Good answer and coincidentally I sort of lucked out this year. I'll explain but first, my estimated payment process has always been a large payment in April, an equal or smaller one in June, another equal or smaller one in September and then a final payment in January if I was short some amount. So, if my taxes were going to be $16,000 I would pay $8,000 in April, $4000 in June and $4,000 again in September. I did this because I always wanted to owe less money later in the year and since I had plenty due to taking my RMD in January it did not hurt me to make a bigger payment up front.
Now, this year I realized I lucked out. My wife just started her RMD in 2024. So our taxes, and the estimated payments ballooned. But my 2023 taxes that I'm going to file in April were less than half of what the 2024 will be. I intend to pay my first estimated payment for 2024 110% of the 2023 tax amount in April, then two equal but lower payments in June and September. That will result in all my 2024 taxes being paid as well as 110% of what my 2023 was. My hunch is that I am in no risk of any penalty no matter what happens, though as I've noted before my estimated tax is pretty precise and in any case I always overpay a few hundred that gets applied to the next year,
Sound good?
