Income Tax—IRS Issues New Draft Casualties and Thefts Form for 2016:

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Income Tax—IRS Issues New Draft Casualties and Thefts Form for 2016:

Posted by Kim Chen on January 7th, 2018

Among other things, the Disaster Tax Relief and Airport and Airway Extension Act of 2017 (Disaster Act) provided relief to taxpayers who suffered a net disaster loss due to Hurricanes Harvey, Irma, or Maria. For example, the Disaster Act eliminated the 10% of AGI reduction and allowed taxpayers claiming the standard deduction to take advantage of the casualty loss provision. In response to this, the IRS has released a new draft version of Form 4684 (Casualties and Thefts) for the 2016 tax year. This will allow victims of the 2017 hurricanes to take deductions for their losses on their 2016 returns. Changes to the form can be found in Section A (Personal Use Property), lines 11 and 15. The IRS also has released updated draft instructions for Form 4684 that take into account these changes. The new form is available at www.irs.gov/pub/irs-dft/f4684–dft.pdf , while the revised instructions can be found at www.irs.gov/pub/irs-dft/i4684–dft.pdf.