Here's what happened:
- I made the maximum contribution to a Roth IRA this year.
- I thought about how my marginal tax rate now is a lot higher than I expect it to be in retirement, so I decided a traditional IRA would have been a better idea.
- I recharacterized this year's contributions to a traditional IRA.
- I realized my income is too high to qualify for a traditional IRA deduction.
Here's what I did not do, and why this question is not a duplicate of similar questions already asked:
- I have not made any conversions at all.
- I have not taken any distributions, and thus have not received a 1099-R.
- I did not previously go from a traditional to a Roth, and now want to go back to a traditional.
- I am not rolling over any 401k or other non-IRA account.
Can IRA contributions be recharacterized multiple timesCan IRA contributions be recharacterized multiple times seems like a good duplicate, but alas it's very old and has no answers.
My understanding is that (for married, filing jointly taxpayers for 2015) that someone with a MAGI above $118,000 is not eligible for a traditional IRA deduction. Below $183,000, the full Roth IRA contribution is still allowed.
I'm in this range (between $118,000 and $183,000), so a Roth IRA seems like the only rational choice. Please correct me if I'm wrong.
So, I would like to unrecharacterize (rerecharacterize?) this year's IRA contribution back to a Roth IRA. I've not yet filed a return for the contribution year, so I'm hoping I can do that.
Can I? Would I report to the IRA two recharacterizations? Or would I file as if no recharacterization ever happened?