Out of pocket charitable deduction – e.g. ingredients for meals you prepare for a nonprofit soup kitchen. Postage for fundraising mailing.

Charity mileage – you can deduct 14 cents per mile plus parking & tolls.

Student loan interest paid by the parents

Job hunting costs

Moving expenses to take your first job

Child care credit

Mortgage refinancing points

American opportunity credit

Credits for energy saving home improvements

John Jeng, CPA

I have compiled a list of the most common tax filing mistakes that most taxpayers made.

Forget to sign your return – you must sign your taxes for the IRS to process your taxes.

Filling out tax forms with an incorrect SSN – the IRS computers will reject your deductions and credits if your SSN is wrong.

Forget to tell your CPA you took an ealy distribution on an IRA – if you are under the age of 591/2, a distribution on an IRA is considered early and subject to a 10% additional tax.

Fail to report non-deductible IRA contributions – All contributions to an IRA must be reported.

Standard mileage vs. actual expenses for business use of car – you can only choose one method when you start using the car and continue with that method until you replace the car.

Incorrectly reported estimated tax payments – if the tax payments did not match, IRS will send a notice of tx due with penalties and interest.

Exceeding the mortgage interest deduction limit – the tax laws limit the amount of deductible interest to the first $1.1 million in total debt.

John Jeng, CPA