Skipped TurboTax for one year, how to correct depreciation etc

[fallinghawks]

I've used Turbotax for several years and have a rental property which I inherited. It was rereoofed a few years ago and, at the time, I entered the cost and opted to depreciate it. Everything went smoothly but last year we had an unusual tax situation where we did not feel confident to do it ourselves, so we had a tax preparer do it. This year we are back to Turbotax and have some numbers getting pulled in from 2 years ago rather than last year, and I'm trying to chase down why my state income from the rental is significantly higher than the federal. Any help thanks

[DianeW777]

The best advice is to compare each return (current and last year) then review the assets to be sure they are entered correctly. In your rental activity simply click on each asset, use last year's depreciation worksheet (should be with your return) and compare the dates placed in service and the prior depreciation amounts. The system for depreciation has not changed during for quite some time (1986).

Depending on your state, they don't always conform to federal rules which could be part of the reason for the situation you encountered. 

You have access to all forms when you choose to print your return in TurboTax Online/Mobile.  However you are required to pay before printing, but do not have to file until you are ready.

• Can I print a copy of my return in TurboTax Online before filing?

If you are using TurboTax Desktop you can switch to Forms and review all forms and worksheets.

[fallinghawks]

Thank you for your reply. We were able to chase down what happened. The building itself has a depreciation amount attached to its appraised value at the date of inheritance.  For some reason that amount, in addition to being applied as normal depreciation, also ended up in the capital loss carryover fields. So the amount was getting deducted twice!

We were unable to enter 0 into the 3 fields where the capital loss carryover number was; Turbotax refused to accept 0, and when we tried the other option (No) it refused to save that, or change the numbers! We found instead that entering .01 (or, I assume, any amount <= .49) would make it round down to 0. 

Once zeroed our federal vs state income returned to the match it should have been. 

A piece of advice to everyone with moderately complicated taxes: when you download, make sure you include all the worksheets in your download. This is not the default.