Steadfast Care Planning

Tax Tips for Caregivers & Long-Term Care Planning with Jennifer Zimmerman

January 24, 2023 Kelly Augspurger Season 1 Episode 12
Steadfast Care Planning
Tax Tips for Caregivers & Long-Term Care Planning with Jennifer Zimmerman
Show Notes Transcript Chapter Markers

Tax Tips for Caregivers & Long-Term Care Planning 

Join Kelly and her guest, Jennifer Zimmerman, Tax Senior Manager at GBQ Partners.

In this episode: 

🔹 Threshold for claiming loved ones as dependents on tax returns

🔹 Credits and deductions for caregivers

🔹 Medical expense and long-term care insurance deductions

🔹 Gift tax

🔹 Tax tricks for those at retirement age

🔹 How IRS contacts you. Beware of scammers.

          

Watch this episode on YouTube:

https://youtu.be/9OJu_vAekHA 
 

Find out more about GBQ Partners and Jennifer:

https://gbq.com/columbus-ohio/   

This episode was recorded in Nov 2022. Tax laws are subject to change.

For additional information about Kelly, check her out on Linkedin or www.SteadfastAgents.com.

To explore your options for long-term care insurance, click here.

Steadfast Care Planning podcast is made possible by Steadfast Insurance LLC,
Certification in Long Term Care, and AMADA Senior Care Columbus.

Come back next time for more helpful guidance!

Kelly Augspurger  0:02  
Hey everyone, welcome to Steadfast Care Planning where we plan for care to live well. I'm your guide, Kelly Augspurger. Today I have with me Jennifer Zimmerman. Jennifer is a tax Senior Manager at GBQ partners, a top 100 tax accounting and consulting firm based in central Ohio. Welcome, Jennifer, thanks so much for being here!

Jennifer Zimmerman  0:22  
Thanks for having me, Kelly. I'm excited for this conversation.

Kelly Augspurger  0:25  
Ditto. Well, today, everyone, we're gonna be talking about tax planning in retirement and long term care. So Jennifer, I know before we even begin, you're gonna give us a little disclaimer.

Jennifer Zimmerman  0:36  
Yes, so every presentation that I give, we try to kick it off by saying the rules that we're going to talk about are subject to change. In my world, especially in the last few years with COVID rules and different guidance, different credits were popping up here, there, and everywhere. So the rules that we're going to talk about are current as of the date of this recording, and any rules that we talk about that you think might be specific to your situation, please consult your own tax advisor instead of taking them for fact. Be sure that you're talking to someone that knows what they're talking about.

Kelly Augspurger  1:11  
Right. Yeah, important disclaimer and now let's get into it, Jennifer. So you know, tax planning, it's a thrilling subject, right? Most people just love talking about taxes. Yeah, not so much, but really important, especially I think in retirement and when you're approaching retirement, and when we're talking about planning for extended care. So I'm really excited to jump in here with you, Jennifer, and, and really get some good advice here. So first question for caregivers - what is the threshold for claiming your loved ones as dependents on tax returns?

Jennifer Zimmerman  1:50  
This is a great question. And so I think it helps to understand what benefits you get by claiming a dependent. I think when we're thinking about dependents, usually you think of your children. I work with a lot of taxpayers, a lot of business owners, and so usually when we're talking about dependents, you're looking at those rules as it relates to your own children. But when you're talking about elderly parents, it's possible that you could claim those people as dependents also. Now there's certain thresholds, they do either need to be a specific family relation to you. So your parents, think your family tree, you can't be claiming someone that you met at church the other day and decide to give a gift to, like the family member relation there. Or you're providing more than 50% of that person's support, and they're living with you, so think under your own household. I have had situations where in addition to elderly parents where maybe they've met that relationship threshold, even if they didn't have the relationship threshold, if they're under your roof, and you're taking care of more than 50% of their support, and you meet the other criteria, you can claim that person as a dependent. Now, that being said, the dependency benefits have changed recently. So under the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act at the end of 2017, the Trump Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, you used to be able to get more of a benefit for claiming dependents than you do right now. That law is set to sunset at the end of 2025. So really, when we're talking about dependents, we'll get into a few credits and deductions that when you're thinking about dependents, you can keep those additional benefits in mind. But as far as like racking up all these dependents to claim on your tax return, the benefits have kind of changed over time. 

Kelly Augspurger  3:40  
Got it. Okay.

Jennifer Zimmerman  3:41  
So I think another thing that comes into play when you're talking about can you claim those dependents or not, is the filing status that you can claim with the dependents. So generally speaking, if you're married, and with filing statuses, you look at what you are at the end of the year. So if I'm married at the end of the year, then I would claim a married filing status, either married filing joint or married filing separate. Generally speaking, when it comes to the amount of income and the rates that they're taxed at, married filing jointly is the best that you can get. 

Kelly Augspurger  4:11  
Okay.

Jennifer Zimmerman  4:11  
Now, that being said, if you are a single person, but you have an aging parent that you are taking care of, you might be able to qualify for the head of household status, which in the terms of the filing statuses that are most beneficial is just below married filing joint. So it's better than filing single, which is what you would have to claim if you did not have that dependent, and it's not as good as married filing joint but you can't get there anyway if you're not married. So something to keep in mind is if you are caring for that aging parent, you could get that additional benefit through your filing status.

Kelly Augspurger  4:47  
Okay, I did not know that. That's a great tip. What about are there credits or deductions for caregivers that should be considered and what are the rules and limitations involved with that? 

Jennifer Zimmerman  4:58  
Sure, so there are definitely both credits and deductions. And before I get into some of the bigger picture ones, let me just talk about what the difference in between that and deduction is. So generally speaking credits are more powerful than deductions because credits can offset dollar for dollar taxes. Deductions are offsetting your income. So when you think about how you get to your final tax due amount, you have your income less your deductions, that taxable income number in this big picture, but you would take that taxable income number, multiply it by your tax rate, and that gets into a whole other conversation that we won't get into here. But that tax rate, taxes due, you take that taxes due less the credits, and that's what you would actually pay. So deductions are not as powerful as credits. 

Kelly Augspurger  5:46  
Okay. 

Jennifer Zimmerman 5:47
So when we're thinking about what caregivers can benefit from, we really want to start looking at the credits because that's where you get the most bang for your buck. There's two big ones and the rules for this have changed significantly. They were much higher for 2021 only, for 2022 and forward, they're about half of what they were in 2021. The first one is the Credit for Other Dependents and so this is a counterpart to the Child Tax Credit, if you know people that have children that benefited from that one. The credit for other dependents is really for - think of anyone that has dependents that aren't children. So broadly, kids 17 and over or in the situation that we're talking about, if you have aging parents or other people that you're taking care of where you would claim them as a dependent, then you could look at this credit for other dependents, it's $500. So the $500 credit can offset dollar for dollar $500 worth of taxes that you owe. So it can be really powerful. And that again, you would look to the dependency rules that we talked about previously. And if that person qualifies as your dependent, then you qualify for the credit. There's another credit available and this one is a little bit more broad. In my world, I more see it when you have parents whose children are in daycare, but if you have aging parents, where you need someone else to help take care of them while you work, you could look at the Child and Dependent Care Credit. And so the difference between the Credit for Other Dependents and Child and Dependent Care Credit, the crucial part of the difference there is the care. So if you are paying for the care of the person, so that you can work, then you would want to look into this credit. The credit there, the way it's calculated, you would look to the qualifying costs. So if you have a caregiver come to your home to take care of the aging parent, or that type of thing, up to $3,000 per person, or $6,000 for two or more dependents is qualifying costs that would be eligible for the credit. And then the credit is 20% of that amount. So if you're talking about $3,000, 20% of that credit, $600 is your credit. And so there again, the credit, it's money that you're spending anyway. So if you can get the credit for the money that you're spending anyway, it's a good deal to have for tax purposes. So like I said, I see it in daycare, a decent amount as far as the cost that qualify, but Kelly, could you speak to the triggers for long term care, because I think that there's overlap here, the way the rule is written is that the person must be physically or mentally incapable of self-care. So if you're talking about little kids, check, but I think if you're also talking about aging parents, there could be things to look for there too.

Kelly Augspurger 8:49
Yeah, you're right and I equivalent that to adult daycare because there are many adult children that do drop their aging parents off at adult daycare during the day, maybe it's six hours a day, maybe it's eight hours a day, so that they can go do their job. But when you have a qualified long term care insurance contract the triggers to be able to actually use those benefits and collect on those benefits, it's very standardized. And so what that means is if you need help with two out of the six activities of daily living: transferring toileting, bathing, dressing, eating, incontinence, just two of those, or you have a cognitive impairment, and you need substantial supervision and your expected need of care in either of those situations is to be more than 90 days, that really signifies long term, then that would trigger, that would allow you to qualify for benefits. Now you don't need both the cognitive and the physical impairment, it's one or the other. Now sometimes you will have both, you may need both, but sometimes it is just going to be one or the other physical or cognitive, so those are the triggers.

Jennifer Zimmerman  9:54  
Well and there's a lot of overlap here right?

Kelly Augspurger  9:56  
Yeah.

Jennifer Zimmerman  9:57  
In what you need for what qualifies for long term care and then what the IRS says qualifies for this type of credit and the cost that you would be spending to care for the individual. So it's kind of two sides of the same coin really.

Kelly Augspurger  10:11  
Yeah, agree. 

And now for a brief message from our show sponsor - the Steadfast Care Planning podcast is sponsored by the CLTC, Certified in Long Term Care training program, which gives financial advisors tools to discuss extended care planning with their clients. Look for the CLTC designation when choosing an advisor.

Do you want to talk about medical expense deductions?

Jennifer Zimmerman  10:33  
Sure, so I think this is the most common one that people assume they have a benefit for ad we really have to do the math on. So I have many clients that and I think this is kind of the stereotype of when you come to your tax person, you bring your shoebox of receipts. I have many people that bring me their shoebox of medical expense receipts and what I try to remind them of as I'm looking through their papers, is there's a floor on that deduction, meaning that if you're looking at your overall income, the amount that you can deduct has to exceed 7.5% of your adjusted gross income. So broadly, your income, if we do easy math, you have $100,000 on your return, that 7.5% floor means that you can only deduct the amount that exceeds $7,500 of expenses. So I have some taxpayers that bring me their shoebox and we add it up and it doesn't pass that threshold. Now, that being said, I think you want to look into making sure that you have gathered all the costs that qualify. So it's not just, you know, general medical expenses, your dental work, you know, eye care, all of that qualifies, hospital bills, insurance with some caveats. And I know we're going to get into how do long term care premiums factor into this, and we can talk about the thresholds there, but that 7.5% percent floor is important to keep in mind as the starting point for what you can deduct. 

Kelly Augspurger  12:05  
Now good record keeping is a big deal, right? It really matters. So you want to keep track of all this throughout the year.

Jennifer Zimmerman  12:10  
Exactly and I think too, the more organized you are, the more of a benefit you might be able to claim because me as your tax person, I can come in, I can try to pull everything that I can, but in the shoebox example client, I'm going to look through and be like, I think they paid this, you know, like trying to find the number, but especially when insurance comes into play, I think if you have kept records of this is what I paid after insurance and this was the insurance cost and all of that, it would make your tax person's day and keep good records for them to do the math for you.

Kelly Augspurger  12:47  
That'll make a big difference. Yeah.

Jennifer Zimmerman  12:48  
For sure. I think too the other thing that comes into play with this one is you don't necessarily have to claim a person as a dependent under the rules that we talked about before in order to claim their medical expenses if you're paying those on their behalf.

Kelly Augspurger  13:02  
Okay.

Jennifer Zimmerman  13:02  
In one specific situation, if the person that you're caring for makes too much money, so before I spoke about the person has to make below a certain dollar amount in order to be claimed as your dependent, that's $4,000ish. If that's the only reason that you can't claim that person as a dependent, you can still pick up their expenses for the purpose of this deduction. And so this is where it gets kind of complicated, right? Like, you'll want to have a qualified person to help you walk through your overall situation, and then tax benefits available to you. Even if you it seems like you might not qualify for all of them. Maybe you qualify for some of them.

Okay, so you really want to get in the nitty gritty with your tax professional and ask these questions. Hey, even if my dependent if their income is too high, what else could be on the table? What can we take advantage of and use for our benefit?

Exactly. Yep. 

Kelly Augspurger  13:58  
Okay, great. Jennifer, let's talk about long term care insurance premiums and potential deductions that people can could take. I know you already said that there is that 7.5% floor for medical deduction. So let's get into that. If you are an individual taxpayer who is itemizing deductions, there are age brackets and there are deductible premium limits if you have long term care insurance, correct?

Jennifer Zimmerman  14:27  
Yes, correct. And I see this a decent amount for people that have already started to plan for retirement, plan for that long term care. They're paying premiums now. And so when you're thinking about that total pool of medical expenses that can qualify to see if you can kick past that 7.5% floor, long term care premiums can be something that you can consider in the pool, subject to certain thresholds. So I think as with everything else that we've talked about, the rules are constantly changing. But as an example, if you have an individual that's already paying into their long term care, they can deduct up to $480 if they're 40 or under, 41 to 50 that number increases to $890. 51 to 60, the amount increases again to $1,790. And so on and so forth, you can get to a point where if the person is paying into long term care insurance, they're paying those premiums, the highest amount that you can deduct is $5,960 if you're 71 or older.

Kelly Augspurger  15:31  
Right, adjusted for 2023, I think we should make that clear, too. That's as of 2023. So, you know, every year, we typically see small changes, typically. So that is something that you do want to consult with your tax professional, but I would imagine that it could be difficult for individual tax payers to be able to do that, because you have to itemize your deductions in order to take advantage of that, right? 

Jennifer Zimmerman  15:56  
That's right. 

Kelly Augspurger  15:56  
So maybe it's not as often as you would hope or think it would be, but the real benefits we see and I see are when we have business owners, right?

Jennifer Zimmerman  16:06  
That's right because then you're moving from that deduction being on Schedule A as an itemized deduction, to it can be part of their self-employed health insurance deduction that isn't subject to the same thresholds that we've been talking about with the 7.5% percent floor. Now, it's still subject to those specific dollar amounts that we talked about that are indexed for inflation and change every year, but you can deduct it, we call it above the line. So before you get to your adjusted gross income that factors into how your tax is calculated, it can be deducted there without being subject to the 7.5% floor, so self-employed people. Yeah, they do get more of a benefit here.

Kelly Augspurger  16:47  
Right and can you briefly explain that above the line a little bit more? I mean, it is more of advantage when it is above the line then when it is below the line. So can you break that down for the listeners? 

Jennifer Zimmerman  16:59  
Sure, so there's a couple of benefits that come into play that I think of when you talk about the difference between above the line and below the line. One is your starting point for your Ohio taxable income, and for many states is your adjusted gross income. So you get the benefit of that deduction on your Ohio return, for those listeners that are in Ohio, if it's an above the line deduction. You also can get the benefit because above the line comes into play before you get into either your itemized deduction or standard deductions. And so the lower we can get that adjusted gross income, then all the various thresholds that are derived from AGI, we shorten it in tax world, the lower you can get that, then the lower your various thresholds are that other things are calculated on. Big picture, I think of it as you've got income, you've got above the line deductions gets you to adjusted gross income, then you have itemized deductions or standard deduction and we'll not get into that, but it's an either or not both, gets you to your taxable income that then taxes based upon taxes due less the credits that we talked about before.

Kelly Augspurger  18:12  
Right.

Jennifer Zimmerman  18:12  
is what you actually pay.

Kelly Augspurger  18:14  
I think the main takeaway here is if you think that there might be potential deductibility for your long term care insurance premiums, you definitely want to talk to your tax professional about that, but the most beneficial and advantageous way to actually get those deductions is if you're a C-Corp, right? 

Jennifer Zimmerman  18:34  
Yes. 

Kelly Augspurger  18:34  
And then self-employed business owners, employees, and then lastly, I would say individual taxpayers who itemize deductions, correct?

Jennifer Zimmerman  18:44  
That's correct. Yeah, I think especially when you're talking about business owners versus employees and that sort of thing. As far as the amount that's deducted and what's taxed and what's not, it really depends on the specific business structure. And then we kind of take it from there, so specific to your own situation, you can run it through with your tax person and go from there.

Kelly Augspurger  19:07  
Yeah, one thing that we do love about the long term care insurance is that there are these potential deductions upfront, but then the benefits are tax free, up to per diem limits, if you've got a cash policy, unless your actual expenses are more than that, and you can prove that, but what a great benefit, right, tax for you benefits that way you're not having to convert assets to income, and then you're paying taxes on that, but you're guaranteed, okay, I know that when I receive a check, or you know, care is paid for, I don't have to worry about paying tax on that.

Jennifer Zimmerman  19:39  
That's right. And I think too, with a lot of taxpayers the inclination is to think I got this money. So what do I do about it with taxes? I see this also with life insurance payouts, like, "Oh, I've got this big payout. What amount of this is taxable?" And like the long term care situation that you just talked about, life Insurance also isn't taxable when you receive it. So It should be a win there for taxpayers.

Kelly Augspurger  20:04  
Right. I do want to hit on too it depends on what type of long term care insurance policy you have. If you have a traditional policy, that's pure insurance, it's just strictly long term care, that is going to be different from if you have a linked benefit or a hybrid policy where you are combining long term care coverage with, let's say, life insurance in the form of a death benefit or cash value from an annuity. So there are a handful of linked benefit policies where they will actually separate those charges for the long term care coverage and then for the life insurance coverage. You cannot get any deductions from the life insurance, right, at any time. It has to be strictly on that long term care coverage. So if you're even investigating long term care insurance, and you're looking at a linked benefit solution, you want to ask, you know, are these charges separate? Am I paying separate premiums for the long term care portion of it and the life insurance portion of it? Because that way, you can hopefully get some type of deduction there.

Jennifer Zimmerman  21:07  
That is a great point because yes, the main thing that I also try to remind people of is, when you're talking about life insurance, the premiums are not deductible, so the proceeds will not be taxable. Whereas with long term care insurance, it's a bit more murky, because you might be able to get the benefit of those deductions that you're paying over time, if you meet the thresholds that we talked about previous So yes, thank you for that clarification.

Kelly Augspurger  21:32  
Yeah. Thanks, Jennifer. Okay, next, if you're providing a substantial amount of support, do you need to worry about gifting? What is a gift tax? Who has to pay gift tax? And would it come into play do you think in any of the scenarios we've talked about?

Jennifer Zimmerman  21:45  
So this is a great segue from what we were talking about previously, as far as if you're getting a benefit, is that taxable income to you? Every year, I get questions from taxpayers that say, "Hey, you know, I have this family member that passed away, they left me this money, is that taxable income to me?" And the answer is no, because and when you're talking about gifting, what teed us up into this conversation, that amount is only taxable to the person that was giving the gift. And so when you're talking about gift taxes, you want to look at the person's entire lifetime of giving, including in their death via their estate. I'll pause right there, though, and say, most times, I do not have taxpayers that are actually paying gift tax because the thresholds right now are so huge. So right now you can give away $12 million, it's almost $12 million, it's like $11 point something million dollars that you can give away in your lifetime, including at your death without paying any type of gift or estate tax. You know, if you are the type of taxpayer where you have that level of assets, then work with a financial advisor, work with that qualified team to help you figure out how to navigate the taxes that you'll be paying. But by and large, most taxpayers do not have that level of wealth that they're concerned about paying estate or gift tax. You can also give away, right now, the limit is $16,000 per person for 2022 that you can give away per recipient per year, that doesn't even start to eat into that $12 million number that I talked about.

Kelly Augspurger  23:32  
Could that be, Jennifer, so could that be let's say, I am retired, and I'm uber wealthy, and I've got five kids, and I want to give a gift to each of my kids and their spouses. They're all married. Can I give a gift of $16k to each child and their spouse, like separately? So really, they're getting $32,000? 

Jennifer Zimmerman  23:51  
Yes. 

Kelly Augspurger  23:51  
Okay.

Jennifer Zimmerman  23:52  
And you can do that every year, and the threshold changes every year, but you can do that every year, and not even start to eat into that $12 million number. 

Kelly Augspurger  24:01  
Oh, wow.

Jennifer Zimmerman  24:03  
You know, wealthy taxpayers are doing those annual gifts so that they can get the benefit of that, but that's where I like to caution people. Don't think that even if you have a year where you have a person that gets a benefit from you, that's above that $16,000 number I talked about, there's still no tax that comes into play, you just probably want to file a gift tax return to kind of show that you're eating into your lifetime exclusion amount.

Kelly Augspurger  24:29  
Okay, cool. Jennifer, what are some common tax tricks for those of retirement age?

Jennifer Zimmerman  24:34  
So the biggest thing that I see that's relevant to what we've already been talking about is that your Social Security benefits are not taxable by the state of Ohio. So even if that gets included in your adjusted gross income, there's a specific line on the Ohio return where you can back that up. So that's kind of part one. Another thing that I think the listeners of this podcast might benefit from knowing is, if you're a retirement age where you're needing to take required minimum distributions (RMDs) out of your retirement portfolio, you can gift directly out of that if you have, if you're charitably inclined. So think about if you would be giving to your church anyway, you can direct for part of that required minimum distribution to go directly to the charity of your choice. And then that amount is not included in your income and you get a double benefit from that because you're not paying federal tax on it. And if it's taken out of the required minimum distribution, you're not paying state tax on it either. Now, where I see people get a little bit confused, is they might think, well, wouldn't I get the benefit anyway if I was just writing the check and sending it to the charity? The problem with that is that it's subject to the thresholds that we've been talking about, as far as are you taking the standard deduction, or are you itemizing, and if you're taking the standard deduction, that check to the charity of your choice, you're not getting a benefit for and so essentially, you're paying, you're not getting the state benefit, either. So you're paying more tax than you need to if it came directly out of your required minimum distribution.

Kelly Augspurger  26:15  
Ok so great tip. Love that!

Jennifer Zimmerman  26:17  
Yes, I try to double check any of my clients that have a situation where they have both the required minimum distributions, and they're writing checks to charity, like, can we marry these up so that you can get more of a benefit there?

Kelly Augspurger  26:31  
That's so great.

Jennifer Zimmerman  26:32  
So the other quick caveat that I think the listeners of this podcast might benefit from that I'm seeing a lot in the news is, I think there are many scams out there pretending to be the IRS as far as how they will contact you. So you know, maybe you have a grandparent or a parent who's getting calls from someone claiming to be the IRS saying that they owe all this money. We cannot caution the people in our lives enough to pause and and do a fact check in these situations because the IRS is not going to call you out of the blue, they're not going to call you out of blue asking for money, especially if they have never sent a letter anything saying, this is something that is owed to us. These scam artists really prey, I think on people's insecurities or not even insecurities, they're preying on the vulnerability of people and trusting. And so I think just knowing that the IRS is never going to call you out of the blue. They are always going to send something in writing. And in all my years of doing tax work, taxes in general, the only situation that I know of where an IRS agent has shown up at a client's home to talk about taxes due was a very specific payroll matter because the IRS gets more sensitive when it comes to payroll taxes not remitted properly. So even talking about you know, we're going to come to your door and demand this money. That's just not something that people that the IRS does.

Kelly Augspurger  28:02  
Beware, right? Tell your parents, your aging parents, your loved ones, anyone that you have in your in your life, maybe older adults, do not send them money if they say that, you know, your grandchild is held hostage and they are in jail, and you they need X amount of dollars, even if it's not the IRS, it might be someone else too, right? I've heard that line before from multiple people that you know, "Oh, my grandma, she got a call from someone saying that, you know, her granddaughter was taken and and she's in jail, and they need $10,000 to get her out. And you know, keep it top secret because of the shame and the embarrassment." No, those are scams, don't do it.

Jennifer Zimmerman  28:40  
Yeah, well, I think there's so much information out there that these predators can pull upon as far as the names of your family members and the names of in the case of a grandparent, they can find the names of your grandchildren. And so when they make that call, it sounds very credible because they have a lot of information that they can get off of the internet. And so just being sure that especially when it comes to taxes, the IRS is always putting out alerts, like we will not call you. And so to the extent that you or a family member are getting those calls, don't fall for it, take a beat and talk to someone that is familiar with your tax situation, so they can help you think through the next steps.

Kelly Augspurger  29:18  
Yeah, any other advice, Jennifer, on how people can plan for care to live well in relation to tax planning?

Jennifer Zimmerman  29:23  
So I think the the biggest thing that I see this time of year, because we're talking about year end planning and that type of thing, take a look at where you are now versus where you expect to be in retirement. If you think your income is going to go down in retirement, then what are ways that you can defer income until you're in retirement, so pay less taxes. Now, if you're able to contribute to, you know, retirement plans and that type of thing. If it's the reverse and you expect your income to be higher in retirement than it is now, what are ways that you can accelerate more income now? For retirees, there's lots of levers that you can pull as far as maybe you want to pull more from your retirement now because you think your income is going to change over time. Think through where we are now, where we will be then. If you feel passionately about tax rates going up or down, you know, take that into consideration and go from there. There's a thing that I try to remind people of too. There's three ways to reduce your tax burden. You either want to defer income, accelerate deductions, or find those credits that we've been talking about. And to the extent that you can pull any of those levers that will help your tax situation.

Kelly Augspurger  30:38  
Well, Jennifer, how can people learn more about you and how you help people?

Jennifer Zimmerman  30:41  
So I like to tell people my primary client base is business owners and their businesses. At GBQ we help a lot of people though. And so to the extent that you have anything weird pop up with anything that sounds like accounting, chances aren't we have a department that can help with it. We have business valuation team, we have forensic accounting, we have all kinds of cool stuff that I know sounds way cooler than taxes, but we also do a lot of tax work too. And you can find me on LinkedIn, Jennifer Zimmerman, and that has my contact info too.

Kelly Augspurger  31:18  
Great. Well, Jennifer, thanks so much for being here today. Have a wonderful weekend!


Intro
Threshold for claiming loved ones as dependents on tax returns
Filing status
Credits and deductions for caregivers
Triggers to collect benefits from qualified long-term care insurance
CLTC commercial
Medical expense tax deductions
Long-term care insurance tax deductions
Above the line deductions explained
Long-term care insurance tax deductions for businesses
Tax-free benefits from long-term care insurance
Tax deductions vary depending on type of long-term care insurance
Gift tax
Common tax tricks for people at retirement age
Beware of scams
How people can plan for care to live well
Contact info for Jennifer Zimmerman