Do I really need an accountant, or can I handle filing my LLC taxes on my own?

Everyone will tell you you need an accountant. But personally, I agree with you--I have learned through extremely painful and expensive personal experience that if you are a detail-oriented, organized, competent, literate, thorough, smart freelancer with a simple business structure and expenses, you are better off without one. Nobody will care about the accuracy of your return more than you. (Although I don't know why you'd do your return by hand, but if it works for you...)

If you are well-organized, you can do it yourself. If you freak out when you hear words like "depreciation," get an accountant. Where I live, an accountant would change quite a bit more than $200 for a freelancer's tax return. I do it myself. I am using Turbo Tax Home and Business which was especially helpful for calculating the home office deduction. I also joined the http://www.freelancersunion.org/index.html. It's free, and they have helpful information just for people like us. In fact, last February they had a webinar with an accountant who pointed out deductions I would never have found myself. The hardest part, at least for me, is keeping track of expenses and saving receipts, especially for the home office deduction. Whether you use an accountant or not, you have to do that yourself. If it would give you more confidence, you could try an accountant this year, and next year you could do it yourself. Just repeat what the accountant did, filling in the new numbers.

I'm not a freelance writer but I am a freelance designer. Ever since I started using an accountant, he's been able to get me thousands back in refunds every year. To me, that alone is worth paying him a few hundred to work on my taxes. Of course, YMMV.

I would absolutely agree with violetk. I am a long-time freelancer and my accountant (who specializes in working with freelancers -- important!) has indeed found me thousands of $ in deductions that I never would have thought to take myself.

My accountant literally covered his fee and beyond with deductions he found that I never would've thought of. The home office deduction (obviously that wouldn't apply to you), deducting that percentage of my rent and other utilities for business purposes, the mileage deduction for business trips I take, various equipment I could deduct, my cell phone since I use it primarily for work, etc. Plus for $200 or so, he did all that and did all the paperwork and filing so I didn't have to do it, which at my hourly rate actually saved me money. And he's good for other stuff, too. That $200 got me a free consultation when I suddenly inherited some money and was kinda freaking out.

Since I write for a living, my expenses are extremely minimal. Fellow writer/editor here. I haven't had much luck with getting deductions or refunds from my accountant, but my overhead is apparently just really low. (Also, when I was just starting out we underestimated my quarterly payments--and then I had a gangbusters year. So...don't do that. OVERPAY THE QUARTERLY. Worst case scenario, you get a refund.) I will probably keep going to her because I'm not that organized, and she takes payment in steak and/or tequila (family friend). But if you're just filing a Schedule C, and you keep decent records, and you're rolling pretty simply in terms of expenses and deductions, you should be just fine on your own or with TurboTax.

There should be no reason you can't do this yourself, particularly if you spend 50 bucks for Turbotax. Turbotax will walk you through all of the deductions. Some items to look out for: 1. Turbotax will fill out the Schedule C for you business income and Schedule SE that calculates your self-employment tax. The bottom line on these are carried over to your 1040 by Turbotax. 2. Turbotax will automatically carry over the 50% of SE tax deduction to your Form 1040. 3. Claiming a home office deduction can be a little tricky but Turbotax will help you there. You have to separate out expenses spent strictly on your home office (e.g. painting your office) from expenses that are generally attributed to your home living space (e.g. utilities, mortgage interest, depreciation). The first category you can deduct 100% and the second category only the percentage of square feet of your office compared to total home square feet. 4. Turbotax will ask you about your health insurance premiums. If neither you nor your spouse are eligible for a group plan from your employer, you can deduct 100% of health insurance premiums for you, your spouse and your dependents. 5. If you don't have a retirement plan from an employer, you can contribute to your own retirement plan, for example a SEP IRA and take a tax deduction. Turbotax will calculate the maximum deduction you can contribute to your plan. 6. You can still contribute $5000 to your individual IRA, regardless of your SEP IRA or other retirement contribution. These are separate retirement plans and you can do both. Turbotax will calculate the portion of your individual IRA contribution that is deductible.

I'm strongly opposed to lying or trying to game the system dishonestly -- by saying that my bike is a business expense, for example Well, you don't report all of your bike usage as a deduction -- just the percent that you use it for work. Just like my car that I use for work (as an independent contractor). I very precisely track the miles I use my car for work, and then on my taxes I input that number. Sure, people might be gaming the system by putting in more than that -- but you can take the honest deduction without gaming the system. And I don't put in "maintenance fees" for my car separately -- the IRS deduction amount / mile already takes that into account. And even with just being honest about it, I got something like $200 off my taxes last year.

I'm strongly opposed to lying or trying to game the system dishonestly -- by saying that my bike is a business expense, for example, when I use it mostly for personal purposes and to commute or to make up other fake deductions. I'll defend my bike deduction by letting you know that I ride to meetings, to buy supplies etc. My accountant only deducts a percentage of my bike (just like she only deducts a portion of rent/utilities/phone) since I only use it for business a percentage of the time. This is not a fake deduction in my case, it is transportation. If you don't use your bike for business then I would expect you not to deduct it.