It’s that time of year again! You have to sit down with your tax return forms and financial documents and go through the long and arduous process of filing your taxes. As Boynton Beach real estate agents, we always emphasize the tax benefits that come with owning a home. We think that it is part of our responsibility to help aid our clients and local homeowners throughout the home buying and selling process, but we also like to give a few tips around tax time in order to ensure that our community gets the best returns possible. The problem is that the confusing nature of tax forms these days causes many Boynton Beach homeowners to make costly mistakes.
In the interest of helping all of you file your taxes correctly, thereby giving you more money to enjoy living in Boynton Beach, we thought that we’d point out some of the more common homeowner tax mistakes and tell you how to avoid them. As your Boynton Beach real estate agents, we want to make sure that you have no problems filing your taxes this year, and we want to help!
Make sure that you’re deducting the correct year for property taxes! On your federal tax forms, deduct the amount that you actually paid for the year, not the amount on your tax bill. Some taxing authorities work a year behind, so this method is the best way to claim the correct amount.
Make sure you don’t confuse escrow amount for actual taxes paid. If your lender escrows funds to pay your property taxes, you want to make sure that you deduct the amount that you paid into your escrow account over the entire year, not the amount your lender escrowed. The reason for this is because your lender may have escrowed an amount above or below what you paid. In order to claim the right amount, you need to make sure that you’re deducting the actual taxes paid, not what your lender escrows each month!
Don’t forget to deduct your PMI payments! If you put less than 20% down on your property when you took out a mortgage, then you had to purchase Private Mortgage Insurance, or PMI. You pay these PMI payments monthly as well, so you need to make sure you deduct that on your tax return. Remember this: once your income reaches $100,000, this deduction begins to phase out.
Keep track of all home-related expenses. From home office to maintenance and repair expenses, it’s incredibly important to keep detailed records of all home-related costs over the course of the year. Filing away documents as you go will allow you to have proof of payment if or when anything on your filed tax return gets questioned.
If you avoid these common mistakes when filing your taxes, we’re certain that you will get an accurate return this year! As your Boynton Beach real estate agents, we feel that it’s important for every homeowner to pay attention to the details when filing their tax returns. After all, owning a home in Boynton Beach comes with many tax benefits, and you want to make sure that you take full advantage of everything that entails!
If you have any questions about buying a home in Boynton Beach or what tax benefits you qualify for, don’t hesitate to contact us! We’d love to help you in any way that we can. We hope to hear from you soon!
Joy Carter and Jeff Booker
Great Florida Homes Team
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