Here’s a quick primer on itemized deductions, and the limitations that apply. Let’s take medical, itemized deduction number one. First of all, your costs have to be out of pocket, not reimbursed. Second, and most importantly, these expenses have to be higher than 7.5 percent of your income, which means if you spent $7,501 in medical costs on an income of $100K, you get exactly $1. You’d never want to be sick enough to benefit. Deduction number two: State and local taxes (or ‘SALT’) can be income taxes you pay to a US city or state, or real estate taxes, but they have to be paid domestically, and cannot be foreign. Foreign income taxes are eligible for the much more valuable foreign tax credit, but you really can’t do anything with foreign real estate taxes. Also, since 2018, you cannot deduct more than $10K for SALT on a personal return (SALT being state and local tax). Mortgage interest on a primary residence (deduction three) can still be deducted pretty freely, even for foreign properties, but not on more than $1 million in mortgage debt. If you pay interest on a mortgage bigger than $1 million, that overage gets prorated and removed as a deduction. Charitable giving (the fourth and final deduction) can be a great vehicle for tax savings, but you have to remember that: A) unless you have a qualified appraisal, your household items and old clothes are valued at what a thrift store would charge for them, and B) cash donations are currently limited in most cases to 60 percent of their face value, so if you donate $100, you get $60. And unless there is a tax treaty between your home country and the US, donations to non-US charities probably cannot be taken at all. Our recommendation: Don’t worry about itemizing deductions and keeping all your medical receipts, unless the US tax laws change again.