

You should note that you can only have one legal primary residence at a time, meaning that you can only apply the home sale exclusion to one sale at a time. Most importantly, this must have been the address for filing taxes, voting, state and federal IDs, and utility bills. There are several ways of formally establish primary residence.


Then, you deduct the home sale exclusion. This means that you first deduct the price you paid for the house, then you remove any tax-deductible improvements or expenses. You should note that taxable capital gains only apply to the amount made on a sale. In 2023, the home sale exclusion his exclusion allows individual taxpayers to exclude up to $250,000 from the sale of their primary home ($500,000 for joint taxpayers). The second tax break is called a Section 1031 (also called like-kind exchange), which allows taxpayers to defer paying capital gains tax on an investment property sale by using the proceeds to buy another similar property. The first tax break is called a Section 121 (commonly referred to as home sale exclusion), which allows taxpayers to exclude capital gains from the sale of their home. This means that it could only be applied to the primary residence where you live. If you’re selling a house, there are two main forms of tax breaks the IRS allows.
