The easiest way to keep a mileage log for tax deductions

Courtesy of http://www.steps-to-starting-your-bus... This video shows how to use a "week at a glance" and and excel spreadsheet to keep track of business miles for tax deductions.

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Closed Caption:

hello everybody i'm going to show you
the absolutely easiest way to keep track
of your business miles for your car
first here's how you make the entries in
your mileage log get a week at a glance
calendar and every time you set out from
your house
jot down the mileage on the odometer if
it's personal trip
you really don't need to write much more
than personal it's a business trip just
write down a little note about what the
purpose of the trip is just right is or
whatever for business and every time you
leave your house just make a note of
whether it's a personal trip or business
trip and if a business trip with the
purposes then at the end of the year
when you get ready to do your taxes will
start off with calculating the total
mileage let's just make up something
here let's say it's 60,000 whatever and
then the very ending mileage is 71,000
and change that gives your total mileage
for the year then we just have to
calculate how much of that is for
business purposes and it's super easy
you just jot down the beginning mileage
of business and then the end of the trip
like as follows you find the first
business trip and you put that number in
here
61 o 85 then you skip ahead to the next
a personal trip six 1173 and that gives
you the business mileage for this this
and this
then you skip ahead to the next business
use of the car
61 248 and then from there you skip
ahead to the next personal use of the
car 6131 one skip ahead to the next
business use the car 6 135 for you can
skip this one then the next
personal trip is 61 427 and and that's
all we the data we have on this calendar
so that's a total of five hundred and
twenty-four miles of business use and
that's just in this one week . but note
we can really cut down on the amount of
data entry we do because the your first
entry is the first business entry second
entry is this one third entry is this
one fourth entry is this one enter the
next business one skip this next
personal one so you can skip a lot of
data entry and just put the beginning of
the business use of the car and the next
personal use of the car which is of
course the end of the business use of
the car that way you can whip through a
year's worth of mileage entry it takes
me about five minutes and you just whip
through it and the mileage is calculated
for you
there certainly is no easier way to do
this it's just a teeny little bit you
know it takes about 10 seconds of
jotting down in the calendar every time
you leave your house and at the end of
the year about five minutes worth of
data entry and you are set and you can
take advantage of business use of your
car mileage which if you don't keep
track of it like this you can't take the
deduction and you're just letting money
slip through your fingers so hopefully
this has been helpful and I thank you
very much