For the New York property tax rebate:
1. Part of it may be a rebate of your 2016 property taxes, and part may be a "property tax freeze credit" on your 2016 property taxes. If you are itemizing your deductions and deducting property tax, then reduce your property tax deduction by the amount of the 2016 rebates. If you are not itemizing deductions and deducting your property taxes, then do nothing; do not report it as income.
2. If part of the check is a rebate from your 2015 property taxes, then:
(a) if you did not deduct property taxes on last year's return, do not report it as income.
(b) if you did deduct property taxes on your 2015 tax return, then the rebate is a "taxable recovery" -- a reimbursement of a previous deduction. This is entered as other miscellaneous income at the bottom of the income page, look for "other income" and then look for a choice that looks like "recovery of a previous deduction."
The property tax rebate and freeze credits are not entered as income tax refunds.
