tar'ing up /home/ directories for restoring

I'm looking at making my workstation mount /home from the server. I want to move everything in my current /home/monte directory over. I was planning on doing something along the lines of archiving it w/ tar, so I have a backup saved also. What is the proper syntax for getting *all* the files in a user's home directory, recursively, and maintaining the permissions, links, etc.? Thanks, Monte