Can I write off my medical bills?

Question

I'm just now getting around to doing my taxes :(

I have about 17k in hospital bills and I've paid off about 6k.

Can I write that 6k off?

Otherwise I'm going to owe a lot of money.

I make about 50k a year, single, no other deductions :(

Answer 1

In 2006 you had a standard deduction of 5,150. When you do your taxes you have an option of using standard deduction or itemized deduction. Claiming medical expenses goes on Itemized deduction, and you can only claim anything in excess of 7.5% of you Adjusted Gross Income (Lets assume that is just 50K) which comes out to be 3750. If you paid 6K of your medical bill you can write off 6000-3750=2250. Which is allot less than your standard deduction of 5150. There are other things that can go on your Itemized Deduction, like local taxes that you paid, Mortgage interest, charitable contributions etc(most of them are also subject to a current percent of your income), but you really need to make sure that it all adds up to over than 5150.

What could be a good Idea for you is to use one of the 0% deals on new credit card and pay off the entire amount, which will give you a huge tax brake for that year. Than use the refund money to pay off part of the debt off your credit card. And than work on paying off the rest.(be careful thought, to roll over the balance to a new deal, before you get stuck paying all the high interest)

I hope that helped.

Answer 2

Sort of, maybe, you can write off part of the amount that you actually paid.


First of all, you have to subtract 7.5% of your adjusted gross income from the medical bills, and can only deduct what's left over. If you don't have adjustments to the $50K, that would mean subtracting $3750 from your total medical expenses to get the amount you can claim.

Then you add up that amount ($2250 unless you had other medical expenses) with any other itemized deductions that you have. If that is larger than your standard deduction, then you take the itemized figures. Depending on where you live, you might have state and local income taxes - those would be deductible (federal tax, social security and medicare are NOT).

The amount of tax you'd save would be the difference between your total itemized deductions and your standard deduction, times your tax bracket. So even if you can, you're likely talking a few hundred dollars saved, not thousands.

Writing something off does NOT mean you subtract it from your tax.

Answer 3

The other responders are correct in saying that it would not be to your advantage to try to deduct the medical bills. Unfortunately, in your situation it's just not enough. Unless you have other expenses you can itemize (charitable contributions, mortgage interest, property taxes, large purchases on which you paid sales tax), you will be better off taking the standard deduction of $5,150.

You didn't mention if you were an employee or self-employed. If you are an employee, and you received a W-2, your taxes will be around $7,000 less your Federal Withholding on your W-2, which should be a good chunk of that amount. If you're self-employed however, your taxes are going to run you around $13,000 to $14,000, in addition to the penalties and interest for failure to file and failure to pay.

Hope this helps!

Answer 4

You may take as a deduction any amount of medical bills PAID for in 2006 which exceeds 7.5% of your AGI. Your deduction is limited to actual bills paid, and not those charged to you, but yet outstanding. Accordingly, if you paid about $6,000 in med bills in 2006 and your AGI is $50K, you can deduct about $2250 of these bills, which is the amount OVER 7.5% of your AGI, which is $3750. Needless to say, you must itemize deductions in order to take advantage of this situation.

Answer 5

The above answers are correct.
Also if you have to file a state tax return, you can still claim a credit on part of the medical expenses, even though you did not have enough to itemize on your federal tax return.

Answer 6

The standard deduction is $5,150 so it would be better to itemize the $6,000 also add any interest paid on home mortgage and donations to charity and all other things that can be itemized (go to www.irs.gov and see the list) they also give links to websites that you can e-file with for free.

Good Luck!

Looking at the other answers I am probably wrong!!!!! GO to irs.gov and get the info you need! ! ! !!

Answer 7

Yes, but only the amount greater than 7.5% of your adjusted gross income.
-MM