Thanks for the reply David.
I did figure it out.
So for posterity lets talk about this:
My wife's business is a service business. In her case, Bounce House Rentals. So, it's a lot of time in the office dealing with customers, but as an operator, it's also very much 'in the field' (not in the office).
When TurboTax asked me how much of her work is done in the office, I put like 20%. Reasonable estimate. But that's true of her total responsibility. However, it is also true that she does 100% of her office work in the office. So the percent allocation didn't work.
For kicks, I adjusted that number to 100% (reflecting that 100% of her office work is done in the office). At that point it generated the simplified home office deduction.
So if you find this thread having a similar issue, just bump that number to 100. The truth of it is, this is not an actual IRC rule (if my research is wrong please correct me). The purpose of the question is to determine if there's a split office situation going on wherein a person HAS a office somewhere (like at their place of business) but is conducting office business in the home as well. The home office has to be the primary office or no deduction is allowed.
That said, if the office is the only office, then the home office deduction is allowed, even if there are business functions performed outside of the office. That was the kicker. She was not allowed the home office deduction because I made it look like there were possibly more than one office space or place of business was being utilized, disqualifying her from the office deduction.
The more you know right?
