Breaking NewsBreaking News

DNA TEST DETERMINES LARRY BIRKHEAD IS THE BIOLOGICAL FATHER OF ANNA NICOLE SMITH'S DAUGHTER, DANNIELYNN HOPE MARSHALL

Advertisement

column_buckwolfcolumn_buckwolf

Last Minute Tax Tips: Is My Cat Deductible?

(Page 2 of 4)

2. Don't attempt a "bad dog" deduction. If your car gets totaled in a hurricane, you can deduct its value as the loss of a personal asset. But if your pooch knocks over a chest and destroys your fine china and glassware, the IRS has no pity.

"A loss like this has to be unexpected, and a dog is theoretically expected to sometimes misbehave," says Kathy Burlison of H&R Block in Kansas City.

Of course, teenagers misbehave, too, and in some cases, the IRS is more compassionate. "If your kid wrecks the car, you can deduct the car's value," Burlison says. "It's inconsistent in that way, because as you know, a teenager can be just as out of control as a pet."

3. Nose jobs can be business expenses. Michael Jackson's nose job could be considered a professional deduction if the singer claimed he needed the surgery to reach the high notes on his tax return.

In the 2003 "Living With Michael Jackson" documentary, the "King of Pop" claimed he's had only one nose job — and that was done to help clear his nasal passage when he sang.

To Cincinnati tax preparer Ed Lyon of Taxtuneup.com, Jackson missed a write-off if he didn't claim that procedure. "I'd suggest any singer in that situation to do that," he says.

4. It's OK to make use of your breast assets. Normally, cosmetic surgery is not deductible. However, if you get breast implants, you won't be turned down flat — as long as they're especially large implants and you can prove you need them for work.

Exotic dancer Cynthia Hess — better known as "Chesty Love" — made tax law history in 1994 when she successfully sued the IRS to take a $2,088 deduction on a boob job that left her with a size-56FF chest.

U.S. Tax Court Judge Joan Seitz Pate noted that Hess increased her income as a result of the surgery and that her cumbersome breasts, weighing 10 pounds each, were so large that she could not derive personal benefit from them. Hess had undergone the surgery "all for the purpose of making money" at an Indiana strip club, and the tax court allowed her to deduct the expense as a "stage prop."

Marketplace