Throwaway because I really need advice for an epic fuck up that I want address it asap. And I'm super anxious about it.
I'm a US citizen. I have not filed Federal or State taxes for many years, probably since 2004, for reasons I won't get detailed about (a couple of hospitalizations for mental reasons, for which I didn't have insurance, and a bankruptcy, and then having to climb out of a deep emotional/financial hole and find employment after a big outage/resume gap). I have been mostly consistently employed since about 2007 though, and have had taxes and social security withheld every year. So I haven’t filed but I’ve paid federal taxes and SS through payroll deductions.
I need to start cleaning up this mess and would sure appreciate input on how to proceed.
I have W2s for every year. However I had two periods of unemployment (about 1 year in 2004 and about 3 months in 2018) for which I have no documentation. I also cashed out an 401K in 2018 for which I might owe taxes. I’m 64 so there was no age penalty. I expect to work until around 70 if that’s relevant. I’m employed now. And since I work in IT I’ve made a decent income during this time span. (Retirement is another subject; let’s not go there now.)
That’s just for federal taxes. I’ve lived in many states so I likely owe some state taxes too.
And while I have all W2s (aside from unemployment periods) I don’t have documentation for banks, 1099s and such. I’ve really only had checking accounts and some 401K though, not high interest accounts.
Anyway, I’m obviously terrible with financial shit and pretty overwrought about this, so I don’t expect to get this resolved alone. I will need to hire some kind of tax professional; I don’t know if they should be a CPA, EA, tax attorney, other? Would the IRS itself be helpful?
Advice would be great on where to start and what type of professional to hire. Thanks very much.
Submitted March 28, 2020 at 11:03PM by Birdbilly https://ift.tt/2WSzBJM
