No, you cannot claim employee business expenses such as home office expenses on your Federal return when you receive a W-2 as an employee. The employee business expense deduction was suspended by the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act for tax years 2018 through 2025.
Under the rules for claiming home office expenses as an employee, the space must be used regularly and exclusively for business, it must be your principal place of business, and it must be for the convenience of your employer. If you do qualify under these conditions, you may want to enter the expenses into your Federal return anyway.
Some states did not conform to the change and they still allow a deduction for employee business expense. You can enter the information about your expenses into Form 2106 as part of your Federal return. Then, if it is allowed by the state return, the information will be transferred there.
Use these steps to go to that section of your Federal return:
- On the top row of the TurboTax online screen, click on Search (or for CD/downloaded TurboTax locate the search box in the upper right corner)
- This opens a box where you can type in “2106” (be sure to enter exactly as shown here) and click the magnifying glass (or for CD/downloaded TurboTax, click Find)
- The search results will give you an option to “Jump to 2106”
- Click on the blue “Jump to 2106” link
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