by Tammy Stoner

Created on: February 11, 2009   Last Updated: January 23, 2010

 Countless people throughout the United States put off organizing information for taxes, and then become overwhelmed as they try to organize it by the deadline. Do not take a shoebox filled with papers to the accountant, and expect them to organize them for you. This will cost you a fortune in time and money. When you follow some simple steps, you can  organize this information.

You will need to know about stocks, bonds, pensions, rental income, employment income. You will want to know about expenses related to each item. Create categories for each source of income and expense that applies to your unique situation.

Depending upon the complexity of your taxes, will tell you how to organize the information. The very first step is to organize all of your W-2 forms, and or 1099 forms. Then take a look at all of your stocks purchased and sold during the year. You will want to know how much you paid for each stock that you sold, during the year. You will want a date for the buy, and a date for the sale of the stock. Often your stock broker will have all of this information, if you don't have it handy.

Next identify any income from rental income. Determine how much money you took in each month in rental income. Organize property according to utilities, maintenance, taxes and insurance. If you have a mortgage, you will receive a statement from the mortgagee listing these amounts. If you don't have a mortgage, call the tax office and obtain the amount paid, and contact the insurance agent for the amount spent. You can also look through your checkbook and find the dollar amount. Organize property into income, taxes, insurance and maintenance.

Self employed? Consider all of your expenses of operating your business. How much did you spend for advertising, office supplies, inventory? Then look at how much income you took in each month, and then the total for the year.

When you want to keep this simple, determine your major categories of expenses. Each month, drop all of the receipts into an envelope for the category. Put them into a divided folder with a label for each month of the year. At the end of the year, just total them up. The process just became remarkably simple.

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