Why would an open roth ira change my tax?

[rkeder]

was a roth ira open in 2017? I answered yes and go from a credit to a a deficit

[dmertz · Accepted solution]

If you answer No, TurboTax calculates a miscellaneous deduction for unrecoverable Roth IRA basis if your Roth IRA distributions during the year are less than the amount of contribution and conversion basis that was in your Roth IRAs.  If you had any Roth account open at the end of the year, i.e., you had a nonzero balance in Roth IRAs at year end, you are not eligible for this deduction.

Being eligible for this deduction means that you had overall bad investment performance in your Roth IRAs, resulting in losses that prevent you from getting back out of your Roth IRAs all that you put in as regular or conversion contributions.

[dmertz]

Corrected "exceed" to say "less than."