Bitch bitch bitch

MSN Money - When you -- and the IRS -- flip a condo: "Now, from your $100,000 gain, you've only cleared $44,700. "

Why is it that when people have to complain about taxes, they don't use any reasonable numbers? This idiot assumes a 35% tax rate. That means he is assuming the subject is making $319,101 or more a year. How reasonable is this assumption? Not very even among his readers. People making that much a year generally won't bother reading a free column for financial advice.

And idiot you even point out how this can be avoided anyway. Hold on the property for a year! Oh what is that? You need to flip it quickly because the market could fall or a balloon payment is due? Well, that is why this is an investment, it involves risk. If you don't want to take risks, then go find some bank CDs, flipping isn't for you.

And to top it off he is complaining that if you buy and sell multiple properties the IRS will consider it a business. Well guess what? If you are buying and selling this often, you are in the trade. Why should you get favorable tax treatment because you consider it a side thing for you? What if do more business than someone who this is their main job? He mentions self employment taxes of 15.3%. That would drop down to about 2% (the medicare part of it) after you sold the first house. And you wouldn't get hit with it in the first place unless you sold more than one (probably significantily more than one). So the numbers he presents is the absolute worst case scenario when combined into 1 transaction. If this was the only source of income (which negates the bitching of self-employment in the first place), the flipper has to make 4 sales at least for it to come true. And all three other sales would have a far lesser hit than the one he shows.

Finally, no where in this column is their any perspective that he is talking about 35 grand for 2 weeks a work, producing nothing, building nothing, not adding any extra value to anything. The flipper is just a leech. It sucks up wealth from the economy while not producing anything. That is why too much speculation is very bad. It is unsustainable. You want to bitch about making only 17 grand a week, go right ahead. You want to bitch about paying the same taxes as if you had a salaried job making the same amount but you work for much less time, go right ahead. It doesn't make you anything more than an idiot.