If we had a house fire with substantial damage and had no insurance at no fault of our own, Shouldn't we have done itemized instead of standard on our taxes?

[tstrongarm]

We also had out of pocket medical expenses , attorney fees and we paid taxes on the home also which the value has decreased

[Hal_Al · Accepted solution]

No. The casualty loss deduction was eliminated, starting in 2018 (except federally declared disaster areas).

[TerryA]

Some states do not conform to the new federal rules that Hal_Al mentions so for state purposes such non-FEMA losses can still be entered as "This event does not qualify as a disaster casualty". This loss will be ignored by the federal program unless there is also a casualty gain in the return whereupon the non-FEMA loss will offset the gain. A nonconforming TT/State program will pick up the loss.

My list of the nonconforming states is AL, AR, CA, HI, IA, MN, MO, and NY. So if you are going to prepare one of those state returns then it could benefit you to enter it into the federal program.