's 50% of whatever yours is. If you have a non working spouse anyways, just drop, try some money to drop them in on a W2 just so they can get Social Security.

And if you're like oh my gosh, did I hear those guys say not pay my spouse because they don't need to worry about Social Security for my spouse. Yes, we just said that. And I have a whole chapter in my book Business Owner's Guide to Financial Freedom. The Business Owner's Guide to Financial Freedom. Not the average American W2 workers guide to financial freedom. So our 95% of our clients, listeners and followers listening to our podcast have a side hustle or a main operational business or rental property. That's why we wrote the book. Check out the chapter on Social Security planning. Next number six. If you are an LLC this year and you had a surprising year, the COVID pandemic played right into your master plan to take over the world which

is very online business, maybe you know, delivery business.

We had clients that the COVID was the best thing that ever happened to the business. And I know that sounds very obtuse or rude to say because some people lost everything. And I'm sorry there's there but it's been a very unique year. There's been winners and losers on both ends of the spectrum. Well, if you had an LLC and you're paying way too much in self employment tax and I just had a meeting with a client yesterday on this. Oh my gosh. You might want to do a retroactive s election to 11 20. And yes, you can do that. There's a rev proc that allows for that procedure. An accountant worth their salt in any way, shape or form should know what to do and how to do it. If not, call us. So you can make an s election effective 11:20 and then get your payroll done by the end of the year. In January is the reporting deadline and you're off to the races. That is a year end deadline. You can't wake up in March and go oh, I should do an S election back to January 1st, 2020. It's too late. It's not going to happen because you missed the payroll period reporting. Talk to your accountant if you're a candidate. All right, now final number seven strategy. Let's say you're a sole proprietor for 2020. You didn't have an LLC. You're not allowed to do a retroactive S election. This payroll thing sounds wonderful if you were on the bandwagon, but you missed the boat. Can you miss the boat and the bandwagon? I don't know. I guess.

I think you can. Yeah.

You can miss both. Let's say you live in Seattle on an island, and you missed the band bus that was on the ferry. Therefore, you could have missed the bandwagon and the boat all at the same time.

Yeah, I don't even know what a bandwagon is.

Well, I was in band in high school.

You were in band in high school? I did not know this.

You did not know that?

What did you play?

I was a band geek.

Did you play, like, keyboard or. What did you play? French horn? Clarinet. You know what?

You're offending a lot of our listeners. I don't appreciate it.

I know Mark plays the piano. You know I do. I heard him play piano. I'll come back to this on another show.

I'm gonna take the fifth on that. My senior year.

It was trombone, wasn't it? Trombone.

This is totally. This is not fair that you're gonna put me on the spot.

All right, okay.

I played the bit. I played the bells. No, I'm just. Okay. No, but I was a band buddy, so, yes, I had missed the band wagon. I've got some pretty good amazing band stories that have gone past the statute of limitations. So it could involve getting the entire band bus drunk before a game, but that's a whole other story. We'll have to go down somewhere.

But,

okay, if you missed the bank bus for 20, and you did not have an S corp, and you did not have an llc and you made a bunch of money, then your deadline to get on the bus for 2021 is January 1st. You want to get your new S corp set up, so make sure you get a consult with our firm or the paralegal setup through Susan Co. And the paralegal team. But you want to make sure you're setting up your S corp now so it's effective January 1st. You don't want to call us at mid January, and, oh, I need an S corp. It could very well not be effective till February 1, and now you just screwed up January. So make sure you're getting your S corp set up for January 1st. That is my last tip with a major deadline. We took a few.

Yeah, that's. And let me say, this is not all inclusive, but we're trying to hit the great. This is like the greatest hits of the year end deadlines to know about. There's a lot of other tax strategies you should be doing and be considering. And you know, we're going to come back to those. We've got other podcasts on them, but focusing in on things you gotta be clear about by December 31st. Hopefully this is helpful. And there's one or two things that you picked up on that can make a big difference on your tax return for 2020.

You know, that was 16 tips. We're gonna have to title this podcast 16 Year End Tax Strategy Deadlines that you may not be aware of.

I like it.

That blows out any. I'm not kidding, any fricking stupid Wall Street Journal affiliate contributor article where they say three year end tax strategy tips, you know, harvest your tax losses in your portfolio. Oh my gosh. That's not even one of our 16. It's so ridiculous. Okay. All right.

Well, thanks everyone for making it through on the Main Street Business podcast. Go to mainstreetbusinesspodcast.com to learn more about the show. If you want to get questions in for Open Forum, which we do every few weeks now, you can submit the questions@mainstreetbusinesspodcast.com and wherever you're listening to this podcast, please like it. Subscribe. Give us five stars. Whatever thing they do on the podcast channel you're listening to, it does help other people find the show and helps other people save taxes and better live the American dream. So thanks for being with us.

Thank you. Happy Holidays.