Individual tax preparation in Lone Tree, CO

What makes a personal return longer

You sold a house

Up to $250,000 of gain on a main home is excluded from tax, or $500,000 on a joint return, if you owned it and lived in it for two of the five years before the sale. Gain is measured against your basis: the purchase price plus improvements. Owners who bought decades ago often have to reconstruct theirs, and receipts for a remodel or a new roof lower the taxable gain. If the house was ever a rental, the depreciation from those years is taxed on the sale even when the rest of the gain is excluded.

You moved into or out of Colorado

The year of a move, you file Colorado as a part-year resident, using Form DR 0104PN to split income between Colorado and the other state, which usually wants its own part-year return. Wages follow where you lived when you earned them. Remote work that carried on across the move is where the split needs the most care.

Retirement income started

Required minimum distributions now begin at age 73. Up to 85 percent of Social Security benefits can be federally taxable once your other income passes the thresholds, so a large IRA withdrawal in one year can pull more of your benefit into tax. Colorado lets filers 55 and older subtract part of their pension, annuity, and Social Security income, and filers 65 and older can subtract all of their federally taxed Social Security.

Your employer pays you in stock

Restricted stock units are taxed as wages when they vest, and that value is already on your W-2. The 1099-B from selling the shares often shows a cost basis of zero or leaves it blank. Filing with that number taxes the same income a second time. The Centennial page goes further into equity compensation.

You earned side income on a 1099

Freelance, gig, and consulting income goes on Schedule C, and self-employment tax of 15.3 percent applies to most of the profit on top of income tax. With nothing withheld, the first year usually ends in a bill, which quarterly estimated payments prevent. For payments made in 2026, a business only has to send you a 1099-NEC once it pays you $2,000, up from $600. The income is taxable either way. A side business that grows gets its own page: small business tax preparation.

Deductions added for 2025 through 2028

The federal tax law signed in July 2025 created four deductions you can take without itemizing: tip income up to $25,000, overtime premium pay up to $12,500 ($25,000 on a joint return), interest on a loan for a new vehicle assembled in the United States up to $10,000, and an extra $6,000 for each filer 65 or older. Each phases out at higher incomes and each expires after 2028.

The same law raised the cap on deducting state and local taxes from $10,000 to $40,000, reduced for incomes above $500,000. For Colorado homeowners with a large property tax bill, that can change whether itemizing beats the standard deduction.

What to have ready

Last year's return, every W-2 and 1099, your mortgage interest statement, property tax records, and paperwork for anything unusual that happened during the year. The full list of what to bring covers the rest. Pricing is by quote, given once we see what your year involves and before any work starts.

Questions about personal returns