HSA

Financial Planning - Financial planning in general. (Moderated) 

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Subject Author Date HSA Gil Faver 08-20-2008  Re: HSA jIM 08-20-2008  Re: HSA Will Trice 08-20-2008  Re: HSA jIM 08-21-2008  Re: HSA Elizabeth Richa... 08-21-2008  Re: HSA jIM 08-21-2008  Re: HSA Elizabeth Richa... 08-21-2008  Re: HSA jIM 08-22-2008  Re: HSA Will Trice 08-25-2008  Re: HSA zxcvbob 08-22-2008  Re: HSA MyVeryOwnSelf 08-22-2008  Re: HSA BreadWithSpam 08-23-2008  Re: HSA rick++ 08-24-2008  Re: HSA rick++ 08-20-2008  Re: HSA Gil Faver 08-20-2008  Re: HSA Will Trice 08-20-2008  Re: HSA pomegranate-man 08-20-2008  Re: HSA Tad Borek 08-21-2008  Re: HSA Will Trice 08-22-2008  Re: HSA Mark Freeland 08-23-2008  Re: HSA Tad Borek 08-25-2008  Re: HSA Will Trice 08-25-2008  Re: HSA Mark Freeland 08-26-2008  Re: HSA Gil Faver 08-26-2008
Posted by jIM on August 21, 2008, 3:54 pm wrote: > > > >> jIM wrote: > >> > My thoughts- > >> > Spend money in HSA now and get current tax deductions now. > > > Money is deposited into HSA pre-tax (like a 401k) > > Money is withdrawn from HSA pre-tax (like a Roth). > > > My thought is to avoid taxes on as much of my income and spending now > > as possible. > > And because you have current large medical expenses which you will enter on > Schedule A, you will be getting another tax deduction this year, in addition > to the HSA contribution. Is that the trend of your thinking? > What makes you think I can deduct on schedule A? The medical bills thus far for kids have been mostly covered by insurance. How much expense would need to be out of pocket to put on schedule A? -------------------------------------- Misc.invest.financial-plan is a moderated newsgroup where Moderators strive to keep the conversations on-topic for financial planning. Other posting guidelines include a request for brevity and another for trimming posts to which we respond. For all of the other tips and suggestions, see "FROM THE MODERATORS: Posting to misc.invest.financial-plan", a weekly post now on the Newsgroup. Posted by Elizabeth Richardson on August 21, 2008, 5:11 pm >> >> And because you have current large medical expenses which you will enter >> on >> Schedule A, you will be getting another tax deduction this year, in >> addition >> to the HSA contribution. Is that the trend of your thinking? >> > > What makes you think I can deduct on schedule A? The medical bills > thus far for kids have been mostly covered by insurance. How much > expense would need to be out of pocket to put on schedule A? I was thinking you were looking to get both the deduction for the contribution to HSA and deduction for expense. How else would you be getting a tax benefit for the expense? Elizabeth Richardson -------------------------------------- Misc.invest.financial-plan is a moderated newsgroup where Moderators strive to keep the conversations on-topic for financial planning. Other posting guidelines include a request for brevity and another for trimming posts to which we respond. For all of the other tips and suggestions, see "FROM THE MODERATORS: Posting to misc.invest.financial-plan", a weekly post now on the Newsgroup. Posted by jIM on August 22, 2008, 2:46 pm > > I was thinking you were looking to get both the deduction for the > contribution to HSA and deduction for expense. How else would you be getting > a tax benefit for the expense? > > Elizabeth Richardson I was thinking HSA withdraws are tax free- so that is a tax benefit. -------------------------------------- Misc.invest.financial-plan is a moderated newsgroup where Moderators strive to keep the conversations on-topic for financial planning. Other posting guidelines include a request for brevity and another for trimming posts to which we respond. For all of the other tips and suggestions, see "FROM THE MODERATORS: Posting to misc.invest.financial-plan", a weekly post now on the Newsgroup. Posted by Will Trice on August 25, 2008, 10:27 pm jIM wrote: > I was thinking HSA withdraws are tax free- so that is a tax benefit. My point was that you'll get the tax benefit regardless of when you make the withdrawal (barring changes to the law...), so you misht as well reap the rewards of tax-deferred (or -free) accumulation. -Will -------------------------------------- Misc.invest.financial-plan is a moderated newsgroup where Moderators strive to keep the conversations on-topic for financial planning. Other posting guidelines include a request for brevity and another for trimming posts to which we respond. For all of the other tips and suggestions, see "FROM THE MODERATORS: Posting to misc.invest.financial-plan", a weekly post now on the Newsgroup. Posted by zxcvbob on August 22, 2008, 3:15 pm jIM wrote: >> jIM wrote: >>> My thoughts- >>> Spend money in HSA now and get current tax deductions now. >> This might make sense, but spending the HSA money does not result in tax >> deductions. I tend to look at an HSA as another tax-advantaged savings >> vehicle, so I would think that spending money out of pocket and keeping >> the HSA intact would be beneficial. >> I've had an HSA for 2 years and I'm maxing it out, and maxing out my 401(k), and maxing out my Roth contributions (would rather put the Roth money in a traditional IRA right now, but part would not be deductible and I don't want to contaminate my IRA.) Needless to say, there's not much money left over at the end of the month to pay medical bills, and my wife is running up pretty big medical bills each month so I put them on a credit card (paying the full balance gets me a 10% discount from the clinic, and running it thru the CC gets me rewards dollars back and easy to track statements.) Then I pay the CC off when it comes due, and when money gets tight I write myself a check from the HSA for a prior month's medical bills and put a copy of that month's CC statement in my medical expenses file. It's not as complicated as it sounds. If the medical bill does not cause things to get tight, I just pay it from general funds. The goal is to have the HSA grow over time to build up a medical slush fund (like I think it's supposed to be) but it's growing awfully slowly right now because of the drawdown. If I ever accumulate a healthy balance in the HSA, I will start paying *all* my medical expenses from it for the immediate tax savings. I'm not sure if that will ever happen, but currently I'm at least avoiding the taxes on $5650* per year without being subject to the floor on itemized deduction of medical expenses. *I think that's the number. Bob -------------------------------------- Misc.invest.financial-plan is a moderated newsgroup where Moderators strive to keep the conversations on-topic for financial planning. Other posting guidelines include a request for brevity and another for trimming posts to which we respond. For all of the other tips and suggestions, see "FROM THE MODERATORS: Posting to misc.invest.financial-plan", a weekly post now on the Newsgroup.