Many taxpayers in this country are now faced with a difficult situation and that is owing too much money to the government and not being able to pay. Todays very difficult economic recession (some say depression) has created double digit unemployment across most of the country, with California and Florida two of the hardest hit states. As a consequence, many people that had good paying jobs in previous years are now faced with little or no income. Some are surviving on just their meager unemployment checks alone and as we all know, these do not last forever.
In years past, many people were self-employed or had jobs as independent contractors. Many of these jobs or small businesses were wiped out by the economic downfall. For example, Real Estate professionals have been hard hit as a group. Most of these folks were independent contractors, working for loan brokerages or real estate brokerages and paying their taxes either quarterly or at the end of the year. Fall of 2007 saw the beginning of the recession and was the pivotal time for real estate because that is when banks ceased lending. The problem was that they did not tell the customers that they had stopped all lending, so applications continued to come in the door. Agents and brokers continued business as usual thinking that if they brought in buyers and borrowers that the banks would eventually get around to approving and funding the loans. Unfortunately the banks did not tell anyone until months later and event then they were in a state of pure denial. By this time most realtors and loan officers were faced with dwindling bank accounts and forced to face the realization that the banks were just not playing along any more. Taxes owed mounted for these people worse perhaps than any other group in the U.S. and no IRS tax relief was in sight.
When it came time to pay their taxes these real estate pros found that they could not catch up and pay their back taxes. For example, if you made $100,000 in 2006, you expected to be able to pay your 30% the following year from your savings. Since most of the savings had evaporated while waiting for banks to approve loans, these same hard working people found themselves with no money to pay the government. There are millions of people in this situation and the government has gone after them hard. There are several ways to get IRS debt relief but none of them are easy.
There are companies like Tax Masters that offer services where they will negotiate with the government on your behalf in order to get you IRS debt relief. If you owe over $10,000 in back taxes, you need to either make a payment arrangement with the government or hire a company like Tax Masters to do it for you. It is not easy to get these arrangements so it is wise to hire a professional. They will get you the IRS debt relief you need but it will cost quite a bit to do it. These guys are not cheap and you need to know that going in. The other alternative is to just call the IRS yourself and ask for a payment plan to catch up and get some IRS debt relief. They also offer an Offer and Compromise program where you can pay pennies on the dollar for heavy tax debts.