I made a car donation in November 2017 to a charitable organization. The car sold in January 2018. Which year do I take the deduction?

[DS30 · Accepted solution]

You will be able to include the car as a donation in the year you actually made the donation (2017) regardless of the year that the car actually sold (2018) as long as you no longer had any ownership interest in the car when it was donated.

Please click this link  IRS - donations FMV for more information on charitable donations and valuing your donations.

[alexbarnes22]

Hi TurboTax Team:

I am encountering an error that is preventing my eFile from proceeding.  Here is the error:

Check This Entry

Charitable Organization (Habitat for Humanity) -- Additional Information - Charitable Cont (2006 Toyota Corolla 4 cycl) -- Form 1098-C.  Date of sale must be on or before 2020-12-31.

Based upon notes in this chat and IRS tax code, it appears there is no restriction for the date of sale needing to be within the same year of contribution.  

My contribution date is 11/19/2020 and the date of sale of the vehicle occurred on 1/14/2021 for $2,550.

I would like to submit this donation during this tax year, can you please help me resolve so that I can submit my e-File this week.

Thank you!

[ToddL99]

List the date of sale as 12/31/2020 - you donated ("gave up") the vehicle in 2020 and that is the tax year in which you can claim the charitable deduction.

This is a very common occurrence. Contributions of this nature (car, boats, etc) are often made later in the tax year and the value of the donation is not established until early in the following year. The fact that the charity didn't sell the item (i.e. establish the value) until 2021 does not change the economic fact that you made the donation in 2020 and that it did have a measurable value. You just didn't find out that value until 2021.