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The new year brings with it new tax-savings opportunities, including larger tax exemptions and exclusions, and new rules governing most retirement accounts. This advisory includes charts showing these figures for 2020 as well as this year's income tax brackets. A list of strategies and tips to consider in your tax planning this year follows each chart.

While “gifting down” to younger generations has historically been the norm, it’s now increasingly common for children to accumulate more wealth than their living parents. This provides an opportunity for children to “gift up” or provide loans to help support parents—while pursuing income and estate tax planning. Other gifting strategies can include gifting assets or creating a trust to help support their parents' living expenses or health care costs. Each solution has pros and cons.

Parents and grandparents often want to help their children and grandchildren with significant financial goals and challenges: buying a first home, making a financial investment, or starting a new business. Intra-Family Loans (IFLs) are a simple, low-cost, effective (yet often underutilized) wealth transfer technique that parents and grandparents can use to assist their family members with these economic challenges—all without incurring federal gift taxes if properly structured.

Successful owners who choose to sell their business have many things to think about before beginning the process. Owners who are new to the process should consider not only the financial ramifications of selling their business but also how it can affect their life after the sale has finished. To make the selling of a profitable business much smoother, there are five things to consider. First, it begins with the question: What financial means do I need to support my current lifestyle?

The SECURE Act of 2019 (the “Act”) has been signed into law and went into effect on January 1, 2020. It has several income tax provisions that affect individual taxpayers, including two important areas, retirement accounts and 529 college savings plans. The Act provides a good incentive to review the naming of your beneficiaries and ensure you take advantage of the tax incentives.

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A discussion on BKD's “Simply Tax” podcast on the importance of year-end planning. Guests Holly Pantzer and Susan Jones join host Damien Martin for a closer look at key considerations for individuals following the recent tax law changes as they share their firsthand experiences from recent year-end planning discussions. Here's a look at what's inside this episode:

As taxpayers head into the homestretch of 2019, some might be surprised that most of the year-end tax highlights for businesses refer to provisions of the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act enacted in late 2017. It makes sense, though, when considering that the IRS has released a host of regulations and other guidance interpreting many of the new rules. Moving forward, there are five year-end tax items to consider for your business: revenue recognition; business interest deduction; qualified business income deduction; bonus depreciation; and transition and exit planning.

With the new year around the corner, it’s time to start thinking about what you can do now to manage your tax bill for 2019. To help you get started and avoid last-minute scrambling for tax deductions, there are five topics you should discuss with your tax advisor: capital gain opportunities; capital loss opportunities; making your K-1 a number one priority; deduction management; and giving while you’re alive.

Is there a better way for investors to donate to charity? Learn how to maximize a portfolio’s tax benefits—and increase the size of the gift—through charitable giving.