tax basics

Some parts of the country are still digging out from the recent nor'easter -- and winter is only a few weeks old. With heating costs soaring as the temperatures dip, it's a great time to think about ways to become more energy efficient, which may even include the purchase of home improvements meant...

The Homebuyer Assistance and Improvement Act of 2010, signed into law by President Obama in July 2010, modified the terms of the existing first-time homebuyer's credit. The new law extended the closing deadline for home purchases from June 30, 2010, to Sept. 30, 2010; binding contracts for the sale...

It's no secret that the IRS is ramping up the number of audits in an attempt to close the "tax gap." That's the term the IRS is using to account for the difference between the taxes it believes it should have collected and what it actually managed to collect. For 2001 (the last year for which data...