dmertz
Level 15

Retirement tax questions

If you recharacterize the 2017 traditional IRA contribution to be a Roth IRA contribution instead, you won't have any traditional IRA deduction or nondeductible traditional IRA contributions reported on your tax return.  Recharacterizing your $5,500 contribution requires that the transfer of the $5,500 to the Roth IRA be accompanied by any gain or loss attributable to the $5,500 being recharacterized.  (The rate of gain of loss is calculated over the entire account.)  If there was a gain, after the recharacterization the gain will be a Roth IRA gain rather than a traditional IRA gain.  Normally your IRA custodian will calculate the gain or loss and transfer the appropriate amount to accomplish the recharacterization of the $5,500; be sure to specifically request a recharacterization.

When making the entries into TurboTax, you enter the original $5,500 traditional IRA contribution and in the follow-up indicate that you recharacterized $5,500.  You'll also enter the Form 1099-R reporting the recharacterization (code N if you complete the recharacterization in 2017 or a made-up code R Form 1099-R if you complete the recharacterization in 2018).  TurboTax should also ask you to complete the explanation statement required to describe the details of the recharacterization.