Question

Why didn't my federal taxes due go down when I entered real estate taxes, personal propery taxes and mortgage interest?

Forum|Forum|7 years ago
June 5, 2019
1 reply
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TurboTax Deluxe Windows

Employee

If your standard deduction is greater than your allowable itemized deductions, TT will default to the standard deduction. The program chooses the option that gives you the greatest benefit.

**Answers are correct to the best of my ability but do not constitute tax or legal advice.

J

Johannarama

I'm sure this is my fundamental misunderstanding, but I thought I had to overall choose either the standard deduction or to itemize deductions. I will be choosing to itemize deductions (as I do each year) so how is it that this one thing can have the standard deduction applied to it?

A

Anonymous

TT automatically chooses the higher of itemized deductions or the standard deduction (if you enter your itemized deduction info otherwise the standard deduction will be used) you can override this choice to use the standard deduction even if less than itemized. you'll probably end up paying more in income taxes if you make this choice.

for married filing separate they both must use the same method. but TT goes through a series of questions to determine which should be used.