My tax situation has gotten pretty complicated over the years. I have stock investments with dividends and capital gains, a rental property with depreciation, retirement accounts, and some freelance income on the side.
I've been using H&R Block software but I'm wondering if there's something better out there. I need tax software for complex returns that can handle all these different income streams properly.
Specifically looking for tax software for investors and tax software for rental property. Accuracy is really important to me - I don't want to miss any deductions or make mistakes that could trigger an audit. Any recommendations from people with similar situations?
For complex returns like yours, I'd recommend looking at professional-grade software. In my professional tax software reviews, I've found that TurboTax Premier or H&R Block Premium handle investment and rental property situations well, but they can get expensive.
For serious investors, you might want to consider TaxAct Premier or even Drake if you're willing to pay for professional software. The key features you need are: proper handling of investment income (including wash sales and dividend reinvestments), depreciation schedules for rental property, and the ability to handle multiple state filings.
Tax software for complex returns needs to be more than just a pretty interface - it needs correct calculations for things like passive activity losses, at-risk rules, and depreciation recapture.
I have a rental property too and I've been using TurboTax Premier for years. It handles depreciation automatically and asks all the right questions about repairs vs improvements, rental income, expenses, etc.
For investments, the import feature works well with my brokerage accounts. It automatically pulls in all the transactions and calculates everything correctly. The only downside is the price - it's definitely not cheap tax software.
If you're looking for tax software for accuracy, TurboTax has been solid for me. I've never had an issue with their calculations, and I've compared results with my accountant a few times just to be sure.
I don't have rental property but I do have complex investment income. I switched from TurboTax to TaxAct Premier last year and saved about $60. The investment import features worked just as well, and it handled my freelance income properly too.
For tax software for investors, I think TaxAct is a good middle ground between price and features. It's not as polished as TurboTax but the calculations seem accurate based on my comparisons.
One thing to watch with any software - make sure it properly handles state allocations for REIT income. Some software does this automatically, others make you manually allocate the income to different states.
Have you considered using two different software programs? I know it sounds crazy, but hear me out. Use FreeTaxUSA for the basic return (it's free for federal), and then use a more robust program just for the complex parts to check your work.
Or better yet, use the robust software to do your return, then recreate it in FreeTaxUSA to verify the numbers match. That's what I do with my investment income - I use TaxAct for the actual filing, but I run everything through FreeTaxUSA too to make sure I'm not missing anything.
For tax software for rental property, I've heard good things about RentPrep's software, though I haven't used it myself.