What are some pre-tax programs similar to FSA that I can take advantage of?
2014 Limit: $2,500 Notes 2014 Limit: $3,300 individual, $6,550 family Notes 2014 Limit: $5,000 Notes 2014 Limit: $2,500 Notes 2014 Limit: $250/month Notes 2014 Limit: $130/month Notes There is a dependent care spending account for child care related expenses. Also Medical and Dental expenses over a certain % of your income maybe deductible on your tax return.
"One difference is in the ability to split the pre-tax and after-tax portions of the Traditional account. (Note that earnings in a Traditional IRA or Traditional 401(k) are always pre-tax, even if it was earned from after-tax money, so if you left the money for some amount of time after an after-tax contribution, chances are it's a mix of pre-tax and after-tax money.) When you take money out of a Traditional IRA, including for conversion to a Roth IRA, you are generally subject to the ""pro-rata rule"", which means that your withdrawal will consist of pre-tax and after-tax amounts in the same proportion as in your whole Traditional IRA. This means that a conversion of a Traditional IRA with any mix of pre-tax and after-tax amounts, will always be taxed on a portion of the withdrawal (the pre-tax portion), and it will leave some after-tax amounts in the Traditional IRA unless you take everything out. The only way to separate the pre-tax and after-tax amounts is to roll over to a Traditional 401(k) (if you have a 401(k) plan that allows this); rules say that only pre-tax amounts can be rolled over into a 401(k), so only pre-tax amounts are rolled over, and if you roll over all the pre-tax amounts, only after-tax amounts will remain. On the other hand, when you rollover your entire Traditional 401(k) to IRAs, you can choose to have the pre-tax portion rolled over to a Traditional IRA and the after-tax portion rolled over to a Roth IRA, separating them, due to IRS Notice 2014-54." "The different things in each calculator are showing you a bunch of different things. In the ""Roth IRA calculator"", it is comparing what you would have in the end after contributing and withdrawing from a Roth IRA, with what you would have in the end with a taxable account (i.e. an investment outside of any IRAs). In the ""Traditional IRA calculator"", the ""IRA after taxes"" shows you what you would have in the end after contributing and withdrawing from a pre-tax Traditional IRA. The ""IRA before taxes"" simply shows the same amount before you pay the taxes on withdrawal, which is not a useful number. So if you want to compare Roth IRA vs. Traditional IRA, you want to compare the ""Roth IRA"" from the Roth IRA Calculator and the ""IRA after taxes"" from the Traditional IRA calculator, but there are some things you need to be aware of to make a fair comparison, because if you just plug in the same numbers you are going to get a very unfair comparison (it will look like Roth IRA is a lot ""better"" even though it's not). The Roth IRA contribution is after-tax, whereas a (pre-tax) Traditional IRA contribution is pre-tax, and an after-tax dollar is much more than a pre-tax dollar, so if you put in the same nominal contribution amount, you are actually contributing much ""more"" from your wallet in the Roth IRA case. To make a fair comparison, you would need to start with the same pre-tax amount, and put in a Roth IRA contribution amount that corresponds to the equivalent amount after taxes. So for example, a $5000 pre-tax amount with 25% taxes is equivalent to $5000 * 0.75 = $3750, so you would put in $5000 for Traditional IRA contribution vs. $3750 for Roth IRA contribution. Note that if you have the same flat tax rate at contribution and at withdrawal, (pre-tax) Traditional IRA and Roth IRA are exactly the same, and you can see this by putting in 25% for the ""Retirement tax rate"" in the Traditional IRA calculator (we already assumed 25% tax rate for Roth IRA when calculating the contribution). You will see that Traditional IRA would be better in a lower retirement tax rate (e.g. 15%), whereas Roth IRA would be higher in a higher retirement tax rate." One thing that kept me from doing a budget for years is how complex some people make it.  For example you list your gross pay, then deduct the taxes, 401K, FSA, etc...  Why?  Those are pretty consistent. For me, the way this is budgeted is I list my net pay, and go from there.  If you were perfect in predicting your FSA, you would have no medical expenses on your budget!  Simple, easy budget! Now this year, you will probably have to pay out of pocket for some expenses.  Can you predict how much?  Can your disposable income absorb the overages?  If not you will need to start a sinking fund.  That is put a sufficient amount of money into a savings account each month to cover the shortage.    Keep in mind you can go over a bit on your FSA contributions.  If you find yourself near the end of the plan year with extra money, you can also claim mileage reimbursement for your medical appointments.  Since your FSA has a history of those, it is easy to calculate your mileage from your home to the DR's office and submit a claim. My opinion is that in general, it is probably not a good idea to borrow at a cost in order to make your RRSP contribution.  Banks, of course, have an interest in loaning you money.  Don't expect their literature to be objective on the matter!  They are selling you a product and the advice is biased.  What better way to double-dip than to get guaranteed interest payments from you, as well as ongoing fees for (probably also) getting your loan money invested in their high-fee mutual funds? A year's RRSP contribution room allowance isn't use it or lose it — unlike 401k contribution allowances in the U.S.. That is, unused RRSP contribution room accumulates and you can take advantage of it in later years. If we couldn't carry our RRSP contribution room over, I might feel different about the general case for RRSP loans. Yet there are two specific cases I can think of where it may make sense to borrow and pay back: (a possible case) ... if your tax rate is currently in a high bracket (e.g. 46%), and you anticipate being in a lower income and bracket next year (e.g. 35%), then it would make sense to take advantage of the higher tax savings in the current tax year.  If you waited until the following year to take the deduction, you'd lose out on 11% of the deducted amount.   For a typical person whose income is level or increasing from year to year, this isn't likely to be applicable, but it could help somebody who is going on leave or otherwise has irregular income. (a foolish case) ... if you knew, somehow, that you could realize a return on your invested RRSP money exceeding the pre-tax earnings required to pay the interest on the RRSP loan.  However, I would suggest this is foolish bet to make.  The interest you pay is guaranteed, but the return you are expected to get is probably not (or if it is, it is probably a return lower than what your bank wants to charge on the loan.) If for some reason it does make sense for you, take the money and invest it somewhere better than the high-fee mutual funds the bank is also pushing. "In asnwer to your questions: As @joetaxpayer said, you really should look into a Solo 401(k). In 2017, this allows you to contribute up to $18k/year and your employer (the LLC) to contribute more, up to $54k/year total (subject to IRS rules). 401(k) usually have ROTH and traditional sides, just like IRA. I believe the employer-contributed funds also see less tax burden for both you and your LLC that if that same money had become salary (payroll taxes, etc.). You might start at irs.gov/retirement-plans/one-participant-401k-plans and go from there. ROTH vs. pre-tax: You can mix and match within years and between years. Figure out what income you want to have when you retire. Any year you expect to pay lower taxes (low income, kids, deductions, etc.), make ROTH contributions. Any year you expect high taxes (bonus, high wage, taxable capital gains, etc.), make pre-tax payments. I have had a uniformly bad experience with target date funds across multiple 401(k) plans from multiple plan adminstrators. They just don't perform well (a common problem with almost any actively managed fund). You probably don't want to deal with individual stocks in your retirement accounts, so rather pick passively managed index funds that track various markets segments you care about and just sit on them. For example, your high-risk money might be in fast-growing but volatile industries (e.g. tech, aerospace, medical), your medium-risk money might go in ""total market"" or S&P 500 index funds, and your low-risk money might go in treasury notes and bonds. The breakdown is up to you, but as an 18 year old you have a ~50 year horizon and so can afford to wait out anything short of another Great Depression (and maybe even that). So you'd want generally you want more or your money in the high-risk high-return  category, rebalancing to lower risk investments as you age. Diversifying into real estate, foreign investments, etc. might also make sense but I'm no expert on those." "Here are the few scenarios that may be worth noting in terms of using different types of accounts: Traditional IRA. In this case, the monies would grow tax-deferred and all monies coming out will be taxed as ordinary income. Think of it as everything is in one big black box and the whole thing is coming out to be taxed. Roth IRA. In this case, you could withdraw the contributions anytime without penalty. (Source should one want it for further research.) Past 59.5, the withdrawals are tax-free in my understanding. Thus, one could access some monies earlier than retirement age if one considers all the contributions that are at least 5 years old. Taxable account. In this case, each year there will be distributions to pay taxes as well as anytime one sells shares as that will trigger capital gains. In this case, taxes are worth noting as depending on the index fund one may have various taxes to consider. For example, a bond index fund may have some interest that would be taxed that the IRA could shelter to some extent. While index funds can be a low-cost option, in some cases there may be capital gains each year to keep up with the index. For example, small-cap indices and value indices would have stocks that may ""outgrow"" the index by either becoming mid-cap or large-cap in the case of small-cap or the value stock's valuation rises enough that it becomes a growth stock that is pulled out of the index. This is why some people may prefer to use tax-advantaged accounts for those funds that may not be as tax-efficient. The Bogleheads have an article on various accounts that can also be useful as dg99's comment referenced. Disclosure: I'm not an accountant or work for the IRS." I'll respect the mod's suggestion. I'd answer with a warning. The concept of 401(k) pretax saving is to save at a high rate, while working, and withdraw at a lower rate. An annual expense pushing 1% or higher is likely to negate the benefit of the account over time.  If your employer offers the Roth 401(k), I'd suggest using that for your deposits, and only up to the match. Then invest outside the 401(k). In the 25% bracket, it's good to have a mix of both pre and post tax retirement money. Generally speaking no person or program is really going to be able to help you lower your current tax burden, most tax decisions are done well before you reach the tax time. You either qualify for the deduction/credit or your don't. Where a good accountant will really be able to help you out is in planning that will limit your future tax burden. Particularly if you run a small business or are very wealthy you will probably want to consider using an accountant. I would always avoid the large scale tax prep places like HR Block they provide the same or lower quality service for a higher price than the software. I run a small business and do my own taxes using turbo tax, but my business isn't overly complex Sole prop, no employees, couple 1099's simple expenses (nothing to amortize) etc.