Customer Reviews

The Expat's Guide to US Taxes: 2001/2002

5 star:		(1)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I have been living abroad for several years, and purchased this book when my tax situation became more complicated (i.e. when my income passed the Foreign Earned Income Exclusion). Although the information in the book is helpful, I found that the large majority of what I needed was available on the IRS' website, which is very user-friendly, contains a wealth of valuable information, and most importantly is free.

In particular, IRS Publication 54 "Tax Guide for U.S. Citizens and Resident Aliens Abroad" seemed to answer all of my questions, and there are hundreds of other publications available from the IRS that are very helpful, are written in plain English and contain many useful examples. Of course, if your tax situation is extremely complex, you may need more help, but in that case, you probably will need to seek recourse to a sophisticated tax advisor as opposed to a book.

This book is an extremely helpful resource for expat tax issues. This subject is very difficult for an individual without a big company taking care of all the details. If I had found this book earlier, it would have saved me dozens of hours scouring the internet for relavent information. Note that this isn't a book to help you figure out the best way to wangle yourself into tax-freedom. You should get this book well before moving, use it to help you plan and then visit a professional - but at least you won't be paying a professional to cover the groundwork.

I am an expat, and I found answers to many of my questions in this work book. I am not knowledgable enough in tax law to pass judgement on the quality of the information presented here. Expat tax law is complicated and intricate, involving many special cases which may not apply to you. The work book overcomes this through careful organization of chapters and topics. It is possible to locate topics of interest without having wade through large amounts of unrelated material. I gave this work book the fifth star for it's spiral binding, which makes it much easier to work with.