Sold house for 250,000.

[jamookiegramps]

Father sold house for less than 250,00. Does he have to file Schedule D??

[PaulaM · Accepted solution]

If your father sold his primary residence, he may qualify to exclude the gain from his sale.

You may qualify to exclude from income all or part of any gain from the sale of your primary residence if you meet ownership and use tests. This means for the 5-year period ending with the sale of the home, you lived in it as your main home and you owned it for 2 years.

If you meet both tests, you may exclude up to $250,000 ($500,000 on joint returns) of gain from your income, and you would not report it on your return.

Do not report the sale of your main home on your tax return unless:

• You have a gain and do not qualify to exclude all of it,
• You have a gain and choose not to exclude it, or
• You have a loss and received a Form 1099-S.

Sale of main home 

IRS pub 523

[aschulman]

Reporting Gain or Loss on Your
Home Sale
Determine whether you need to report the gain from
your home. You need to report the gain if ANY of the following is true.
• You have taxable gain on your home sale (or on the
residential portion of your property if you made separate calculations for home and business) and don’t
qualify to exclude all of the gain.
• You received a Form 1099-S. If so, you must report
the sale even if you have no taxable gain to report.
• You wish to report your gain as a taxable gain even
though some or all of it is eligible for exclusion. You
may wish to do this if, for example, you plan to sell another main home within the next 2 years and are likely
to receive a larger gain from the sale of that property.
If you choose to report, rather than exclude, your taxable gain, you can undo that choice by filing an amenTIP
ded return within 3 years of the due date of your return
for the year of the sale, excluding extensions.
If NONE of the three bullets above is true, you don’t
need to report your home sale on your tax return.