Taxes - Sorry for the dupe

[Peter Bowen]

LOL - gotta love the old and new list addresses in a reply all - sorry 
for the dupe.

-Peter

Peter Bowen wrote:

> Sasha - First let me say - RIGHT ON!  Owning your own business will 
> either be the best thing you ever do or the worst, and planning makes 
> all the difference in the world. I use Turbo Tax for the operating 
> system that cannot be named, but Intuit has a web quicken as well.  
> The prior points about keeping good records, and keeping two accounts 
> are good - however the only reason to do an LLC/S-Corp is for 
> liability protection - and you will pay for the privelige in 
> additional bank accounts, filing fees, paperwork, etc.  For a simple 
> consulting situation, a sole propriter will be easiest.  Use cash 
> based accounting and it's a breeze.  Basically, you're going to report 
> cash in as income and cash out as expenses.  This is exactly the way 
> that your W2s work.  A simple accounting program should be sufficient 
> and you'll be able to spend time making money instead of account 
> manipulation.
>
> BTW - Turbo tax will handle a sole propriter just fine, and in many 
> cases being an LLC will not shield you since anyone who will loan 
> money, lease space, etc. will ask you to personally guarantee your 
> obligations.
> Oh - Finally, I've had good experience with Hawkins, Cloward & 
> Simister in Orem.
>
> Good Luck,
> -Peter
>
> Sasha Pachev wrote:
>
>> Hello, everybody,
>>
>> This is going to be less OT than some of the threads have been. If 
>> you are a Linux hacker, you might have a consulting business. And if 
>> so, figuring out how you pay your taxes is a part of it. So this is 
>> somewhat on topic :-)
>>
>> As some of you may have noticed or heard, I am now a full-time 
>> independent consultant for the first time. Things are going well so 
>> far, except I need to figure out how I am paying taxes to make sure 
>> IRS does not hit me with a fine, and also to make sure I do not pay 
>> more than I have to.
>>
>> Questions:
>>
>> Does anybody know of a calculator that will tell me based on my 
>> expected annual income, family size and estimated deductions how much 
>> tax I owe per quarter for both state and federal taxes? I have found 
>> one on Intuit site that kind of does it, but it does not do 
>> deductions/child tax credit/etc, nor does it do state taxes. (And to 
>> keep this on topic, it has to be Linux-compatible).
>>
>> If I did fine without a CPA when most of my income came from a W-2 
>> type job, do I need one now?
>>
>> Any other tips?
>>
>
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