Get Rich Education 519: Threatening New Taxes You Might Need to Pay. Tom Wheelwright Explains.
Tom Wheelwright is back by popular demand, our most recurring guest in GRE show history. He’s a CPA, an International Authority on Tax, and Best Selling Author of “Tax-Free Wealth” amongst many other titles. We focus on the potential unrealized capital gains tax, which would tax the increase in property value even before sale. Tom explains the implications of this proposal and the broader impact on tax policy.
We cover the Democrats' proposal for capital gains tax at ordinary income rates, capital gains on gifts, and capital gains when you die.
The proposal for a billionaires tax, which would tax unrealized gains at $100 million, could potentially extend to lower net worth individuals over time.
Real estate income can result in a negative tax rate, increasing cash flow after taxes.
Learn about the benefits of working with a knowledgeable tax advisor.
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Keith Weinhold 00:01
Welcome to GRE. I'm your host. Keith Weinhold, this week we're talking about the value of the raw land that comes along with your property, the importance of an as built survey in real estate. Then it's tax topics with pro Tom wheelwright, the specter of an unrealized capital gains tax, higher capital gains tax rates, how gambling is taxed, and how to permanently reduce your overall tax burden. Today on get rich education,
00:33
since 2014 the powerful get rich education podcast has created more passive income for people than nearly any other show in the world. This show teaches you how to earn strong returns from passive real estate investing in the best markets without losing your time being a flipper or landlord. Show Host Keith Weinhold writes for both Forbes and Rich Dad advisors, and delivers a new show every week since 2014 there's been millions of listener downloads of 188 world nations. He has a list show guests and key top selling personal finance author Robert Kiyosaki, get rich education can be heard on every podcast platform, plus it has its own dedicated Apple and Android listener phone apps build wealth on the go with the get rich education podcast. Sign up now for the get rich education podcast or visit get rich education.com
Corey Coates 01:18
You're listening to the show that has created more financial freedom than nearly any show in the world. This is get rich education.
Keith Weinhold 01:34
Welcome to GRE from Essex County England to Essex, Massachusetts and across 188 nations worldwide. I'm Keith Weinhold. You're listening to get rich education before we talk taxes, let's talk about the land, the raw land, the lot that comes along with your property. Investors don't spend much time thinking about it. Yet the land is sometimes worth more than the home or structure that's on it, per the FHFA, land constitutes 32.2% of the value of the average US single family property in a metro area. Now the inexpensive land prices nationally, they are predominantly in what I'm classifying it as three US areas, the Midwest, the southeast and Appalachia well, where you have inexpensive land. Oh, that also happens to be where the cash flow for long term rentals resides. Land costs more by the water because people want water activities, water proximity and water view. So the lower costs are inland, and land also costs more by the water, because coasts and shorelines constrain development, sprawl that limits supply and a limited supply of buoys up prices. Consequently, the highest land values are mostly in the Northeast Corridor, from Boston to DC, Miami, coastal California and Honolulu. Yes, Manhattan values are flat out extortionate for raw land now, Seattle, Madison, Wisconsin and Boulder, Colorado. They are three places with really high land values as well. Seattle and Madison are on geographic isthmus. And isthmus is a narrow strip of land with water on both sides. It's interesting how Nashville's nascent population influx made its land values surge inside a cheap sea of southeastern US land values now costly land areas like these ones that I've been talking about on the coasts, they could work well for short term vacation rentals like Airbnb and VRBO, your classic waterfront and beachfront weekly rentals, but they do not work for long term rental cash flow. Texas Land values are sort of low to medium. Land near the Mississippi River and its major tributaries have low costs because rivers are efficient transportation networks, prohibitively high land costs. That's one reason, actually, why alternative building methods just really aren't as cost effective as some people think. I'm talking about things like 3d printed homes, prefabbed homes, tiny homes and shipping container homes, well, all of them have got to sit on land, just like conventionally build homes do. And there is a land cost. Talk to a tear down specialist, and they'll tell you that in some older homes, 100% of the total value is in the l and. And in practicality, it's actually even more lopsided than that. The structure can have negative value because demolition is not free. So for you to get an idea yourself, your property tax bill, it's going to show you your split. That's where you'll see the assessed values broken out for both your structure and the land. So the bottom line here is that cash flowing properties have low land values, typically 25% or less of the total property value. That's generally what you want to look for. And I swear the only thing that's more barren than raw land is the creative naming process for new developments. There is such a lack of creativity in these development names. I'm talking about names like Willow Creek Estates, stone bridge crossing, or what else do they name a new housing development? How about VISTA, view heights? They all have these idyllic sounding names that somehow just all sound like each other. Well, we're talking about raw land when you get in contract to buy a property, the seller side is expected to provide you with an as built, it often still comes in the form of an old fashioned piece of paper and as built survey, what it is is a plan view, a bird's eye or aerial view of your property. It's not a photograph, but a drawing, and it shows you the dimensions and the placement of structures on your property, and it includes things like fences and other features like easements. Now, lenders don't always require an as built before granting a loan, but it's a good idea to ask to see one before you wrap up your next deal. If you want to in your offer, you can even require that a recent as built be done by a surveying company. All right. Well, what exactly do you look for on an as built once you have one in hand, first see that the house or apartment building that you're buying is properly set back from the property lines to meet zoning requirements. If the six foot side setback is only five feet 10 inches, then you'll have to address that before you buy even if it's five feet 11 inches. Now it's possible that the jurisdiction that you're buying in will grant a letter of non conforming status, but if not, the structure is going to have to be adjusted. Another item to look for on an as built are encroachments. This is where part of a neighbor structure protrudes over the lot line and onto your property. And encroachment is really only acceptable if you're willing to grant the neighbor an easement in perpetuity for their encroachment onto your land. But why would you want to do that? The third thing that I want to mention that you should look for an as built is the existence of easements. An easement that just means that another party has a legal right to come over onto your land and use it. Yeah, and easements are actually quite common. It's not as threatening as it might sound. A common one is that as your as built would show, say, a five foot wide by 60 foot long easement. Is there that a utility company has access to. Well, that's something that makes sense. It's for the common good, but just be mindful that an easement cannot have a structure with a permanent foundation built on top of it, alright, because an electric company or a water company might have to excavate there. Most people think of easements on the raw land, but there are also aerial easements, for example, an overhead power line where the roof eaves are not allowed to intrude on that airspace. So to review what you learned so far today, the best cash flow properties typically have low land values, often about 25% or less of the tolerable property value. And an as built survey is an aerial view drawing of your property and its dimensions on an as built look to see that it meets zoning requirements like setbacks and look for encroachments and easements. It is resale properties where it's more important to look at as builts than it is for new construction properties. As we're about to bring in tax pro Tom Wheelwright shortly, business owners and real estate investors really get so many of the best tax breaks in the US Code. But you've got to know. How to find them, or else work then with a CPA that does know how to find them, that really knows how to navigate their way around the tax code, people that make high salaries pay high taxes, as much as 50% you remember I did that episode a few months ago, high salaries don't create wealth. Taxes are one big reason why, say, for example, a chiropractor makes $1.2 million a year in salary. But if that chiropractor becomes an investor by buying and selling other Chiropractic Clinics or investing in real estate, their tax rate will drop by half or more, and that's because capital gains tax rates are about half of ordinary income tax rates. So see, you don't want to be a super earner. You want to earn enough money to invest and become a super owner, but tax policy could change Tom and I will discuss that first. Then we'll talk about reducing the amount of tax that you pay. Today is a new punishing unrealized capital gains tax coming that you will have to pay. What this means is that if you have a $500,000 home, and it rises in value to $550,000 well, you would have to pay tax on your $50,000 of profit, but you haven't sold your home. So this feels so wrong, because you haven't realized any profit at all. This is what unrealized capital gains tax is. And also, where are you going to get the cash to pay the tax on your 50k of profit just because your home rose in value yet you didn't realize it? I mean, might you have to sell your home in order to get the cash to pay the tax. And then what if you though could pay the tax on your unrealized capital gain so you do pay it, but then the following year, the home goes down in value. Well, would you get a refund then? So the unrealized capital gains tax proposal is a mess. Let's learn about it and more. This week's guest is a best selling author, CPA and an international authority on tax. He's brilliant because he actually makes taxes fun, easy and understandable. He's familiar to you because he's the most recurrent guest in show history. Welcome back to GRE Tom Wheelwright.
Tom Wheelwright 12:48
thanks always good to be on your show.
Keith Weinhold 12:50
Tom probably with more than 30 show appearances here now you are 6% of GRE episodes.
Tom Wheelwright 13:00
That's a little scary. But you know, taxes are your single biggest expense, so why not?
Keith Weinhold 13:05
It's appropriate. And yeah, I guess all these appearances are certainly an endorsement of how much you help our audience. It's also a reflection of how tax and legal are not my strong suit. So it really helps to have you here absolutely the all time, assists leader in GRE history then and Tyler. An awful lot of timely tax topics going on that are probably first and foremost in more people's news feeds than they usually are. As we're here during presidential campaign season, the one that it really seems to revolve around the most is this potential tax proposal on unrealized gains. I've been around long enough where I seem to see this proposal come up more often, but it never seems to go anywhere. So first, why don't you tell us what unrealized gains are?
Tom Wheelwright 13:51
it actually goes beyond that. Interestingly enough, what the Democrats are proposing is, first of all, they're proposing capital gains rates at ordinary income rates. So they're proposing doubling the capital gains rate. That's actually as important as anything else. The second thing is, they're proposing capital gains on gifts. So if you give it, if you give your business to your child, you have a capital gains ordinary income rates. They're proposing capital gains when you die. So not only an estate tax, but also a capital gains tax. So then you get taxed twice when you die. So about 80 to 90% of your estate goes to the government when you die. If you're a business owner, as an example, then they're proposing eliminating the 1031 exchange, which would mean that on a trade of real estate, you'd have a capital gains tax at ordinary income rates. Then they're talking about this unrealized capital gains so if you do nothing but build your business or your real estate, the increase in value is subject to capital gains taxes at ordinary income rates. Now you know their proposal is, we have this tax. Tax when you're over $100 million that is not seem to be in the news feeds right now, but that's what it is. They call it the billionaires tax, and they're calling it an alternative minimum tax on billionaires. But clearly, 100 million is not a billion. That's only a 10th of a billion. And the biggest issue, of course, is if you tax unrealized gains at 100 million, soon you're going to tax them at 10 million, then it's going to be 1 million. Because history. That's the history of our tax law. The history of our tax law. Remember, in 1913 when we passed the 16th Amendment, it was passed because it was only a tax on the rich, right? It would never have passed if it was going to be a tax on the average person. And yet it passed. Because great, we're okay taxing somebody else, as long as it's not our tax. We're okay taxing somebody else. That's pretty much what's going on with this unrealized gains tax is, oh, well, it's on somebody else and they have enough money. It's no big deal. Therefore, I'm okay with that, because why shouldn't they pay more tax? That is what this is about. The challenge is, is, as we saw with the income tax, eventually it will reach the average person, or at least the average entrepreneur, real estate investor. Because think also, let's say that you build your wealth in real estate, and then when you retire, you say, Well, look, I don't want to be doing active real estate anymore. I'm going to trade my single family homes or my apartment building. I'm going to trade for a Walgreens a triple net lease, well under their proposal, that would be taxed because, again, no 1031 exchanges over $500,000 so that means that if you accumulate your wealth through business or real estate, you pay a much higher tax rate than if you accumulate your wealth by investing in Wall Street through a 401k because if you invest in Wall Street through a 401K, you only have to pay tax as you pull that out, you're not going to be paying tax on the value. Now that's assuming that they don't tax the increase in value of your 401K, which is also obviously a possibility. Interesting enough people talk a lot about the constitutionality of this. The challenge with that is that we already have taxes unrealized gains. If you're a dealer in stocks, in securities you do mark to market, that is meaning that you're going to pay tax on unrealized gains. And so there is actually precedent for this, and that's the scary thing, is that they could point to that precedent and say, Well, wait a minute, it's just an income tax, it's not a wealth tax, that's what they're going to say. They're going to say it's an income tax, not a wealth tax, because it's on appreciation, and appreciation is income. That's how they're going to go down this road. Will it start at $100 million Absolutely, that's where it will start. Will it then drift down? Who knows? But likely that's the history of our tax system. Yeah. I mean, we've talked before about the phenomenon of the camel getting its nose under the tent. However, in this case, I didn't realize there's already precedent for unrealized gains, in a sense, as potentially, if this is approved for those with $100 million net worth, and in next it's 10 million net worth, $1 million net worth and so on, like you described there, when you talk about capital gains tax rates being stepped up so that they're at ordinary income tax rates. It's actually somewhat of an interesting philosophical discussion, in a way. It sort of makes sense that a person's gains from investment could or should be taxed at the same rate as one's income when they go to their day job. However, why don't we do that by lowering income taxes rather than doubling capital gains? Wait a minute, no, because it's a double tax. Let's say that you're a business owner. Why does your business increase in value? Well, because you're making income, but you're already being taxed on that income. It's called income tax. What we do in this country, which a lot of countries don't do, by the way, is we tax it a second time. We call that a capital gains tax or a dividends tax. We tax it twice now. Now we're going to have that second tax at the same rate of the original tax. So if you think about it, you're being taxed on the same income twice because it's your income that determines your value, so you're being taxed twice. It's really not the same. It's fine if you're invested in the stock market, and that's where your capital gains are. That's a hard one to argue too much, although it does take liquidity out of the market, because the problem with capital gains tax is being taxed over 28% it's about 28% is that you actually lower the contribution to the Treasury because there will be fewer capital gains. There will be so many fewer capital gains that you actually lose money. The Tax Foundation, taxfoundation.org, I'd refer people to, has done lots of studies on this, and it's very clear. Here that high capital gains rates actually reduce the amount of money that comes to the government. So this is purely political. This has nothing to do with let's generate more revenue, one of the challenges so you have to score this, right? So that means that you're scoring what's the revenue that's going to be produced? You have two types of scoring. One is called static scoring. The other is called dynamic scoring. Static scoring means that we're going to look at the capital gains we already have, and we're just going to, if we double the rate, we're going to double the revenue. So that's assuming that we're going to have the same number and amounts of capital gains as we add at the lower rates, right? Dynamic scoring means that we're going to take into account how people behave motivationally when you double the tax rate. Yeah. Well, let me give you an example. So I'm a business owner. My wealth is in my business primarily. Do you think, really, I'm going to sell that business and take the capital gains immediately and be done with it? But if I have a high capital gains rate, I'm going to sell this over 20 years. So I'm actually going to defer my capital gains as long as I can, because I don't want to pay those high capital gains rates. So that means less money to the government. That's what it means. So it actually reduces on a dynamic scoring if you look at truly how people behave and have behaved in the past. So this isn't a new thing, right? We've had high capital gains rates before. It's not like we don't know. It's not like we haven't seen this before. It's that, for whatever reason, politically, they've decided that, wait a minute, the rich are out of favor. We need to tax the rich more. That's a very popular line, and therefore this is a way to do that, even though it by all calculations that are dynamic, it would actually reduce the amount of funds that come to the Treasury.
Keith Weinhold 22:00
That does make sense about the double taxation. Case in point, with an apartment building, if you increase its noi, you have more income than pay tax that if you increase the noi, therefore you've increased the value of the building. Consequently, the capital gains tax that you might have to pay down the road Tom, maybe current capital gains tax are higher than I thought, is the 28% capital gains tax. Number You mentioned, current or proposed. What is that?
Tom Wheelwright 22:24
Well, right now we have a 24% capital gains tax, okay, we have 20% pure capital gains tax, plus we have a 3.8% net investment income tax. Doesn't apply right now if you're a real estate professional, but applies to everybody else under the Harris proposal formally adopted Biden's plan under the Harris proposal, then you would get a actually 39.6% rate, plus 5% net investment income tax, regardless of whether you're your real estate Professional. So that is 44.6% that's the 45% the 28% number I threw out is that's the number the Tax Foundation says is the maximum you can raise it to without losing revenue.
Keith Weinhold 23:11
That puts things into perspective, as real estate investors, for a long time, we've appreciated substantial tax shelters. What are they being the 1031, tax deferred exchange, like you mentioned, that's been around for more than 100 years. Does that have any realistic shot of being shot down? Of course, Trump shot down substantial parts of the 1031 outside of strict real estate investing.
Tom Wheelwright 23:32
He did, and he actually set the precedent for eliminating it. So by doing that, because he eliminated it on everything except real property, right? I mean, actually, and even before that, there was a time, and there's still ways you can do it with paper assets. But it's not a 1031 exchange. So 1031 exchange has it evolved. It's gotten it's shrunk. It keeps shrinking. Even three or four years ago, no realistic possibility of eliminating 1031 exchange. The challenge, of course, is it would have an impact on the liquidity of the market. However, big deals never do 1031 exchange. Ever you don't see big multifamily developments sold in 1031s. The only time you see that happen is when they've used the Delaware statutory trust. And then you've got some of the investors who use it. And some of them who don't, you can do that in the Delaware statutory trust, but the regular developers, I haven't seen a 1031 done by a syndicator in years. So could they eliminate? Yeah, they could.
Keith Weinhold 24:33
yeah, that would be concerning. Are there any other presidential hopeful proposals that have to do with taxes that are germane, and our audience should know about?
Tom Wheelwright 24:41
my heavens. So the Democrats want to raise taxes by $5 trillion they want those taxes to all be on investors. And the reason I say that is because typically, people who make less than $400,000 which is their threshold, are not major investors. Most of their money goes to spending. Money. If you're making under $400,000 you can easily spend $400,000 a year. Oh, yeah, okay, that's not that hard, especially in today's world. It's a transfer from high net worth individuals who invest their money in long term projects like real estate, like energy, like business, and it's going to be a transfer to people who spend the money and they're going to spend it, my prediction is that if the Democrats get their way, we enter into a long term period of stagflation, high unemployment and high inflation. Because if you transfer $5 trillion from people who aren't spending it in the first place to be able who do spend it. You've got $5 trillion of new money going into the marketplace. Now it could depress asset values. So that could be good for investors, okay? Because you don't have as much cash available to the I'll call it the investor class, to go into real estate. If that's the case, then you have $5 trillion less, right? I mean, it's not a huge portion of the market, but it's big enough. If you take $5 trillion out of investment capital, then that would put a downward pressure on asset prices, which would include real estate.
Keith Weinhold 25:29
we're talking about potential changes to the tax code. It's always a germane discussion, because taxes are the biggest expense in your life. We're talking with Tom wheelwright. We come back, we're going to talk about the real estate tax laws as they are now, for example, how your rent income is taxed differently than your job income, and also, what are taxes like on sports, gambling. You're listening to get rich Education. I'm your host. Keith Weinhold.
Keith Weinhold 26:45
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Blair Singer 28:29
this is Rich Dad, sales advisor, Blair singer. Listen to get rich education with Keith Weinhold. And above all, Don't Quit Your Daydream.
Keith Weinhold 28:48
welcome back to get rich education. We're talking with tax pro Tom wheelwright. He's been talking to us about some of the proposals that presidential candidates have here in a campaign season, and whether these things become true or not. Sometimes it seems like just the fact that they're proposing. They're proposed, or if they get instituted at a small level years down the road, it can blow up into something bigger. So Tom tell us more about some of the proposals that are on the table.
Tom Wheelwright 29:12
So we talked about the democratic proposals, which also include things like a $6,000 tax credit for babies. It also includes an enhanced Child Tax Credit. Also includes some other there's lots of provisions in there, right? So it's a transfer. It's just a transfer of money from one group of people to another group of people. On the Republican side, we haven't talked about that now they want to extend the 2017 act. They've been very clear, that's what they want to do, which is an estimate $4 trillion so the other direction. So basically, you're talking about a $9 trillion swing between the two parties. We've never seen this before, ever in a presidential election. Now, that big of a difference, one major tax increase, one party proposing major. Tax increases, the other proposing major tax decreases in the same election. It's something that I'm glad people are paying attention to, because it's a little overdue in this election cycle. Because really, when you talk about policy, that's probably the biggest policy difference between the two parties.
Keith Weinhold 30:18
Now one thing we've learned over time from talking with you is these presidential wish lists, if you want to call them that. Well, these tax changes are things that require congressional approval, and we have a divided Congress currently. So what do you think the prospects are of really any of these things becoming new law?
Tom Wheelwright 30:36
First of all, remember, most of the 2017 act expires at the end of 2025 so something will have to be done next year. They don't have a choice, either that or is just expires, and then we're back to what we had. We have smaller standard deductions, we have alternative minimum tax again. We get a deduction for state income taxes, right? That comes back the one. We lose our 20% Small Business deduction, the only thing that stays permanent is the corporate income tax rate that was permanent in the original bill. So there is going to be something, you're right, if there is a divided Congress, and I say that if, because if one party sweeps, then, especially on the Democratic side, the Republicans don't seem to be as cohesive as the Democrats are on these things. And if the Democrats sweep, I would say, remember, we don't have Kyrsten Sinema, we don't have Joe Manchin from happening. And so would the Democrats sweep all these through, not all of them, but you're going to see a major tax increase for sure, on the Republican side, would you see the 2017 act extended? You'll probably see it, but you're right that otherwise, if it's a divided Congress, we're going to have something in between. We thought we would get a divided Congress in 2020 though, remember and we didn't. So I would not count on a divided Congress
Keith Weinhold 31:59
erstwhile 2017 Trump tax cuts in JOBS Act brought the highest marginal income tax bracket from 39.6% under Obama down to 37% as I remember it. Some thought Biden would take it back up to 39.6 but he hasn't and it's just stated 37 All right, so if Republicans stayed in power, presumably that 37% would go ahead and carry on. That's what we think about as our w2 income. Tom, why don't we talk about the taxes that actually exist today? I think a lot of real estate investors just don't understand the difference between how your w2 job income is taxed versus your taxes on real estate rent. Can you talk to us about that?
Tom Wheelwright 32:42
The reason it's confusing is because they're both considered ordinary income, right? The difference is, is that one is business income and one is non business income. Your wages are non business income. You don't get deductions against non business income, but you do get deductions against business income. So your rental income is considered business income for purposes of the Internal Revenue Code. What that means is you get deductions for taxes. You get deductions for interest, you get deductions for maintenance, you get deductions for depreciation. That's why, when you have your income from your rentals. Typically taxed much lower than your income from your salary, because you get no deductions against your salary like you do against the rentals.
Keith Weinhold 33:30
Maybe it would help to introduce an example here. I don't know if this will complicate things too much or not. If a real estate investor has, say, a single family rental property with $2,000 of rent, income, $1,000 mortgage, $800 in operating expenses. How is that tax that leaves them with $200 of cash flow?
Tom Wheelwright 33:50
You have $200 of cash flow, but then you probably have depreciation on top of that, which is a non cash deduction. And so let's say your depreciation is $500 that means you actually have a $300 loss that, in many cases, you can use to offset income from your w2 so you actually have a negative tax rate. In other words, you're making money from taxes. So actually, is that an increase to your cash flow? So it's a way to think of it is, I have $200 of cash flow from my tenant, if I have a $300 loss for tax purposes, let's say I'm in a 33% tax bracket. I have $100 of income from the government. So that means my cash flow is really after tax. Cash flow is $300 not $200 whereas if you have the same $200 of income from your wages. Let's say you have just the net, right? Let's start with the net. You have $200 well, you're going to be taxed. And let's say that again, your 33% tax rate, that means you're after tax, right, is going to be roughly $125,000 okay, under $30 so $130 we're. $300 so it's like twice as much. In fact, all of that difference is because of the tax law.
Keith Weinhold 35:06
Gosh, that was a great breakdown. I'm really glad that I introduced that example, $2,000 in rent, minus $1,000 for the mortgage, at $800 in operating expenses, again, leaving you with $200 in cash flow with that example. There's probably more going on here with taxes. Because, of course, with that $1,000 mortgage amount, some is going to be principal, some is going to be interest. In part of that interest can be tax deductible.
Tom Wheelwright 35:31
I'm assuming it's all interest, because if it were not, we'd have a higher taxable income. Remember, your principal payment is not deductible. So in your example, I was assuming that the $1,000 mortgage payment was all interest. If it was only $800 then you'd have $400 of income before depreciation. You don't have $100 loss, because, remember, your principal's not deductible, so therefore you have to add that back into your taxable income.
Keith Weinhold 35:58
Will you talk to us about how to apply depreciation to this income versus expenses. Example, is there anything else you can speak to when it comes to that $800 of operating expenses in this example, and those expenses include things like property insurance, property tax itself, maintenance repairs and utilities.
Tom Wheelwright 36:19
Right but also, for example, you might run your rental real estate business out of a home office in your home so you could have a home office deduction. You might have your use your car for the rental purposes, and then you get a deduction for your car. So there are additional expenses that aren't even in that $800 that you could pick up that would not otherwise you'd never get a deduction, and you're really not spending any more money. You're just using it for business, and therefore getting a business deduction. So it's really all about what do I get to deduct? Remember that if you own a home for yourself, you don't get to really deduct the taxes. You have a limit on how much you can deduct. So taxes are limited in deduction. Mortgage Interest may or may not be limited. Remember also that if you have a mortgage, you're limited to how much a $750,000 mortgage being deductible, whereas if you it's a rental property, it could be a seven and a half million dollar and mortgage, and you still get the deduction, so you're not limited like you are. On top of that, again, it's a business, so let's say that you put solar panels on your personal home, you'd get a 30% tax credit, but you'd get no depreciation deduction. If you put solar panels on your rental house, you get the same 30% tax credit, but now you also get a depreciation deduction of probably another 30 $40,000 in the first year. So there's always more deductions in a business setting than a personal setting.
Keith Weinhold 37:56
Well, real estate has been around a really long time. Often laugh when people talk about non conventional investments and put real estate investing in their real estate's about the most conventional investment that we can possibly think of. It's been around a long time. We think about a newer thing that people do with their money, but I sure don't call it investing. That's sports gambling, and it's something that you and I haven't talked about before. Here Tom in 2018 the Supreme Court opened the way for states to legalize sports gambling, and at last check, 38 states, plus DC and Puerto Rico have legalized at least some form of sports gambling. So now it's a more germane conversation for you and I to have than it was a few years ago. Can you tell us about sports gambling, taxes and how it's treated.
Tom Wheelwright 38:41
So remember, all income is taxable. So that includes gambling winnings. They are taxable. In fact, you'll get a 1099 just like you would if you rendered services, you'd get a 1099 or you have interest income, you get 1099 you get 1099 from gambling. What you actually have to show is that you actually have gambling losses. So you have to track those gambling losses to show the IRS that you got gambling losses. But your gambling losses can never be more than your gambling winnings. You never get to generate a tax loss on gambling. What that means is, is that if you win $10,000 during the year, and you can prove that you lost $8,000 during the year, you're going to be taxed on $2,000 but if you can't prove the 8000 you're going to be taxed on 10,000
Keith Weinhold 39:33
so you the gambler, have the burden of tracking this, and I guess tracking your losses. I'm not a gambler. How would one track their losses?
Tom Wheelwright 39:42
I would keep detail ledger. Personally, I probably have a separate bank account just for gambling. Gosh, I'm not a gambler either, so that's what I would do. I would have a bank account just for gambling, by the way. It's also a good way to budget your gambling so they, you know, get in trouble, right? So just set up a separate bank account. Don't put whatever money you say, I'm comfortable with this money, I'm going to gamble with this money put in that bank account, and then you have a ledger that shows the money that went in and the money you lost, the money you won, and don't do anything but gambling in that bank account.
Keith Weinhold 40:15
Hey, that separate account's a great way to hide it from your spouse, not that I'm suggesting. Not bad.
Tom Wheelwright 40:22
Interesting. You went there.
Keith Weinhold 40:23
I'm not a gambler at all. Can't even believe I was thinking that far ahead. What are the gambling tax rates like?
Tom Wheelwright 40:31
They're ordinary income tax rate. So gambling winnings are just ordinary income. They're the same as your wages. They don't have social security taxes their income, just like any other kind of income, nothing special. And this all applies to whether it's sports gambling or general gambling, like lotteries and sweepstakes? Just remember, all incomes taxable unless the government says it isn't all income, okay? And then there's some types of income that are taxed at special rates, like capital gains, but gambling has no special rates. By the way, gold also has special rate for when you sell gold, it has its own tax rate. Gambling has no special tax rate, so it's just your ordinary income rates.
Keith Weinhold 41:11
To me, it seems like it's hard to break even with gambling over time, and then when you take the tax adjusted earnings that you get from it, you know, over the long term. I just don't think Harris and Bally's Casino is really incentivized to inform gamblers on how punitive this can be with ordinary income tax rates applied to gambling winnings.
Tom Wheelwright 41:30
No, but they will send you your 10909g I guarantee that, that's for sure.
Keith Weinhold 41:34
Well, Tom has helped business owners and real estate investors permanently reduce their taxes. He does it like virtually no one else in the world does by keeping it simple, by helping you find deductions that other CPAs can't do. You can learn more about how Tom and his team can actually help you. You can get a free consultation. You can do that at getricheducation.com/tax. And Tom tell us more about the importance of a business owner or a real estate investor or anybody else really being connected with the right kind of tax professional that can permanently reduce your taxes.
Tom Wheelwright 42:12
So remember that if you want to change your tax, you have to change your facts. It's that simple. What you have to do is you need to know what facts you need to change. That's where a good tax advisor comes in. Is what facts do you need to change in order to change your tax now good news is, wrote tax through wealth. So you got an idea of what that is, but the tax law is very detailed. You must dot your i's cross your t's, so to speak, so that you make sure that you meet all of the rules, such as documentation, for example, for your business expenses. When you do that, you're going to get a better tax result, especially if your tax advisor is also preparing your tax return. Because really, your tax return is just part just how you implement your tax strategy, right? That's how you do it. So we launched, just recently, a franchise of tax advisors, and now we actually have much, really good control, quality control with our tax advisors, and they use our software system. It's very important that you have somebody, if not us, find somebody who you know you can actually give tax free wealth too, and say what cares make sure that we're doing it this way. But if the easy button is really the getricheducation.com/tax.
Keith Weinhold 43:27
Tom Wheelwright, It's been valuable as always. Thanks so much for coming back onto the show.
Tom Wheelwright 43:33
Thanks, Keith.
Keith Weinhold 43:40
Yeah, key insights from Tom as always, taxes are complicated. Tom's Network helps sort it out for you. We've already covered a lot of ground on this week's episode with raw land values as built, proposed tax plans and how to reduce your tax burden within the existing tax system. Tom and I talked, and he will be back yet again with us later this year for more tax wizardry. Now, just recently here, Kamala Harris proposed a smaller capital gains tax hike than Biden. She's starting to put sort of her own policy spin on things, breaking with the President on the size of a proposed increase on the capital gains tax rate that is a 28% top tax rate when investments are sold for those that make a million dollars plus. So that's more than the current 23.8% top rate, but less than the 39.6% rate that Biden had supported all income is taxable. Therefore it is axiomatic that the fastest way to increase your ROI is to work with a tax advisor that can find you all of the biggest deductions right away. You can read Tom's book Tax Free Wealth, get a good system of documentation going and get connected with Tom's team. At the end of an episode at times, I like to leave you with the most actionable resource on the topic that we covered. You can schedule a free call to see how Tom's team can help you out. At getricheducation.com/tax. That's getricheducation.com/tax. Until next week. I'm your host. Keith Weinhold, Don't Quit Your Daydream.
45:33
Nothing on this show should be considered specific, personal or professional advice. Please consult an appropriate tax, legal, real estate, financial or business professional for individualized advice. Opinions of guests are their own. Information is not guaranteed. All investment strategies have the potential for profit or loss. The host is operating on behalf of Get Rich Education LLC, exclusively.
Keith Weinhold 46:01
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