Traditional IRA contribution Question

2 replies
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Hello I contributed to my wifes traditional IRA for tax year 2019, but made all the contributions in 2020 as I have done in the past. Turbo Tax is stating in the IRA Contributions worksheet that this cannot be greater than zero when I run the review. I have done it this way before without error. So a little confused here. I am also recharacterizing to a roth this year. Any input would be appreciated.

srbowthegov17Author

Level 2

If I do not recharacterize to a roth in turbo tax this error goes away. It seems to be a bug in the software in my opinion. I contributed this year for 2019 but it states this should be zero. I enter in the traditional IRA contribution first then do the recharacterization to a roth for all of it. Not sure if TT thinks I should have zero contribution after the recharacterization.

dmertz

Level 15

What does recharacterizing to Roth have to do with the traditional IRA contribution? Did you wife recharacterize the traditional IRA contribution? Was the intent to instead do a Roth conversion?

Does the modified AGI for the purpose of a Roth IRA contribution exceed the limit where eligibility for your wife to contribute to a Roth IRA drops to zero?