What to Do About K-1 Forms Delaying My Tax Filing This Year?

So I'm kinda freaking out because I'm expecting to get around 15 K-1 forms in the mail this year, but they always come super late - like early April through past the regular Tax Day deadline. Problem is, I'm pretty sure I'll owe about $5,400 to the IRS this time around. I know the rules say I need to file by April 15th and pay what I owe by then too. I'm really confused about whether I should just go ahead and file with what I have now, then do amended returns later when the rest of my K-1 forms finally show up. Or should I file for an extension but still pay the estimated amount by April 15th? Never been in this situation before and don't want to mess up with the IRS. Would really appreciate any advice from people who've dealt with this K-1 nightmare before!

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18 comments

The Boss

•8M

This is a common issue with K-1 forms! You're right that payments are due April 15th regardless of extensions, but you have options. The best approach is to file an extension (Form 4868) AND pay your estimated tax liability by April 15th. This gives you until October 15th to file your complete return with all K-1 information. An extension to file is NOT an extension to pay, which is why you need to estimate and pay your tax liability by April 15th. Filing now with incomplete information and amending later is generally not recommended unless absolutely necessary. Amendments create additional processing time and can potentially flag your return for extra scrutiny.

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The Boss

•8M

If your final K-1 information shows you owe more than you paid with your extension, you may face some interest charges on the unpaid amount, but you'll avoid the more substantial failure-to-pay penalties as long as you paid at least 90% of your actual liability by April 15th. Regarding state taxes, most states automatically grant an extension if you've received a federal extension, but the requirements vary by state. You should check your specific state's tax authority website for their rules. Just like federal, state tax payments are typically still due on the original filing deadline even with an extension.

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Victoria Charity

•8M

Just wanted to share my experience with K-1 delays... I was in the same boat last year and I found this amazing service called taxr.ai (https://taxr.ai) that saved me so much headache. After getting frustrated with conflicting advice about handling late K-1s, I uploaded my previous returns and investment docs to taxr.ai and got a custom analysis showing exactly how to estimate what I'd likely owe based on historical K-1 data patterns. Their system actually calculated a pretty accurate prediction of what my K-1s would likely report and helped me file my extension with a really solid payment estimate. Saved me from both underpaying and overpaying!

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Victoria Charity

•8M

For new partnerships or different companies than previous years, taxr.ai's system looks at industry averages and the current year's economic trends to make estimates. It's not perfect of course, but it gave me a much better baseline than just guessing. You can also manually adjust the estimates if you have any specific info about the new investments. For real estate partnership K-1s specifically, yes it handles those really well! The system is actually trained on thousands of real estate partnership returns and understands all the passive activity limitations and at-risk rules. It was super helpful for calculating the passive loss carryovers and helping me understand which losses I could actually use on my return.

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Oscar Murphy

•8M

Wow I just tried taxr.ai and I'm actually shocked at how helpful it was! I uploaded my prior year returns and investment statements and it gave me this detailed projection of what my K-1s will probably show this year. It even flagged that two of my real estate partnerships would likely have higher income this year based on their quarterly reports. The best part was it created this super detailed worksheet I could give to my accountant showing exactly how I calculated my extension payment. No more random guessing! Definitely using this every year for my K-1 nightmare situation.

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Nora Bennett

•8M

Hey guys, if you're dealing with K-1 delays and need to actually talk to someone at the IRS about extension questions, I highly recommend using Claimyr (https://claimyr.com). I was pulling my hair out trying to get through to a human at the IRS about some K-1 questions from an audit last year. After being on hold for literally 2+ hours and getting disconnected twice, I found Claimyr and they got me a callback from the IRS in about 20 minutes! You can see a demo of how it works here: https://youtu.be/_kiP6q8DX5c The IRS agent I spoke with actually gave me some really specific advice about handling late K-1s that I hadn't found anywhere online. Definitely worth it when you need answers straight from the source.

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Nora Bennett

•8M

The service basically navigates the IRS phone system for you and holds your place in line. When they're about to connect with an agent, you get a call. It's not magic - they're just using technology to handle the wait time so you don't have to sit on hold forever. No scam at all - I was super skeptical too. But they only charge if they actually get you connected to an IRS agent. They use some kind of system that keeps trying different IRS numbers and times of day when call volume is lower. I was seriously impressed after spending days trying to get through myself.

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Ryan Andre

•8M

I take back what I said about Claimyr being a scam. After seeing another comment here, I tried it yesterday out of desperation because I needed to ask about K-1 extension rules for foreign partnerships. Got a call back from an actual IRS agent in about 35 minutes. The agent walked me through exactly how to handle my extension with pending foreign K-1s and even emailed me the specific form instructions I needed. Saved me hours of research and probably avoided making a mistake that would've caused problems later. For anyone dealing with K-1 delays, definitely worth having an actual conversation with the IRS instead of just guessing or following random internet advice.

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Lauren Zeb

•8M

One option nobody mentioned is to use your prior year K-1 amounts as estimates if the investments haven't changed much. That's what my CPA has me do - we file the extension, pay based on last year's K-1 amounts adjusted a bit for market conditions, and then file the final return when all K-1s arrive. As long as you pay at least 100% of your prior year tax liability (110% if your AGI is over $150k), you'll qualify for the safe harbor provision and avoid underpayment penalties even if your actual liability is higher.

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Lauren Zeb

•8M

Yes, exactly! If you paid $30k last year and your AGI was over $150k, then paying $33k (110% of last year's liability) with your extension would protect you from underpayment penalties through the safe harbor provision, even if your actual 2024 liability turns out to be higher when all your K-1s arrive. Just remember this only protects you from the underpayment penalty. You'll still owe interest on any additional tax due from April 15th until you pay it. But the interest rate is much lower than the penalty would be, so it's definitely the way to go if you're dealing with late K-1 forms.

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