Why does Turbotax need to know the cost basis and purchase date of inherited stock that i have donated to a charity?

Typically when people are giving away (usually appreciated) stock they are giving stock that they purchased and usually the stock is held long-term.  But of course you could be giving away (foolishly) stock that has either gone down in value or stock that you purchased a month before the gift.  The tax rules as to the amount of allowable charitable contribution deductions differ depending on the situation and that's why TurboTax is asking those questions.

When you enter the donation there's a page that comes up that asks how you acquired the stock; you click "inherited".  (First picture below.)  You get a page of instruction that outlines how you're supposed to proceed in this situation.  (Second picture below.)

Thanks Tom.

I had followed down the path that you'd described above and then got stopped by the purchase price question.  In my case I don't know when it was purchased or what the purchase price was because it was something that I inherited and I have no way of getting that information.

From what I can gather, the deduction IS the value of the donation when I donated it and I don't think the cost basis would matter, would it?

Sorry if I'm being obtuse here; tax law isn't my strong suit.

That page where the purchase information is requested is the page I was referring to here:

"You'll come to the next page where it asks for the "purchase" information.  Enter the value on the DoD, enter "various" in the date acquired box and select "inheritance" as the method of acquisition. "

Yes.  I know how to get to that screen; that's where I'm stuck at now.

I just don't have any way of answering that question and I don't understand why it's relevant since I'm donating all of the stock to a charity.  What difference does it make to the IRS what my cost basis was?  I've donated it to a charity so capital gains are irrelevant.

I've told you the way to get past that screen and report the donation properly.  It's just a workaround to a somewhat funky interview.  You are not providing answers to the questions that are "literally true."  You're just giving answers that are correct for your situation, i.e., you inherited it on such a such date with a value of such and such.

Oh, I think I see what you're saying.

When it asks me for the purchase price, I should enter in the value of the stock that I donated.

Thank you for the help here, Tom, much appreciated.

I had to take a break from taxes while I assembled and configured a new computer but it was very nice to resume where I was "stuck" and fly through the problem area armed with your advice.  🙂

Thank you for this answer. I had a situation where I gave away stock inherited less than a year, and entering Various as the date inherited was the key to getting it to give me the fair market value as a deduction.

Note for anyone else who sees this -- when it asks you if you have owned the stock for more than 1 year, you have to say "Yes", even if you inherited it less than a year ago. All inherited property is long-term regardless of when inherited.

Turbotax I know this probably doesn't affect very many of your users, but it sure threw me for a loop, it sure would be nice to handle this use case better in the interview.