How much for accountant services?

bingbongsmama · February 2014

Ballpark - how much would you expect it to cost for a basic return (personal not business). 2 W2's, doing itemized deductions.
Thanks

Xstatic3333 · February 2014

$75 to $100 a return. Ours charges $100 a return, but he's a trusted family accountant and we expect things to be complicated this year so it's worth it to us. We have three returns (two states) so the total is $300.

ETA-medium-high COL area

formerlyGDaisy09 · February 2014

Ours charges $100 for federal and $75 for state.

blondie42107 · February 2014

$75 total for our state and federal.

mana8503 · February 2014

$175 total where we go.

vlagrl29 · February 2014

no more than $150

bingbongsmama · February 2014

Thanks. I was quoted $250 and I thought that was high but not sure since its for the our joint return rather than an individual. We're also in a high COL area

Erikan73 · February 2014

I got prices from $88-$350 for that. Needless to say we didn't go with the $350.00 firm.

VadersValkyrie · February 2014

I just got a call from our accountant: $175 to file our joint returns. I live in CT, if that helps with COL.

JoanE2012 · February 2014

We're in NJ. I got a quote in my high COL county for $300. We drove 20 minutes to a lower COL county and paid $140 total for our joint, itemized return.

Smonet · February 2014

We pay 330!

hoffse · February 2014

If yours are basic (nothing more than your typical itemized deductions), might I suggest turbotax for $50 on Amazon.com? You can e-file for free and get your refund in about a week. It includes a state return too. If you print and mail the state return, that doesn't cost anything.

We had 5 W-2s and I go through every deduction section just in case. Took me about 90 minutes.

http://www.amazon.com/TurboTax-Deluxe-Efile-State-Refund/dp/B00F8K9MZQ/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1392862962&sr=8-2&keywords=turbotax

Just saying.

Xstatic3333 · February 2014

As a related PSA, all above-basic Turbo Tax versions are 20% off on Cartwheel this week

zzbb · February 2014

Ours was $101 4-w2, medical, school loan and interest, mortgage, retirement and several other things related to kids.

bingbongsmama · February 2014

We usually do turbo tax but I think we're doing something wrong bc the estimated return is lower than we expected even with max withholdings and having bought a house. So confused

hoffse · February 2014

bingbongsmama said:

We usually do turbo tax but I think we're doing something wrong bc the estimated return is lower than we expected even with max withholdings and having bought a house. So confused

That's possible but pretty unlikely. A lot of people assume they will get a huge return when they can finally itemize their house, but you have to have a pretty big mortgage these days to overcome what you get with the standard deduction. I think the standard deduction is up to like $12,500 per married couple per year. You would have to be spending more than that in INTEREST plus property taxes (and maybe a few things like charitable contributions) to itemize. There are other things that you itemize, but those tend to be the biggies. Point is, your grand total has to exceed your standard deduction.

In our area property taxes are pretty low. H and I would have to buy about a $325K house (with 20% down) to break even with our standard deduction given the current interest rates. It would have to be a lot higher than that for us to see a noticeable difference between itemizing and the standard deduction. Remember, deductions aren't dollar for dollar tax savings. For every dollar you deduct, you might save $0.15-$0.25 in tax.

By all means have a tax pro run the numbers again. But if you're really talking about deducting mortgage interest, property taxes, and charitable contributions, turbotax is probably spot on.

hoffse · February 2014

I should also add - if you and your spouse both work and make similar incomes, you might be subject to a marriage penalty. H and I were subject to that last year even though most of his income came from part-time jobs. It was just enough to bump us up into a higher marginal tax bracket.

smerka · February 2014

bingbongsmama said:

We usually do turbo tax but I think we're doing something wrong bc the estimated return is lower than we expected even with max withholdings and having bought a house. So confused

If you bought the house in 2013, chances are you didn't pay enough in mortgage interest yet. Wait until you have a full year's worth. Also in IL, we pay property taxes in arrears, meaning you pay 2013 in 2014 so usually the seller gives you a credit for the taxes at closing. That means in the first year of homeownership, you aren't paying property taxes. Your state may do the same thing.

formerlyGDaisy09 · February 2014

bingbongsmama said:

We usually do turbo tax but I think we're doing something wrong bc the estimated return is lower than we expected even with max withholdings and having bought a house. So confused

This is where an accountant might help you figure out if it is better to do itemized deductions or take the standard deduction. TurboTax is probably right, we didn't get as much back the year we bought our house as I was expecting. this was because H was working 2-3 jobs most the year and I had forgotten to look at what the taxes should have been on his combined income...he didn't pay in nearly as much as he should have. our property tax (our town is high) and interest basically made it so we didn't owe several thousand dollars and only had to pay about $500.

bingbongsmama · February 2014

We went through turbo tax itemized + non-itemized, looks like we get a bit more itemized. Haven't bought a program yet, just used the online version but I'll go with that amazon package if we don't go the CPA route. I appreciate the info and advice everyone!

How much for accountant services?

Re: How much for accountant services?

Choose Another Board

Search Boards