Turbo Tax -disc or download

[leftcoastjayhawk]

CDs? How modern! I still have 3.5 inch diskettes for the 1993 Taxcut around somewhere. And I think you can still buy external drives for those cheaply. But I'm in trouble if I need to use the 5 1/4 inch "floppy disks" for my 1988 TaxCut...



Now I store the downloaded H&R Block Tax (formerly TaxCut) installation files on our NAS box, which is backed up weekly to a cloud account. Much easier...

 

[audreyh1]

Why would you ever need to access your 1988 tax program? I think you are safe.

 

[Al in Ohio]

Why would you ever need to access your 1988 tax program? I think you are safe.

Why would you ever need to access or reload any previous year? I never have in over 20 years of using TT. I print out a PDF of my returns and save an electronic PDF and save the Tax file to a thumb drive. Then I delete the TT program about 6-12 months later. I use the download version. I quit using the CD version. Exact same thing except it requires driving to a store.

 

[Texas Proud]

Heck, I got 11 years of tax programs on my computer.... I am sure I have the CD somewhere, but have been really bad at putting things where they belong for awhile...

 

[audreyh1]

Why would you ever need to access or reload any previous year? I never have in over 20 years of using TT. I print out a PDF of my returns and save an electronic PDF and save the Tax file to a thumb drive. Then I delete the TT program about 6-12 months later. I use the download version. I quit using the CD version. Exact same thing except it requires driving to a store.

Right, we have complete PDF copies of our returns and don’t expect to have to rerun programs after a year. But DH usually makes a CD of the downloaded program with our files, and it goes with the tax records in safe deposit box. We occasionally shred old ones.

 

[Time2]

This will be my first your year to do my own taxes, previously we had a business and used an accountant, but now I want to save that money.
I have LTCGs, STCGs, dividends and interest, an HSA contribution and Roth conversions. I don't think I need a deluxe program.
What program should I start looking for at what price?

 

[samcat]

I'd say Turbotax deluxe. You can get it for $40 most places...maybe cheaper at Costco. You'd need more than a free version because of the stock gains. You will hate it the first year as you have to enter everything but the following years, you will love it. My dad experienced this. I remember him complaining the first year but now he loves it.

 

[RetiredAndLovingIt]

I'm sticking with the disc as long as I can since my daughter also uses it for her taxes. This year I read somewhere that she could download the software from Turbotax and then enter the code from the disc but when she tried that it would not work. It told her the code belonged to another account IIRC. I took the actual disc over to her and she installed from it and entered the code and everything worked fine.

 

[Midpack]

This will be my first your year to do my own taxes, previously we had a business and used an accountant, but now I want to save that money.
I have LTCGs, STCGs, dividends and interest, an HSA contribution and Roth conversions. I don't think I need a deluxe program.
What program should I start looking for at what price?

TurboTax will insist you need Premier, but Deluxe will handle all those situations with a little prodding on conversions - Premier asks directly, Deluxe does not, but all the IRA forms and worksheets are there. I know because I ponied up for Premier for a couple years only to find I didn’t need it. And there’s no risk in buying the Deluxe download as you can easily upgrade to Premier, you pay the list difference and voila you have Premier.

 

[timo2]

It told her the code belonged to another account IIRC. I took the actual disc over to her and she installed from it and entered the code and everything worked fine.

I got that message also when I tried to download my version onto DW's laptop, to see if that would be less buggy than on my tower PC.