Tax Information Photographers Should Know

Taxes suck.  If you want my opinion, hire a pro so you can spend more time doing things you know how to do.

Some tips from the self-proclaimed Tax Ninja, aka Matthew Whatley.  Click here for info on Matt.

• Keep a day planner in your car to keep track of client's visited and mileage.  Include starting mileage and destination address.  Yeah, it sucks but do it.
• Save your receipts!  Can't be bothered?  Get a separate bank account with debit card and use this purely for business only.  Don't mix the two!
• New equipment: take note of date of purchase, amount of purchase and exact name of that piece of gear (serial number if you're anal).  You can a) write off depreciation in the first year or  b) do a graduated depreciation and write it off over several years.
• If you do sell the equipment and have already written off the depreciation value in total, this is called a 179 Expense.  Essentially, you have to report this sales price on your taxes.  Which means, if you took the full depreciation deduction up front, you will need to pay back the IRS the percentage that was not depreciated.  Get it?  Good because I'm not sure I do...

I think that's about all the tax info I can handle for the day.  If you'd like to hear the rest, check out the Tax Ninja's video The 7 Common Tax Mistakes Made By Photographers.