1.      Clear the clutter. As the old saying goes, “looks can be deceiving.” That’s certainly true when it comes to a cluttered home. Potential buyers need an accurate picture of the size of the house. If you’ve cluttered up your home and garage, it will be difficult for prospective buyers to get a real sense of the space. 

Get rid of the extra junk in closets, attics and basements before you put the house on the market. Pare down the stuff on shelves and tables too, and limit the gadgets on kitchen counter tops.

2.      Remove yourself from the equation.While you might be attached to your children’s school photos, trophies and other mementos, the people looking at your house won’t be. Prospective homebuyers may have a harder time seeing themselves living in the house if your personal touches are everywhere. 

Tip: don’t hover when the potential buyers are checking out the house. Buyers will appreciate a simple walk-through with their realtor without your input.

The prime residential real estate selling season is in full swing – and 2013 looks like it could be a good time to sell, depending on your situation. Mortgage interest rates are down and the National Association of Realtors reports that home sales are up, compared with a year ago.

So, while prospective sellers are making their properties look like model homes in the hopes of raking in a nice profit, this is a good time to review how taxes will factor into the transaction. With the home sale gain exclusion tax break, the profit from selling your principal residence might be free from federal income taxes (and possibly state income taxes, too). The rules are straightforward for most sellers.

With Health Savings Accounts (HSAs), individuals and businesses buy less expensive health insurance policies with high deductibles. Contributions to the accounts are made on a pre-tax basis. The money can accumulate year after year tax free, and be withdrawn tax free to pay for a variety of medical expenses such as doctor visits, prescriptions, chiropractic care, and premiums for long-term-care insurance.

Participating employers can also contribute to accounts, on behalf of their employees.

Beginning with the latest wave of auditor reports, managers of nonprofit organizations can expect to see some significant differences from prior year. Reason: The Clarified Auditing Standards became effective for audits of periods ending on or after December 15, 2012.

These new standards feature several significant changes, including new terminology and changes in the form and content of the report, which will be reflected in 2012 reports for calendar-year organizations.

The Bernie Madoff scandal, which was first uncovered in 2008, sent shock waves through the financial services community. The infamous Madoff was accused of swindling investors in a massive Ponzi scheme the likes of which had not been seen before. Prosecutors estimated the size of the fraud to be $64.8 billion. Eventually, he pled guilty to 11 federal crimes, was sentenced to 150 years in prison and ordered to pay restitution of $170 billion.

But Madoff is not the only high-profile con artist accused of bilking investors and business associates out of large sums of money. In one recent investigation, as reported by the FBI and culled from court documents, another criminal was recently brought to justice.

Employees who receive cash tips of $20 or more in a calendar month are required to report the total to their employers. These employees must provide written reports by the tenth of the following month. Employees who receive tips of less than $20 in a calendar month aren't required to report their tips to employers, but are still required to report the amounts as income on their tax returns.

So you've finally sat down with your financial advisor and answered important questions, such as do you need life insurance, how big of a policy do you need, and what type makes the most sense for you. One thing you don't want to happen after purchasing your life insurance policy is to find out the company that sold you the policy has run into financial trouble. If your insurer went out of business, not only would you be uninsured, but you would also have to reapply for a new policy at a potentially more expensive rate due to your age and health.

It’s easy to follow a long-term investment strategy in good times; the hard part is sticking with it during bad times. What should you do if you are a long-term investor sitting in the midst of a bear market? If you are holding a well-diversified portfolio, the answer is rather straightforward: stay the course.

Volatile markets can cause investors to abandon their long-term goals for risky short-term investment strategies. Volatility can range from a single-day market crash to extended periods of jagged performance. The market has undergone cycles with high and low annual returns from 38% (1995) to -37% (2008) over the past 50 years. It can be tough to stay the course in the face of such fluctuations.

If your grandchildren are fortunate enough to have you chip in with their college costs, there are a few things you need to be aware of before you start writing checks.

The most straightforward way for a nonparent to help a student pay for college is with a cash gift. Gift tax rules in 2013 allow any individual to give another individual up to $14,000 per year ($28,000 from a couple) without the gift counting against the lifetime estate tax exemption. A problem with this approach is that your contribution will be taken into consideration when the student applies for need-based financial aid. Cash given directly to a student the year before he or she applies may be considered student income, reducing need-based aid by as much as 50% of the amount given. Furthermore, money held in the student’s name is treated as a student asset, reducing aid by another 20%. Cash given to the parents also counts against financial aid, albeit at a much lower rate of up to 5.64%. To potentially avoid any financial aid impact with a cash gift, keep in mind that the Free Application for Federal Student Aid takes into account income from the prior year in determining need-based aid. Hence, consider giving the money when you know the student will not be applying for aid next year.

Given the backdrop of economic uncertainty and the rise in both life expenctancy and medical costs, prospects look difficult for those facing retirement shortfalls. Fortunately, a financial advisor can show you how pulling these key levers can help your retirement nest egg last.

If you thought that running a successful business on your own was hard enough already, think again. As a self-employed individual, defined by the IRS as someone who operates a trade, business or profession, (either by yourself or as a partner), you are required to pay self-employment tax as well as income tax. Self-employment tax consists of Social Security and Medicare taxes, similar to those withheld from the pay of most wage earners. Failure to comply with IRS regulations may result in your business operations being jeopardized. The following are a few key facts to keep in mind:

1. The Social Security tax rate for 2013 is 15.3% on self-employment income up to $113,700. Should your net earnings exceed $113,700, you continue to pay only the Medicare portion of the Social Security tax, which is 2.9%. Starting this year, the Medicare tax rate for net earnings in excess of $200,000 ($250,000 for joint filers) is increased to 3.8%.

Credit cards are magic little pieces of plastic that allow you to use money without having it, right? Wrong. The reality is that credit cards are magic little pieces of plastic designed to make money for the credit-card companies. Not being aware of your full responsibilities as a credit card holder can bury you deep in debt and significantly limit your access to credit in the future. Therefore, it is crucial for you, the consumer, to be aware of all the little details of credit-card transactions.

A credit card is a valuable convenience, since it means you don’t have to carry cash around anymore. But it definitely does not mean that you can make unlimited purchases and not pay for them, as some people may think. With a credit card, all the purchases you make during a certain period of time are allowed to accumulate, and you receive a bill (statement) for the total amount spent at the end of that time period (usually a month). Once you get the bill, you have a grace period—normally 20 to 25 days—until the due date.

As residents of areas affected by Hurricane Sandy found out, a natural disaster can bring out not only emotional hardship, but financial hardship as well. From keeping important documents safe and accessible to having enough cash on hand to get by until things return to normal, being prepared for a disaster is an important part of protecting your home and your family. It could be a natural disaster like a hurricane, tornado, flood, fire, mudslide, or earthquake. Or it could be something on a more limited scale like a power outage. Whatever the crisis, taking the steps below will help you better handle whatever might come your way.

Thirty-four states offer some sort of tax deduction or tax credit for contributions made to a 529 plan. But in 29 of those 34 states, the tax break is available only for contributions made to an in-state plan. Only in Arizona, Kansas, Maine, Missouri, and Pennsylvania give residents a tax break for contributing to any state’s plan. If you own an out-of-state 529 plan, you may be missing out on this tax break advantage, and it may be worthwhile to do some research and consider rolling your out-of-state plan to an in-state one.

By now, most people have heard about the provision in the Affordable Care Act (ACA) that may impose a penalty on employers who do not provide health insurance to their employees. But the ACA has numerous other health plan provisions and deadlines that employers must be concerned about. Below are just three, along with the deadlines attached to them.

Maybe it’s a good thing that the April 15 federal tax deadline coincides with the urge to spring clean. It feels good to throw out some of the financial records stuffing your filing cabinets. But before you head for the dumpster, make sure you’re not disposing of records you may need. You don’t want to be caught empty-handed if an IRS auditor contacts you.

In general, you must keep records that support items shown on your individual tax return until the statute of limitations runs out. Generally, this is three years from the due date of the return or the date you filed, whichever is later. That means that now you can generally throw out records for the 2009 tax year, for which you filed a return in 2010.

The IRS and construction firms are often at loggerheads over whether certain workers should be treated as employees or independent contractors. Typically, the IRS will contend that the workers are employees, while the construction firm will argue that the workers should be classified as independent contractors.

It’s not just semantics; there could be a bundle in tax dollars at stake.

The outcome depends on the particular facts and circumstances. In a new case, the Tax Court decided in favor of the IRS, even though the construction firm hired the workers on a project-by-project basis.

Under the sweeping Affordable Care Act (ACA), which passed in 2010 and was upheld by the Supreme Court last year, the healthcare system in the United States will be overhauled and millions of uninsured Americans will become covered.

The ACA has numerous provisions – some that have already taken effect and some major changes scheduled to kick in next year. Among the provisions are:

• Restricting insurance companies from denying coverage, excluding individuals with pre-existing conditions, or charging more based on a person’s health status.
• Creating state health insurance exchanges that will cover uninsured individuals and those currently covered under state high-risk pools.
• Requiring large employers to offer health coverage to full-time employees or be charged a penalty.
• Imposing a tax penalty on individuals who do not buy sufficient health insurance coverage.

Economic espionage has captured the attention of the United States government as a potential threat to the countries prosperity and national security. One court case involving an engineer stealing trade secrets from his employer’s system and sharing them with a competitor after leaving the company underlines the importance of protecting intellectual property.

Although companies take steps to protect their trade secrets and intellectual property, it is often not enough to prevent critical information from being stolen.

Trade secrets must be protected. If a company fails to limit trade secret access to only those with a “need to know,” a defense attorney can attempt to place doubt in the minds of a jury regarding the defendant’s guilt. In other words, if you don’t take steps to keep a trade secret a secret, you may lose the rights to it.

Close to 100,000 discrimination charges were filed by employees to the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) during the fiscal 2012, signaling that employers must keep up their guard to avoid being drawn into costly and potentially damaging litigation. As in recent years, the largest categories of employment discrimination accusations were retaliation (38%), race (34%), and sexual discrimination, including sexual harassment and pregnancy (31%). In releasing detailed data about complaints, the EEOC provides practical insights into potential trouble spots.

Although the specific number of complaints made to the EEOC last year (99,412) was down by half a percent from fiscal 2011, it was a banner year for the EEOC in terms of “monetary recovery” from employers through its administrative process. The EEOC collected $365 million, the largest amount ever.

Encountering stock market losses early in one's retirement years can deliver a blow to an equity-heavy portfolio. If you’ve determined that your equity weighting is extremely aggressive relative to your risk appetite, reducing risk by altering your portfolio’s asset allocation may be essential. The need to reduce the risk of your portfolio doesn’t mean you have to move money directly from stocks to bonds. As you cut back on your equity exposure, it may be wise to move money into cash and/or short-duration bonds (duration is a measure of interest-rate sensitivity), then slowly and systematically move it into the bond market over a period of several months or years. This way, you may be able to obtain a range of purchase prices for your new bond holdings.

The importance of keeping thorough and accurate records cannot be emphasized enough. If you have incomplete or no records and get audited by the IRS, it can cost you valuable deductions.

A new Tax Court case illustrates what happens when adequate records are not kept throughout the year.

Facts of the case: For the tax year at issue, Mohammed A. Rehman was employed for approximately five months at a health insurance benefits company. A Long Island, NY resident, Rehman worked as a marketing outreach representative. He left his job and became a self-employed securities trader and later created a limited liability company for the business.

The IRS disallowed many of the deductions on Rehman’s tax return for expenses he claimed to incur as part of his employment and his self-employment. The tax agency also rejected other deductions.

Estate planning laws have undergone swift changes over the past several years and may change again in the years ahead. If you're creating or updating an estate plan, it's essential that you seek the advice of an attorney who's well versed in this area. Before you hire an estate-planning attorney to draft or update your estate plan, it's important to understand your role in the estate-planning process.

Find a qualified attorney: Because your estate plan will likely need to be updated as the years go by and your personal circumstances change, it makes sense to find an attorney who practices in the community where you live. This can help you meet with him/her on an ongoing basis.

The NASDAQ recently proposed a rule that companies listed on the stock exchange will soon be required to establish and maintain an internal audit department. In response, the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) is in the process of circulating the proposal and gathering public comments. The comment period ends shortly on March 29, 2013.

If the proposal results in a rule change, companies currently listed on the exchange must establish an internal audit function no later than December 31, 2013. For companies that plan to list on NASDAQ after June 30, 2013, they must implement the internal audit function before they can list on the exchange.

A new I-9 Form, which is the document employers use to verify the identity and eligibility of employees hired in the United States, has been issued by the Department of Homeland Security. You can obtain forms now and should begin using them soon. However, you may continue to use the old forms a bit longer. Just be sure to have a supply of the new version on hand, because you must begin using them no later than May 7, 2013.

Here are more details from the federal government on this important issue:

The U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) has published a revised Employment Eligibility Verification Form I-9 for use.

All employers are required to complete a Form I-9 for each employee hired in the United States.

The IRS announced it is providing an extension of time to employers that want to claim the Work Opportunity Tax Credit (WOTC). Specifically, employers have more time – up to April 29, 2013 – to file the required IRS form to claim the valuable tax credit (IRS Notice 2013-14).

The WOTC can be claimed by employers hiring individuals who are members of targeted groups. The amount of the credit is a percentage of wages paid in the first year. The maximum credit a for-profit employer can claim is $9,600 for each worker ($6,240 for tax-exempt organizations).

Reinvestment can be a crucial component of the wealth accumulation process, as the reinvested amount compounds and grows over time. Yet if you are reinvesting dividends and capital gains (“distributions”) in funds you hold in your taxable account, it can be important to ensure that you're not paying more tax than necessary. You pay tax on those distributions in the year in which you receive them. But if you don’t keep good records, you could end up paying tax on those distributions again when you sell.

For example, say you bought 1,000 shares of a fund for your taxable account at the end of 2011; you paid $18 per share for a total of $18,000. In 2012, with the share price still at $18, the fund made a dividend distribution of $0.50 per share, or $500 for your 1,000 shares. You'd owe tax on the $500 on your 2012 taxes, whether you reinvested the money or took the cash in hand. (The taxes would be deferred if you held the fund in a tax-sheltered account). If you reinvested the money in the fund, you’d now own 1,027.78 shares: your original 1,000 plus the nearly 28 additional shares that you were able to buy (at $18) with the $500 dividend distribution. If you sell now, with the fund's net asset value at $20, you’d think you’d owe taxes on your $2,555.56 profit ($20,555.56 minus $18,000), right? Wrong. You would only owe taxes on $2,055.56 ($20,555.56 minus $18,000 minus $500). Otherwise, the $500 dividends would be taxed twice.

As the 2013 tax filing season opened, the IRS announced a national crackdown on identity theft schemes aimed at stealing taxpayers’ refunds.

The tax agency announced there were 734 enforcement actions in January of this year, including indictments, search warrants, complaints, and arrests. This follows 2,400 enforcement actions against identity thieves in fiscal 2012.

The crime has trapped scores of innocent taxpayers. Here is a description of how tax identity theft works, along with eight steps you can take to help protect yourself from the devastating results.