Thank you for the detail!
just to confirm:
3) when the 2018 excess is removed, we will only owe a 6% penalty per year? This distribution won’t also be taxed as taxable income and also won’t incur a 10% penalty for early distribution?
4) For 2019, bc we aren’t eligible for a Roth, when we do a recharacterization and then conversion to Roth, this 5500 per person won’t count as taxable income for 2019 taxes? (Sorry, I didn’t understand the part of your response that included all the forms and lines and what that means for it being taxable :(
