Estate basic exclusion amount

[kenwoolley1]

In the Lacerte Estate Tax program, there is no way to update the basic exclusion amount on Line 9a of the Form 706 from the 2023 amount of $12,920,000 to the 2024 amount of $13,610,000. So, for decedents of 2024, Lacerte makes the wrong calculations, even though the IRS has announced the 2024 amounts in IR-2023-208 dated Nov. 9, 2023, and the tax form has the date of death, so that Lacerte should know the proper inflation adjusted exclusion amount. One might say to wait until Lacerte releases the 2024 version of Lacerte Tax Software. But for a January 2024 decedent, the due date is in October of 2024, not the spring of 2025. If the January 2024's estate tax is ready to be filed in the summer of 2024, that is a long wait, when it can impact beneficiaries. Lacerte needs to allow the tax preparer to override the basic exclusion amount the correct new inflation adjusted amount.

[TaxGuyBill]

I don't use Lacerte, but can't you just override it?

[sjrcpa]

An extension is available, too.

[kenwoolley1]

Lacerte does not offer an ability to override this amount. That is the problem.

[kenwoolley1]

Part of completing an estate administration is filing an estate tax return and getting it accepted by the IRS before distributions to estate beneficiaries is made. If the estate return would otherwise be ready in June, but not be able to file it for this one item for six months is really bad.

[kenwoolley1 · Accepted solution]

Thanks to Lacerte.

Someone at Lacerte heard what I was saying. While working on a Form 706, Line 9a Basic Exclusion Amount was changed from the incorrect amount to the correct amount.

Now, you cannot start working on a Form 706 without entering the date of death. That date of death is used by the program to look up the correct exclusion amount for the year of death and input that into line 9a. While still hard entered, it is the correct exclusion amount. You can see for yourself by creating test Forms 706 with different dates of death and see the correct exclusion amount for that year appear in line 9a.

This is so much better than the solution I was originally told to do- prepare the return by hand.