vacation home sale

[ELNbluemax2]

We sold our Fla. vacation home in 1996. I declared the profit as regular income. It was not rented out, but, was I supposed to figure it as a long term gain (15 yr.) and pay a lower capital gains tax?? I know it's too late (more than 3 yrs.) but, I keep thinking I paid $2,000 more income tax than I should have. Did I?
Please ease my mind on this. Thanks.

 

[loku]

I don’t know if this will ease your mind, but you are correct: you should have reported this as a long-term capital gain and you should have paid capital gains tax only, so you did pay more tax than you should have.

You are also correct about the statute of limitations on refunds being the later of 3 years after the return is filed or two years after the tax is paid.