The end of the year can feel a little bit hectic with planning around the holidays and seeing loved ones near and far. Add in your kids being home from school and some very important sports games and you’re already wondering how you are going to do it all. Well, we hate to be the bearer of bad news but there’s more… It’s also the end of a business quarter and an important window for implementing some tax saving strategies that can serve up major savings in the new year. The good news is that with a trusted tax planner, this can be an easy and stress-free experience. Let’s look at some tax saving strategies:

  1. Max Out Your Retirement
    If you haven’t been contributing the maximum amount to your retirement accounts, now would be the time to do so. Currently for 2025 401(k) plans, that’s $23,500, or $31,000 if you are 50 to 59 or over 64, and $35,750 for those 60 to 63. Making these contributions helps to reduce your taxable income for the year, besides the obvious benefits of allowing your money to grow tax free for maximum savings.
  2. Consider Selling Investments
    “Loss harvesting” is an important year-end strategy for those with investments. Badly performing stocks or mutual funds can be sold to realize losses that can then be used to offset any taxable gains. If you have losses exceeding your gains, you can use up to $3,000 of excess loss to wipe out other income. Any additional losses beyond the $3,000 can be carried over to the next year.
  3. Check Your Tax Withholding
    If you’ve been surprised by what you owe the IRS at the end of the year, or confused about why you got such a large refund, you probably need to update your tax withholding. Your employer will issue you a W-4 to help determine your tax withholding and it should be updated anytime you receive a large salary increase, significant asset gains, or have a major life event like marriage, divorce or adding dependents like children. The beginning of a tax year is a great time to do this.
  4. Engage in Charitable Giving
    Consider some additional charitable giving if you are looking for a deduction on your taxable income. The “Big Beautiful Bill” brings back charitable deductions for those not itemizing starting in 2026 and increases the deduction from $300 to $1,000 for single filers and from $600 to $2,000 for those filing jointly. You can increase the tax benefits of your deduction even more if you are donating appreciated stock or property. Don’t forget that you must have receipts to take advantage of this deduction.

If you’re stressed about your upcoming tax bill and haven’t considered any deductions to lower your taxable income, don’t fret! There are still a few ways to save (and even more that we didn’t get to discuss in this article). Many of these tax saving ideas need to be taken care of by December 31st so it’s worth quickly jumping on implementing these ideas. If you need help or have any questions on potential tax saving strategies, feel free to reach out to a ClarkSilva team member today.