The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) permits you to write off either your state
and local income tax or sales taxes when itemizing your deductions.
People who live in a state that does not impose income taxes often
benefit most from this deduction. However, you might also be better off
deducting sales taxes instead of income taxes if you make large
purchases during the year and your total sales tax payments exceed those
for state income tax. You can use either the actual sales taxes you
paid or the IRS optional sales tax tables.
If you’re taking the sales tax deduction, here’s how to enter the sales tax you paid:
- Open (continue) your return.
(To do this, sign in to TurboTax and click the orange Take me to my return button.)
- Do a search for where do I enter sales tax (use this exact phrase), and then click “Jump to” link in the search results.
- When asked how you want to enter your sales tax info:
- Choose EasyGuide if you want us to walk you through it.
- Or, if you’ve saved all of your receipts, you can choose Enter All My Receipts and give us the grand total.
If you can’t reach it through the “Jump to” link, go to Deductions & Credits and choose what you work on. Then go to Estimates and Other Taxes Paid. You’ll see Sales Tax in that list of topics.
