Home Based Business Tax Benefits
Home Based Business tax saving strategies should be one of your primary business goals for a successful business. Working from home has many advantages and disadvantages but one primary benefit you can derive from your home based business is your tax saving benefits. If you have a home business, you need to be fully aware that you will have a variety of tax deductions that you can claim as benefits to help offset your business expenses.Tax Benefits for home based business sole proprietors:Before starting up a business, it is important to determine the most advantageous setup for your business by consulting a tax accountant or an attorney. Some of the benefits of establishing a business as a sole proprietorship are as follows.Easier tax returns to file: Tax returns can be filed easier for a sole proprietorship because, generally, you don’t need to provide lengthy and complicated forms. Normally, you only need to fill out a short one or two page IRS form. Generally, these forms are simple enough that you can complete them yourself.Free from mandatory audit: Filing your own taxes can you a lot of money if you don’t need to pay for an external audit or to hire an Accountant or Tax Consultant to file your taxes.Dissolution of business: A Sole proprietorship may not have tax implications if you wish to dissolve your business if you don’t have a lot of business assets that you have accumulated.You can personally manage your expenses and therefore, your deductions: As a business owner, you can determine your expenses and better manage your cash flow and payroll expenses. You can manage your finances and make expense adjustments that will benefit you through your tax write offs.Healthcare for you as a business principal and your employees is a deductable expense. Normally, most Proprietors don’t realize that healthcare is a tax deduction and therefore fail to take advantage of this valuable benefit. You will need to check with your Accountant or Tax Consultant to find out the limitations on these deductions.You will need to fully understand that no matter what type of business structure you form, you will need to report your income, profit and loses and other financial information on tax returns. An advantage with your home based business is that your business income counts towards your personal income and any loses that your business incurs may also be deductible to reduce your personal taxes as well.Deductions and Claims:Additional possible deductions for your Home Based Business include your business portion of your home expenses. To find out how much you can claim you need to calculate the amount of space you are using for your business. Suppose you are using 10% of your space for work, you can claim 10% of your heating expenses for the days for deduction. This results in major tax savings.You may also be able to claim a percentage of the following expenses also. However, make sure to verify that they are deductible with an Accountant, Tax Consultant and/or with your local tax office.• Mortgage• Rent• Telephone• Electricity• Internet• Home insuranceApart from the above expenses, you may also be able to deduct these additional indirect expenses incurred with regard to your business:• Meals and entertainment for business related reasons• Advertising Costs• Business tools like computer, printer and paperIRS Restrictions regarding these deductions:To deduct expenses related to business you need to meet the following requirements.• The business space should be used exclusively for the principal business activities.• The space should be exclusive place where you meet your clients for business purposes. • The space should be used for your personal use for doing normal daily business activities (i.e. phone calls, bookwork and etc.)Home based businesses are great tax shelters. Though the expenses you incur in your home based business are tax deductible, the tax law varies from Country to Country and State to State. Therefore, you’ll need to find out from your local jurisdiction about the deductions which can you can legally claim for your specific business.