Should I enter my mortgage interest payment in California state return? I did enter it in the Fed return, but wound up with the standard deduction.

[jakebmill]

In the California state return there is a new section called Mortgage Interest Adjustment where it states, "Enter y qualifying interest that was disallowed on your Federal Return."  I am not sure if I am supposed to enter the same mortgage interest paid amount as I did in my Federal return.  I don't think it was disallowed, but Fed did not use this value since it had me take the standard deduction (not itemized).

[DawnC0]

No, you would not need to enter it there because as you said, the deduction was not disallowed.  The standard deduction was more than your itemized deductions and your federal mortgage interest deduction amount was not affected by the new law.

That question is asking about only the interest that was disallowed on your federal return, such as: 

1. mortgage interest on debt over $750K but less than $1M (and this only applies to mortgages with origination dates after 12/14/2017) and/or 
2. interest on home-equity debt where you used the money for things other than buying, building or substantially improving your home.

The interest that falls into one of these 2 categories would be disallowed on your federal return, and therefore reportable as an adjustment on your CA return.  There would have been the opposite adjustment taken on your federal return to justify the CA state adjustment.    

[triadyk]

If I have 2 mortgages for 2 houses, each of them less than 750k, but combined they are between 750k and 1 mil, do I need to enter this? In another word, is the 750k limit apply for combination of all your mortgages, or for each individual mortgage?

[DawnC0]

 It is on the total debt of all mortgages combined - but if the origination date is after 12/14/2017 - the $750K limit does not apply - so it would not be ''disallowed'' on your federal return.  

[larado42]

I entered my mortgage interest paid in the federal tax document and now am showing the the California State tax document is reducing the amount.  Why is this happening?

[RobertB4444]

California allows a deduction on mortgages up to a million dollars.  That is bigger than the federal amount.  So the California deduction, if anything, should be going up not down.  You should go back through the deductions and credits section to make sure that all of the numbers that you entered are correct.

If that doesn't work I would recommend phoning TurboTax to ask for help.

Here is a link to the TurboTax Phone Number.