Triumph!

So, it's been a slow week for blogworthy things but not for work.  Work has been crazy and on top of all that I wanted to get the taxes done so that I didn't have to worry about them any more.  For our 2009 taxes we had H&R Block do them ( I wouldn't give them awesome review if you were wondering) because in 2009 we sold an investment property, bought a new house, and lived in 2 different states.  Plus we had N.  So 2009 was a year where I just didn't have the confidence to do the taxes my self.

This year however, I was NOT going to pay $300-$400 dollars for someone else to do the taxes.  We didn't have anything big, no moves, no new dependants, no new jobs.  So I knew that I could do them myself through TurboTax.  I'd done it in the past before we had all the complications in 2009.  So we had all the stuff (or so I thought) together in a folder so I sat down to just get them done one night this week.  Well turns out that A and I had no put the receipts for our charitable donations, or work gear (for A) in the file so I ended up having to go through another ridiculous folder to find everything before I could to this.

So.  I went through everything and after the federal tax section was done, we were getting a refund.  Sweet!  Then I went through the state section and it said we owed a big chunk of money to the state.  I looked at what they had taken out and assumed that it was because we hadn't had enough withheld, becuase what was withheld didn't look like a lot to me.  So when A got home I was discussing it with him and he said that it didn't sound right to him and the more I thought about it the  more I agreed with him.  So I was thinking it over and we looked at A's W2 and found what we thought might be the issue.  He works in a different state than we live in.  So out of his paycheck the state he works in had been getting the taxes.  We thought at first that it was an issue with his W2.  I posted the question on the TurboTax community and A called some guys he works with to see what they had done, they live in different states as well and no one had an idea.  So we sat down to dinner. 

At dinner A and I were still talking about it and have a brainwave.  I remembered seeing something about a "non-resident" return and I realized that I probably needed to file a "non-resident" return for the state that A works in and then file in the state we live in as well.  When I got back to the computer after dinner that's exactly what the answer to my question from the TurboTax community had been.  I was super excited.  I went through and added the addition state return and guess what.  The amount it said we owed to the state we live in, dropped 97.5%!  We owed basically nothing compare to what it had said originally, plus we are getting a return from the state A works in.

I have never felt so good about myself for figuring something out in my life.  Ok, so maybe that's not true but I was really very excited to have figured this out.  My mom is an accountant and I grew up with accounting and math all around.  From helping her sort checks when we were younger to working with her on my taxes when I got older.  I would have been very disappointed in myself if I didn't figure that out.  So of course I called my mom to brag :-). 

So we are getting a good return, we owe just a little to the state we live in, and A and I are extremely happy. 

This may not have been blogworthy to all of you, but it is to me.  So deal with it.

Moral of the story here is that you CAN do your taxes by yourself and save the money.  Just make sure if something doesn't seem right you double check it before you file.  It's worth it.