Turbo Tax alternatives 2022

April 15, 2022 10:30 AM

I have a slightly complicated tax return (rental income in a non-resident state, some investment income). What are my best options for tax prep software?

I have already downloaded the fillable pdf forms, and I know I just file that way if I need to. I used to do all my taxes, and the only thing that I really find confusing is handling the income from a rental property I own in my old home state. This requires figuring out depreciation on the rental property, and all the various expenses to make sure the income on that property is accurate, and doing a non-resident state return.

Turbo Tax will charge me around $170 total, I think ($69 if I buy the program through Costo, plus $49 for each state). H&R block looks to be maybe $160. I don't want to do business with either company on principal, and anyway I think $170 is pretty steep for what is otherwise a fairly simple return. Any other better options that would be a bit less? Otherwise, I'll just do it all on my own.

posted by anonymous to Work & Money (7 answers total)

Have you checked to see whether there are any programs that allow you to freefile for the relevant states? I use olt.com for this in NY; I no longer qualify because I make above the income cutoff for that, but it only costs $10/ per state. Caveat: I do not have rental property so don't know how well it handles that.
posted by metasarah at 10:47 AM on April 15, 2022

I think FreeTaxUSA can handle your rental income. If so, it would cost $30 ($0 federal plus $15/state.) It’d be easy to try it out before paying.
posted by michaelh at 10:49 AM on April 15, 2022 [1 favorite]

FreeTaxUSA can do rental income for non-residents. I had the option to do it. But since the state that has my rental property has a free state tax filing software, I used that. But you can do it on FreeTaxUSA for $15.
posted by WizKid at 10:51 AM on April 15, 2022

I used Credit Karma for the last few years, which this year became Cash App. I have lots of side gig/investment income which is included in the free (only!) version of Cash App -- that article I linked to says that rental property income is also included. It also very quickly does state returns. Did mine about 2 weeks ago, already have both fed and state refunds.

You do have to download their app if you want to complete your taxes on a desktop but it was all very easy and brought over all my past Credit Karma returns.

Edit: Oh shoot, it looks like they don't support nonresident state returns. Maybe this will be helpful for someone else though.
posted by jabes at 10:57 AM on April 15, 2022

If you don't find any alternatives and have to go with one of the big software companies, I recommend TurboTax, it's way more user-friendly than H&R Block. I used it for the first time this year and was very impressed.
posted by radioamy at 2:32 PM on April 15, 2022

Nthing FreeTaxUSA. I have complicated taxes and they've been able to handle everything I've thrown at them. Previously I had used H&R Block, TurboTax, CreditKarma, and FreeTaxUSA does everything they can do only faster, easier, and cheaper.
posted by basalganglia at 2:53 PM on April 15, 2022

I wish I had a better answer for you, but I haven't found a program that makes rental depreciation clearer than TurboTax Premier, especially after the first year renting. I wouldn't call it an endorsement-- it's very expensive and, now all my data is entered, I feel pretty locked into using it forever. The upside is that importing prior year TurboTax data makes it very easy to do the depreciation calcs in the future. I also found it clearer about where to enter rental mortgage interest and property taxes. I guess it's slightly comforting that the lowest it ever goes on sale is $59 + a $10 gift card, including the software for one state but not the e-filing fees for that state.
posted by Gable Oak at 3:49 PM on April 15, 2022 [1 favorite]