To file your taxes as a homeowner, the documents you need start with Form 1098 from your mortgage lender and your property tax bills or payment receipts, both of which feed Schedule A of Form 1040. From there, the paperwork depends on what happened with your home during the year: a sale, a home office, energy upgrades, or an inheritance each add their own records. Before you pull any of it together, check whether itemizing beats the standard deduction for your filing status. For the 2026 tax year the standard deduction is $16,100 for single filers or married filing separately, $32,200 for married filing jointly or a surviving spouse, and $24,150 for head of household.1Internal Revenue Service. IRS Releases Tax Inflation Adjustments for Tax Year 2026 If your mortgage interest, property taxes, and other deductible expenses don’t clear those numbers, most of the documents below only matter for the year you eventually sell.
The Two Core Documents
Form 1098 from Your Lender
Your mortgage lender sends Form 1098 by the end of January, reporting the mortgage interest you paid during the prior year. The form also shows mortgage insurance premiums, points paid at closing, and any property taxes collected through your escrow account.2Internal Revenue Service. About Schedule A (Form 1040), Itemized Deductions Compare the figures to your own monthly statements before you file. Lender errors happen, and a mismatch between what you report and what the IRS has on its copy of your 1098 is a common audit trigger.
The interest amount from Form 1098 goes on Schedule A. If you have more than one mortgage, refinanced during the year, or have a home equity line of credit, you may receive multiple 1098 forms and need to combine them.3Internal Revenue Service. 2025 Instructions for Schedule A (Form 1040) – Itemized Deductions Keep the 1098 even if the interest alone looks small, because starting with the 2026 tax year private mortgage insurance premiums appearing on the form are again deductible as mortgage interest.
Property Tax Bills and Payment Records
Gather every property tax bill and payment confirmation from your county or municipality for the year. If you bought or sold mid-year, your Closing Disclosure shows how taxes were prorated between buyer and seller; keep it for that number alone.
Property taxes fall under the state and local tax deduction, which also covers state income or sales taxes. For the 2026 tax year the SALT cap rose to $40,400, well above the $10,000 ceiling that applied from 2018 through 2025, with a phase-down for filers whose adjusted gross income exceeds $505,000. That change alone makes itemizing worthwhile for many homeowners who have taken the standard deduction in recent years, so it’s worth re-running the numbers before deciding you don’t need any of this paperwork.
Documents If You Sold a Home This Year
Form 1099-S and the Closing Disclosures
When you sell, the title company or settlement agent typically issues Form 1099-S reporting the gross sale proceeds.4Internal Revenue Service. Instructions for Form 1099-S (04/2025) To figure the taxable gain, you also need the Closing Disclosure (or older HUD-1) from both the purchase and the sale. The sale statement documents broker commissions, title insurance, transfer taxes, and legal fees that reduce your gain. The purchase statement anchors your original cost basis.
Receipts for Capital Improvements
Improvement receipts are the paperwork most homeowners fail to keep, and the ones that most often save real money at sale time. Improvements add to your cost basis and reduce taxable gain; routine repairs do not. An improvement adds value, extends the home’s useful life, or adapts it to a new use. A repair simply restores what was already there.
The IRS treats the following as improvements that increase basis:
- Additions such as bedrooms, bathrooms, decks, or garages
- Systems including central air conditioning, new wiring, security systems, and water filtration
- Exterior work: a new roof, new siding, storm windows, or insulation
- Interior work: kitchen modernization, built-in appliances, and new flooring
- Grounds: landscaping, driveways, fences, and swimming pools
Replacing one broken window pane is a repair. Replacing every window in the house is an improvement. Save receipts for the entire time you own the property, because a kitchen renovation from a decade ago can shave thousands off your capital gains bill.
Section 121 Exclusion Records
The Section 121 exclusion lets you exclude up to $250,000 of gain on the sale of your primary residence, or $500,000 if married filing jointly. You must have owned and used the home as your principal residence for at least two of the five years before the sale, and you can’t have used the exclusion on another sale within the prior two years.5Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 26 USC 121 – Exclusion of Gain from Sale of Principal Residence For the joint $500,000 exclusion, both spouses must meet the use requirement but only one needs to meet the ownership requirement.
If you sold early because of a job relocation, health issue, or certain unforeseen circumstances, keep documentation supporting a partial exclusion.6Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 26 U.S. Code 121 – Exclusion of Gain from Sale of Principal Residence Active-duty military on qualified extended duty can suspend the five-year test for up to 10 years.7Internal Revenue Service. Topic No. 701, Sale of Your Home
Inherited Home Records
If you inherited the home, your cost basis is generally the fair market value on the date of the decedent’s death rather than what they originally paid. Keep the appraisal or the estate tax filing (Form 706 or Schedule A to Form 8971) that establishes that stepped-up value.8Internal Revenue Service. Gifts and Inheritances Using a basis higher than what the estate reported can trigger an accuracy-related penalty.
Documents If You Work From Home
One boundary first: the home office deduction is only available if you’re self-employed, a freelancer, or an independent contractor. W-2 employees cannot claim it, even if they work from home full time. The Tax Cuts and Jobs Act eliminated the employee home office deduction starting in 2018, and the One Big Beautiful Bill Act extended that elimination.
If you do qualify, the records you keep depend on which method you use. Under the actual expense method, measure the square footage of the space used exclusively and regularly for business, divide by the home’s total square footage, and apply that percentage to mortgage interest, property taxes, utilities, insurance, and repairs benefiting the whole home. These expenses go on Form 8829, so save every bill.9Internal Revenue Service. Simplified Option for Home Office Deduction The space must be used solely for business; a desk in a bedroom that also serves as a homework station does not qualify.
The simplified method lets you deduct $5 per square foot up to 300 square feet, for a maximum $1,500 deduction, reported directly on Schedule C with no Form 8829 or utility records required.9Internal Revenue Service. Simplified Option for Home Office Deduction The tradeoff is no depreciation deduction. That also has an upside: depreciation you take under the actual method is recaptured and taxed as income when you sell, even if the rest of your gain qualifies for the Section 121 exclusion.10Internal Revenue Service. Depreciation and Recapture 3 Whichever method you use, note it in your records each year so recapture can be figured accurately at sale time.
Documents If You Made Energy Upgrades in 2025
If you installed solar panels, a heat pump, energy-efficient windows, or similar upgrades in 2025 or earlier, you can still claim the credit on your 2025 return. Both the Residential Clean Energy Credit (Section 25D) and the Energy Efficient Home Improvement Credit (Section 25C) were terminated by the One Big Beautiful Bill Act and are not available for property placed in service after December 31, 2025.11Internal Revenue Service. FAQs for Modification of Sections 25C, 25D, 25E, 30C, 30D, 45L, 45W, and 179D Under the One Big Beautiful Bill Installation must have been completed by December 31, 2025 for the expenditure to count, even if you paid earlier.
For a 2025 return with eligible improvements, gather:
- Receipts for hardware and professional labor
- Manufacturer certification statements confirming efficiency standards
- Product identification numbers, required since 2025 for Section 25C items
- Form 5695 to calculate and report the credit
The 2025 credit rate was 30% of qualifying costs, subject to annual limits: $1,200 overall for most efficiency improvements, $600 for windows and skylights, $250 per exterior door with a $500 total, and a separate $2,000 cap for heat pumps and biomass stoves.12Internal Revenue Service. Instructions for Form 5695 (2025) The Section 25D clean energy credit had no annual dollar cap.
Deduction Limits That Decide Which Papers Matter
A few rules determine whether the documents you gather actually translate into a deduction.
Mortgage debt cap. You can deduct interest on up to $750,000 of mortgage debt used to buy, build, or substantially improve your main home or a second home ($375,000 if married filing separately). These limits were made permanent by the One Big Beautiful Bill Act.13Internal Revenue Service. Publication 936, Home Mortgage Interest Deduction Mortgages taken out before December 16, 2017 fall under the older $1 million limit ($500,000 if married filing separately), provided the debt hasn’t been refinanced above the original balance.
HELOC and home equity loans. Interest is only deductible when the borrowed money was used to buy, build, or substantially improve the home securing the loan. Using a HELOC to pay off credit cards or cover tuition means no deduction on that interest.14Internal Revenue Service. Real Estate (Taxes, Mortgage Interest, Points, Other Property Expenses) 2 Keep records of what the proceeds paid for.
Second homes. You can deduct interest on one second home in addition to your primary residence, under the same combined $750,000 cap. If you rent the second home out, you must also use it personally for more than 14 days or more than 10% of the days it’s rented, whichever is longer, for it to qualify as a second home rather than a rental property.13Internal Revenue Service. Publication 936, Home Mortgage Interest Deduction Points paid on a second-home loan are spread over the life of the loan instead of deducted in the year of closing.
How Long to Keep Your Records
The IRS generally has three years from the filing date to audit a return, so keep supporting documents at least that long.15Internal Revenue Service. Topic No. 305, Recordkeeping Anything tied to your home’s cost basis — the purchase closing statement, improvement receipts, depreciation records from any home office years — should be kept for as long as you own the home and at least three years after you file the return reporting the sale. A $12 receipt for weatherstripping is probably not worth the filing space. A $15,000 kitchen renovation invoice absolutely is. Save a complete digital copy of your filed return every year, including all schedules and attachments.