10 Deductions You Probably Forgot to Claim

Are you anxious staring at your tax liability, and wondering how in the world would you be able to reduce it? Here’s an easy way to do it. If you didn’t know, deductions help you to lower your taxable income and can even lower your tax due! Here’s a breakdown of the 10 most commonly missed deductions.

Here are some Deductions you may have missed out on!

Find out if you are eligible to claim them.

Moving Expenses for Job Relocation:

Moving could be burning a hole in your wallet, especially if its for your job. Luckily, you can deduct your moving expenses for job relocation purposes. If you have moved over 50 miles, you may deduct 20 cents per mile, parking fees and tolls. You may also deduct your car expenses and the costs of moving yourself and your belongings to your new home.

Student Loan and Interest Paid:

Are your parents paying back your student loan? The IRS views this as your parents giving you the money so that you can pay your debt. If someone is not claiming you as a dependent, you could be eligible to deduct up to $2,500 of your student loan interest paid.

College Tuition:

Great news! If your income is too high to qualify for the Hope Credit or Lifetime Learning Credit and you paid college tuition for yourself, your spouse, or your dependent, you can still deduct up to $4000 on your return. This can really offset your income and cut you some slack on your tax liability.

You are not qualified if:

• Your filing status is married filing separately
• You are a dependent on another tax return, your AGI exceeds $80,000 or $160,000 if your filing status is married filing separately
• If you were a nonresident alien for any part of the year
• The education credit and expenses were already claimed by someone else

Out of Pocket Charitable Contributions:

You may be able to list out of pocket expenses you incurred while working or donating for charitable purposes. For example, if you prepare dishes for a nonprofit organization of $250 or more, you can list the cost of ingredients you purchased. Click here to find out if your charity is a tax-deductible organization.

Child Care Credit:

It is easy to overlook the child care credit if you pay your child care bills through a reimbursement account at work. You will be able to list up to $6,000 in child care expenses. If you pay your expenses through a work account, you can only list up to $5,000.

Military Reserved Expenses:

1. Travel Deductions: If you are a member of the National Guard or Military Reserve, you may qualify for a deduction for travel expenses to drills and meetings even if you do not itemize your deductions. In order to qualify, you must travel more than 100 miles and be away from home overnight. If you drove your own vehicle, you can deduct 48.5 cents per mile plus the cost of lodging and half the cost of your meals.
2. Moving Expense Deduction: Typically in a permanent move, you can deduct reimbursed moving costs.
3. Uniform Deduction: If you purchased uniforms, you can deduct the purchase price and cleaning costs. However, you must subtract your allowance from your deduction.

Estate tax on income in respect of a descendant:

If you withdrew money from an inherited IRA, you may deduct whatever taxes you paid from the amount you withdrew.

$250 Educators’ Expenses:

Both teachers and aides can deduct up to $250 they spent on books and classroom supplies. You can get this deduction whether or not you itemize.

State taxes you pay:

If you owed tax when you filed your prior state tax return, you may list this as a state tax deduction for your current tax return.

Jury compensation paid to your Employer:

In many scenarios, employers require you to surrender your compensations from jury duty pay in exchange for your regular salary during the period you were fulfilling your civil duties. Even after passing this money over to your employer, the IRS still considers this to be taxable income. Therefore, you can deduct this amount as a job expense whether or not you itemized on line 36 as a write-in above the line deduction identified as “Jury Pay.”