ladysuz wrote:

Nancy -

Your post recites, almost word-for-word, an email that was sent around in the spring.  Politifact.org looked at the capital gains portion of the email, and regarding the home sales, said

"But there's another problem with the e-mail's statements, specifically the implication that all home sales are subject to the capital gains tax. Many home sales are exempt from the capital gains tax. As long as they meet rules requiring that they've lived in their home, homeowers don't have to pay the capital gains tax if the profits on their home are less than $250,000 for a single person or $500,000 for a married couple. The rule applies to workers and retirees alike, said Eric Toder, a tax policy expert with the Urban Institute in Washington, D.C."

Please note that you only pay capital gains if your profits are more than $250,000/$500,000. 

Oops!  Sorry, Madalyn.  Just saw your post.

Madalyn, a little more explanation needs to be posted. Sorry for the big letters.  I C&Pd and it came out like this.

Capital Gains When Selling Your Home Over the years the tax laws have changed with regards to how the sale of your home is taxed. There were once laws that said that you could rollover the profit from the sale into a new more expensive home. There used to be a one time exclusion on the sale of your home if you were over 65. Those laws are now no longer valid and have been replaced by the current law.

The current law states that if you purchase a home, and live in it for 2 out of 5 years, you do not have to pay capital gains (or any other tax) on up to $500,000 gain for a married filing joint couple or $250,000 gain for a single person. In plain English, this means that if a couple purchased a home for $200,000, lived in it for 2 years and then sold it, they could sell it for $700,000 without paying any taxes on the profit ($450,000 for a single person). There is no limit, you can buy and sell a home every two years with the same exclusion.

What if you do not live in the home for two years? There are three exceptions to the two year rule.

1. Change in Place of Employment. The IRS says that if you, your spouse, a co-owner of the home, or a person whose main home is the same as yours changes employment, you can still take the exclusion. The employment can be a new employer, the same employer or self employment. The new employment must however, be at least 50 mile farther from the home you sold than the old place of employment. The change of employment must take place while you are living in the home.

2. Health. The IRS says that you can claim the exclusion if you have to move because of a specific medical problem. This can be for a parent, grandparent, stepparent, sibling, step sibling, half sibling, mother or father in law, aunt, uncle, nephew, niece or cousin. The move must be to obtain, provide, or facilitate the diagnosis, cure, mitigation, or treatment of disease, illness or injury. You can't take the exclusion if you move just because it will benefit a persons general health or well-being unless a doctor recommends the change of residence.

3. Unforseen Circumstances. Unforseen circumstances is an event that you could not reasonable have anticipated before you bought and moved into the property. They include things such as natural or man made disasters, act of war or terrorism, death, unemployment (if you qualify for unemployment), divorce or legal separation, multiple births resulting from the same pregnancy or a change in employment that results in the inability to pay your ordinary living expenses. Unforseen circumstances does not cover if you just prefer a different home or your finances improve or you spend too much to maintain a luxurious life style.

Examples:

Employment: Justin was unemployed and living in a townhouse in Florida that he owned and used as his main home since 2005. He got a job in North Carolina and sold his townhouse in 2006. Because the distance between Justin 's new place of employment and the home he sold is over 50 miles, he qualifies for the exclusion of the gain from the sale of the townhouse.

Health: In 2005, Chase and Lauren, husband and wife, bought a house that they used as their main home. Lauren 's father has a chronic disease and is unable to care for himself. In 2006, Chase and Lauren sell their home in order to move into Lauren 's father 's house to provide care for him. Because they are moving to care for the father, they qualify for the exclusion.

About the Author
Christopher Anderson wants to educate people on how to take every tax deductionsas possible. That means learning about the rules of tax deductions. Lone Peak Business Solutions   

  

God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change; the courage to change the things I can; and the wisdom to know the difference

Why do the women on the other thread call "Joe the Plumber" a fake?  Why instead are they not upset that the government in Ohio had the NERVE to look up this man to see what kind of BS they could find on him?  Joe is not a fake.  He is a plumber.  They need to look into how much longer Joe needs to work in order to get his license.  A plumber can work under a license plumber.

I love Tito.  He just said that if he fired his wife he'd lose his money.  He employs four people which includes himself.  One is also his wife.  He said that he hires contractors sometime.  He said Obama's taxes wouldn't bother him now, but he's looking into the future plus he has said before he didn't want "crumbs" from Obama.

Why are people so nasty on the other thread by saying that the McCain's want to turn the Whitehouse into trailer trash?  What's wrong with living in trailers?  Is that an "elitist" remark?  What if I lived in a trailer..should I fell insulted by that remark?  What if I have to move into a trailer because I lost my home?  Should I feel insulted by that comment?

I know..I should be reading over there. 

Shirley

I want to ladies form the other thread to know that McCain is not going after Wright.  I cannot post over there so I'm hoping someone will read this.  It's another group that has nothing to do with McCain.

Obama said he wasn't going to use race in this campaign.  He did by pointing out that he looked different and his name was different.  McCain has NEVER used race in his campaign.

No matter if you hate McCain it's better if you know your facts.

I don't have to walk one inch in Wright's shoes to know he's anti-American.  Why do you ladies on the other thread think Obama finally DENOUNCED Wright?  I have my own ideas, what are yours?

One other thing--don't put too much credibility into weekend polls-- they are nightmares for Republicans since many are not available---add to that Halloween and it will account for allot of disparity.

 I hear Michael Medved is saying that allot of the pollsters are having allot of problems with this election because there are up to 80% non respondents. 

No, Moody, I'm not banded.  You are stripped of your privilege (freedom of speech) if you post anything negative on their thread.  Remember, it's the "positive" Obama thread.  This is the "respectfully Republican conversation."  Not much difference except we've never told other women on breastcancer.org that they are not welcome to post on this thread..that they have their own thread...However, not everything is so positive over there...they are very mean and cruel to Joe the Plumber. laugh at Tito the Builder, call Sarah Palin a Vagina, call Senator McCain too old to be president and lest we forget McCain also had cancer...bad, bad, bad..he could die, ya know.  Well, I could too. I could fall down my stairs, crack my head wide open and die.  I could die from a heart attack.  I could die from a stroke.  I could die from bc.

I don't know how tall Obama is.  I think he's pretty tall.  I hope he's had his heart checked out.  Ya know what?  Many people have this heart thing when they're very tall..don't know what it's called...and they die immediately from a heart attack.  I don't wish that on Obama or anyone else.  And, I don't know exactly how tall he is.

McCain runs circles around many of us.,,you know..he's too old.  This man has been campaigning long and hard for two years.  He looks darn healthy to me.  Even with his war injuries...bless his heart.  Since they can't find too much dirt on McCain, sometimes his affair and divorce and marriage to Cindy comes up.  What a horrible man!  It's okay that Clinton did his "thing" in the Oval Office..it was his personal business you know..but I didn't know you could do that kind of personal business ON THE JOB!  They can't find any unamericans that McCain's palled around with so other little dirty and incendiary remarks are made about him.

My other question:  Why won't Obama meet with the press on his plane.  Seems like no one knows our possible next president.  Well, perhaps his wife does and Rev. Wright...politicians do what they do......Wright knew that Obama sat in his church and heard his unamerican hate messages.  Politicians lie..according to Wright.

I'm not being negative.  I'm being truthful.  If anyone wants the truth it's easy to find if you take your blinders off and pull out those darn ear plugs.  But no...if one speaks honestly about THE ONE we're negative..racist. yada yada. 

I'm just a little bit sick of it and I'm not running a poupularity contest.

Shirley

Well, Sherri, if Obama wins HE WILL BRING ME TO TEARS!  It will be quite distrubing.  LOL  No, it's not LOL...it's sad.

Shirley

Something came out about an aunt who is here illegally.  And he has a brother in Nairobi that makes nothing...Hannity wants to send him $$$ if he could find out his addy.  And Obama and his wife donated less than 10% of their income to charity.  LOL  And he wants to "redistribute wealth."  No thanks.  I think Americans are quite charitable and are able to donate their money where they want.  Americans work in soup kitchens, homeless shelters..etc.  Help build homes.  Volunteer and still volunteer to help with the leftovers of Katrina..feeding the workers.  There's so much good in Americans.  Why we must apologize to any country is beyone me.

Shirley

SherriG, didnt you know?  Obama didn't know she was living in poverty.........................He didnt know jeremiah wright.................he didnt know bill ayers......................he didnt know the PLO was at that dinner.......................he didnt know kaldahli..........................he didnt know about acorn.............................and on, and on, and on

Well that 65% in Springfield MUST be discriminating due to McCains age, and sexist against Palin then if they wont vote for them!

He lives down the street from one of my clients and they were having dinner one night and ron white was complaining about his lawn people doing something stupid and my client told him "well you cant fix stupid" .  ron almost busted a gut and asked him if he could use that in his routines.  tommy said sure, the next thing he knew it was the TITLE 

too funny ibcspouse.    My hubby says duck tape can fix anything..........

Hi to all the Republicans here on this thread. I am one of those Hillary Clinton Democrats who met with John McCain at his Arlington office after Hillary conceded to Obama. I want to wish you all the best of luck on election day, I am praying McCain can defeat Obama for many, many reasons that are too complex to go into here. Many of us Clinton Democrats feel that our country will be placed at great risk if Obama is elected. Friends of mine (left wing Democrats) have known him intimately in Chicago and detest him for his corruption and lack of a moral core. They have lived with and worked with him for many years, and know him well. If even the people who agree with his political views detest his character, you know there is something deeply wrong. We haven't been successful in getting the media to report all the voter fraud his campaign perpetrated during the primaries, but it is a real danger to our democracy.

McCain was terrific on SNL, wasn't he? He is still here in NYC overnight and I and other McCain volunteers will be meeting him at 8:00 AM Sunday morning  on West 54 St. to wish him well, It may be the last time I ever get to meet him in person. Afterward our busloads of NYC volunteers (LOTS of Democrats included) will head out to PA to campaign for McCain/Palin until the big day. We are praying we can flip PA for McCain, their 21 electoral votes could turn the election.

 I'm really sad that I got my BC diagnosis in August and had to have a bilateral mastectomy in September, it really sidelined me at a time I would have been volunteering in PA for McCain. Instead I was emptying drains and trying not to pull my incision open by doing too much. There are so many Clinton Democrats who will be voting for McCain, I hope it's enough!

Thanks Rescue,

Turn PA red.  Yes, I agree, good luck on your recovery. 

The offhand aside to Joe the Plumber about "spreading the wealth around" was revealing because it suggests a crude redistributive view of "social justice". Yet the nimble Hope-a-Dope sidestepper brushed it aside, telling a crowd in Raleigh that next John McCain will be "accusing me of being a secret communist because I shared my toys in kindergarten."

But that too is revealing. As John Hood pointed out at National Review, communism is not "sharing." In a free society, the citizen chooses whether to share his Lego, trade it for some Thomas the Tank Engine train tracks, or keep it to himself. From that freedom of action grow mighty Playmobile cities. Communism is compulsion. It's the government confiscating your Elmo to "share" it with someone of its choice. Joe the Plumber is free to spread his own wealth around - hiring employees, buying supplies from local businesses, enjoying surf 'n' turf night at his favorite eatery. But, in Obama's world view, that's not good enough: the state is the best judge of how to spread Joe the Plumber's wealth around.

The Senator is a wealthy man, mainly on the strength of two bestselling books offering his biography in lieu of policy and accomplishments. Many lively members of his Kenyan family occur as supporting characters in his story and provide the vivid color in it. But they too are not merely two-dimensional cartoons. His Aunt Zeituni, a memorable figure in Obama's writing, turned up for real last week, when the dogged James Bone of the London Times tracked her down. She lives in a rundown housing project in Boston.

In his Wednesday night infomercial, Obama declared that his "fundamental belief" was that "I am my brother's keeper." Back in Kenya, his brother lives in a shack on 12 bucks a year. If Barack is his brother's keeper, why couldn't he send him a $10 bill and nearly double the guy's income? The reality is that Barack Obama assumes the government should be his brother's keeper, and his aunt's keeper. Why be surprised by that? For 20 years in Illinois, Obama has marinated in the swamps of the Chicago political machine and the campus radicalism of William Ayers and Rashid Khalidi. In such a world, the redistributive urge is more or less a minimum entry qualification.

http://www.ocregister.com/articles/obama-dimensional-hope-2212958-barack-government

I saw a clip of Obama telling that crowd in Raleigh that next John McCain will be "accusing me of being a secret communist because I shared my toys in kindergarten."

He used the same schoolyard bully mocking tone of voice that he used against Hillary during the primary campaign, and encouraged the crowd to laugh at McCain.  Can you imagine the outcry if any republican encouraged a crowd to mock Obama for something he never did?

That nasty, mocking, bullying thing offends me.  I worry that it is the "real" Obama showing through the scripted image.

I can understand that there may be a delicate balance between helping his aunt and brother monitarily and offending them, but surely a man that wealthy and that smart could come up with a way to help them at least somewhat without offending.