Donated a film collection that is comprised of items comprised of both gift and purchase

Forum|Forum|4 years ago
February 2, 2022
3 replies
15 views

I donated a portion of my home design book collection and a large portion of my film collection to Goodwill last year. A number of them have risen significantly in value, others not. FMV in total is above $500 but <$5000.

Some I purchased, others I received as gifts. I can get the purchase price for those I've purchased over the years, but for the gifts, I can't even remember who gave me which item and when, much less expect they'd be able to provide me the cost was when they gifted me.
1) Does that mean I cannot claim a deduction for the items I acquired through gift?
2) Turbotax is asking for a single date acquired, but since it's a collection with acquired dates spanning years - how do I do this?

PattiF

Alumni - Intuit

Please see the response below. @amacedo652

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amacedo652Author

Level 2

Interesting - thank you.
If we cannot donate personal items acquired as a gift, it makes me wonder why it even allows you to select "gift" as the means of how it's acquired.

AnnetteB6

Employee Tax Expert

You can certainly donate a gift that you received. Since the fair market value of the items you donated is under $5000 you will not need an appraisal to justify the amount you are claiming as a donation.

When entering the information for your donation, you may combine both your book collection and film collection as a single unit that was donated or you may want to separate them into two separate collections. Each item does not need to be entered individually.

If you group them together as a collection, your date acquired may be entered as 'various'. Then, when you enter how you acquired the item(s), just choose one option such as purchase or gift. Also, enter your best estimate of the purchase price for the whole collection donated. As long as the overall value of the whole collection that you are claiming as a donation does not exceed the purchase price (the collection as a whole has not appreciated), there will be no restrictions placed on the donation.

To learn more, take a look at IRS Publication 561 Determining the Value of Donated Property.

@amacedo652

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