EBay record keeping for taxes
Halfpence
Posts: 462 ✭✭✭✭
How do you all keep records so you pay taxes on only your EBay profits? Must you have receipts for everything you buy and sell? If so, how do you record the tax basis for garage sale purchases, where receipts typically aren’t given?
0
Comments
Make your own receipt, note the date, and amount paid. If you purchase a lot of several coins then same thing just split the total paid by the number of coins. It is not a perfect system but unless you state that you bought every MS67 coin at a garage sale you should not have any problems.
My Collection of Old Holders
Never a slave to one plastic brand will I ever be.
How I do it.
Every coin, bar, etc. I purchase gets entered as a line item on my Excel "INVENTORY" spread sheet. If I buy a quantity, 10 coin roll of coins for example, I will enter it as a single line item. If I decide later to sell individual coins I can at that time turn the single line item into 10 line items.
Warning to the wise about Excel. It is sometimes, not often, not very forgiving when you make a mistake. Save your data often and if you get to where you can't fix something, close the app without saving and start over where you last saved.
When I buy I start a line item on the "INVENTORY SHEET" and when I sell I complete the data for the line item. When line item is complete I cut and paste the line item to a duplicate "2021 SALES" sheet. First sheet provides me a running total on cost my current inventory. I keep an updated note on this sheet with a running total of ounces of each bullion metal I hold in the inventory. Second Sheet provides me all the data I need to complete my annual income tax return.
Note that these sheets are for inventory control and for compiling tax return data and do not give me a current value.
Let Excel's "formulas" do all the work:
M = H + I + J + K+ L
N = F - D - M
And set up running totals at the bottom of columns at your discretion.
Column F includes the sales amount plus any taxes collected from the buyer (H) by your payment processor and is the "gross amount" on your paypal transaction page. These taxes are later removed from your net as one of your fees. Reason you do this is because your 1099 "gross income" from your payment processor (copy to the IRS) incorrectly reports these collected state sales taxes as income to you. Knowing the total amount of these taxes enables you to reduce and correctly report your correct gross income when you file your income taxes. I use three decimal places on the taxes because there are cases where I sell more than one item at the same time, the sales tax amount total is an odd number, and I have to divide the taxes collected by the number of items to determine the amount for each item.
Receipts and printed hard copies of all transactions to support all data entries should be maintained. Current shift from Paypal to Ebay's managed payment system requires a little more work to gather and print the data. What used to be a paypal fee is now included in the Ebay Fee. Sales that do not involve Ebay, Paypal or grading simply get a zero in the respective column.
"A car is a tool that takes you from one place to another. Everything beyond that is a payment for other people's perception of you."
I create one, with date, time paid and location.
I even have to do that on instore purchases at times, when customers refuse to take a reciept for purchase of coins.
And I'm darn sure not going to let them go to the next guy who dosen't and loose the buy.
scrap, I dont, becuase by law i cant with out id.
Fortunately, managed payments makes the accounting easier as everything is in one place.
As already mentioned, you can make your own receipt if you need to. How the IRS will feel about it, you'll probably never need to find out.
All comments reflect the opinion of the author, even when irrefutably accurate.
I only buy from trusted dealers, not the public. Figure original purchase price, cost of certification, shipping to and from; selling costs, shipping, insurance and all other related costs. Not much profit unless you are lucky. Thefts and other deductions should be included. When filing don't forget to work in everything, even stock losses can be carried over indefinitely.
http://rover.ebay.com/rover/1/711-53200-19255-0/1?icep_ff3=2&pub=5575378759&campid=5338273189&customid=&icep_item=124634667792&ipn=psmain&icep_vectorid=229466&kwid=902099&mtid=824&kw=lg&toolid=11111
Where do you find the EB fee for the item?
Where do you find the sales tax collected on the item?
"A car is a tool that takes you from one place to another. Everything beyond that is a payment for other people's perception of you."
http://rover.ebay.com/rover/1/711-53200-19255-0/1?icep_ff3=2&pub=5575378759&campid=5338273189&customid=&icep_item=124643832199&ipn=psmain&icep_vectorid=229466&kwid=902099&mtid=824&kw=lg&toolid=11111
Download a report. It’s a clunky format, but it has all the information.
I rarely sell, but I have a spreadsheet with details on everything in my collection including price paid (plus additional fees if I get it graded, etc), date, and seller. For online transactions I could dig up a receipt in my email. If I pay cash at a coin show, yeah, I might not have one. But I’m not too worried about that, especially since I don’t sell that much and my records have realistic numbers that aren’t going to show all my sales as losses.
This
It's a little clunky, but actually less clunky than the PayPal spreadsheet. And it is all in one place.
All comments reflect the opinion of the author, even when irrefutably accurate.
much more cluncky the the individual paypal transactions detail sheet that provided everything I need and was available right after each sale.
"A car is a tool that takes you from one place to another. Everything beyond that is a payment for other people's perception of you."
Are the eBay reports around longer than 60 days?
You can also get that information individually for each sale, if you want.
Just click on "see all" on recent transactions and then click on "details".
All comments reflect the opinion of the author, even when irrefutably accurate.
don't know yet but it does let me create reports going back multiple months. But since I don't have any transactions that old, I can't say whether it does or doesn't. I would assume it does since it keeps your monthly statements available for 18 months or so
All comments reflect the opinion of the author, even when irrefutably accurate.
What profits?