Personal Tax Considerations

The following checklist includes items to think about and perhaps address with your team of legal, tax and financial professionals.

• Check your wills, trusts and other legal documents to potentially change outdated information. Tax law changes or not, it's always good to review these documents annually to make sure they are drafted as you wish.


• Talk to your human resources department to ensure you are withholding just enough from your income to pay next year's taxes.


• Reexamine saving for college through a 529 plan for at least these two reasons:

First, the federal tax law now allows qualified withdrawals for private and parochial grade school and high school of up to $10,000 annually. Check to see if your state 529 plan will allow this, first.

Second, use your full annual gift tax exemption times five. You can combine five years of contributions up to the annual gift tax limit for each of the five years. (You can't make another gift to the same person during this time.)

• Did you make some money on the side? If you did, you need to report all the income, not just that for which you received a 1099 statement. This form isn't required for annual earnings under $600, but taxes are still due.

Talk to your tax professional to get a complete list of what you will need for your next tax planning meeting.