Tax return preparation fees (McLean, Fairfax: real estate, rental, purchase)

[reebo]

Just trying to get an idea of what you're paying, if you don't mind sharing. My mother's accountant charged $900 to prepare her returns, state and federal (including schedules A, B, D).

I know you pay for their expertise and knowledge and if that's what the going rate is here, that's fine. I'm curious. TIA

[ACWhite]

Wow. That sounds very high. Is your mom's situation so complex (beyond A, B, and D) that she can't use TurboTax to prepare her returns herself? That would cost her $100-300, and some time.

[reebo]

She’s got dementia so I’m managing her financials. It’s too complicated for me to do on turbo tax.

Thanks for your input.

[rome99]

I wouldn't pay more than $400.

Originally Posted by reebo

Just trying to get an idea of what you're paying, if you don't mind sharing. My mother's accountant charged $900 to prepare her returns, state and federal (including schedules A, B, D).

I know you pay for their expertise and knowledge and if that's what the going rate is here, that's fine. I'm curious. TIA

[FCNova]

Schedule A(itemized deductions) and Schedule B(interest income) are fairly straightforward but D with capital gains can get a little intimidating for people. It really depends how long it takes your tax preparer to do it. $100-$150/hour isn't outlandish for a CPA to charge. I could do a simple tax return in an hour or two but a really complex return could easily take 6 hours, so $900 isn't necessarily crazy. But probably your mom's return isn't that bad and you can find someone who can do it for less if you shop around a little.

[Mike From NIU]

Originally Posted by FCNova

Schedule A(itemized deductions) and Schedule B(interest income) are fairly straightforward but D with capital gains can get a little intimidating for people. It really depends how long it takes your tax preparer to do it. $100-$150/hour isn't outlandish for a CPA to charge. I could do a simple tax return in an hour or two but a really complex return could easily take 6 hours, so $900 isn't necessarily crazy. But probably your mom's return isn't that bad and you can find someone who can do it for less if you shop around a little.

What FCNova said. Schedule A can also take time, depending on which deductions are being itemized. Healthcare expenses above 7.5% of AGI can take a while to itemize and calculate, especially if the client comes in with the proverbial shoebox full of statements and receipts.


Similarly, schedule D can be simple with one or two mutual funds. However, if there are many individual stocks bought and sold, some of which may have issued dividends, with various or multiple purchase dates, it could be a challenge to calculate the appropriate basis for each transaction.


So, the $900 may be high, or it could be quite reasonable for the amount of time spent. Look at last year's return to see how many supporting schedules are provided and how many line items are used on each of the schedules. The more sub-schedules and line items, the more time it takes to complete the return.

[lovnova]

Originally Posted by reebo

Just trying to get an idea of what you're paying, if you don't mind sharing. My mother's accountant charged $900 to prepare her returns, state and federal (including schedules A, B, D).

I know you pay for their expertise and knowledge and if that's what the going rate is here, that's fine. I'm curious. TIA

We had a kind of muckety-muck tax guy over in McLean for years that cost about $950 +. We only used him because of our combined income and a out of town Summer rental property we owned.

Now with the rental property out of the picture, we're paying about $350. But we are in Southeast Virginia now. When our new tax person saw what we paid that guy the previous year, She nearly fell out. No regrets, but I really believe we were overcharged by that guy. But no one held a gun to our heads to use him.

Anyway I think around $500 for a private tax person would be fair in NOVA.

[Ffxdata]

We have the same sorts of taxes and we pay $500 and that’s with a slight discount (5%). Our guy is in Fairfax.

[lchoro]

Originally Posted by reebo

She’s got dementia so I’m managing her financials. It’s too complicated for me to do on turbo tax.

Thanks for your input.

I would get prior year's tax return and set up columns for worksheets for preparing 2016 and 2017 side by side. List the summary totals for each line on a form or schedule. Under each total that would appear on form 1040, sched A, B, D, E, etc., you could identify the details that went into make up the sum. It's helpful if you identify the source of the information, such as real estate tax receipts, 1098, 1099, etc. That is essentially what we turned into our accountant to prepare, and I eventually did away with using an accountant since I realized his client questionaire translated to line items on the tax return.

I do it about twice a year so that it's organized for the quarterly estimates and the final return.

[ACWhite]

Originally Posted by lchoro

I would get prior year's tax return and set up columns for worksheets for preparing 2016 and 2017 side by side. List the summary totals for each line on a form or schedule. Under each total that would appear on form 1040, sched A, B, D, E, etc., you could identify the details that went into make up the sum. It's helpful if you identify the source of the information, such as real estate tax receipts, 1098, 1099, etc. That is essentially what we turned into our accountant to prepare, and I eventually did away with using an accountant since I realized his client questionaire translated to line items on the tax return.

I do it about twice a year so that it's organized for the quarterly estimates and the final return.

This seems more difficult to me than entering the data directly into TuboTax—or importing some of it directly from financial institutions.