Would selling my stock mess up my taxes?

Question

Would selling my stock mess up my taxes?

Answer 1

No but you would have to figure out how much you made/loss you can declare it.  You have to take the difference between what you paid and what you sell it for to come up with your profit/loss.

Answer 2

That depends on the gain or loss that you would have from the sale and the nature of your remaining income.  A very large gain on the sale of stock in one year can have a great deal of impact on the return as it will increase your AGI.  A very large loss will have less impact as you can not claim more that $3,000 loss in a year.

Answer 3

And, absolutely, positively, don't forget to report the sale on your tax return.

The IRS currently only gets the sales price.  If you forget to file the 1040 schedule D, about a year later you will get a mismatch letter (CP2000) that will use a basis of $0, assume it's short term, etc.  While the issue is easily solved by filing the schedule D, getting a letter saying you owe $10K when you lost money can get your blood rushing.