This is probably the first time in, like forever, that I had my tax returns finished before the end of January. The verdict for the "reduction" in tax liability under trump's tax bill for me was 0.8% in the "effective tax rate" over the effective tax rate of the year before. Less than 1%, so not a big difference.
For 2017 I had a combination of approximately $11,400 in itemized deductions plus the $4,050 ($4,100 for 2018 pre-new tax bill) personal exemption for a total of more than $15,500 to reduce my adjusted gross income under old tax law. Under the new tax law, I wouldn't have enough itemized deductions to exceed the standard deduction and would have no personal exemption so my taxable income would be higher for no other reason than that (disregarding any increases in my adjusted gross income).
So, knowing that on January 2, 2018, I took $101,255 from my savings account and paid off my mortgage so that I would not be paying the approximately $4000 in interest in 2018 in addition to having a reduced "deduction" in my adjusted gross income. Actually, I am happy that, I considered, the new tax bill to "force" me to do this as I should have paid off my mortgage as I had originally planned to when I sold my house in Louisiana; but, because I had been paying both mortgages for 5 months and it was relatively painless, when I sold that house I decided to just add the equity I received to my savings. So in 2018 each month I just added what had been the mortgage payment to the amount that I transferred to savings to build it back up.
I was pleasantly surprised while preparing my federal tax return that in addition to the $12,000 standard deduction that an additional $1,600 was added for over-65 unmarried filing status for a total of $13,600 reduction of the adjusted gross income arriving at the taxable income.
Another thing that came to light with the new tax bill, (and this won't affect those of you in Florida) is that some states require a taxpayer to use the same form of deduction (either standard or itemized) as they use on their federal tax returns. Thankfully, Arkansas does not do this. Their standard deduction is only $2,200 and my property taxes and contributions greatly exceed this amount and I was able to used those itemized deductions to reduce the amount of state income taxes. If I had not been able to do so, the increase in state income taxes would have exceeded the amount that I saved under the new tax bill on my federal taxes by about double. Hopefully, other states that have required the same type of deductions will have made adjustments in their tax requirements so that this doesn't happen. If not, there may be a lot of our folks in this country with a very nasty surprise.
Happy income tax filing everybody!