Taxpayer, a New York homeowner, received a check captioned "Property Tax Relief" (not "refund" or "rebate") and dated 8 Jan 2018. There's no indication of it being tied specifically to taxes paid in 2016 or
2017.Question: how is this handled for Federal tax purposes?
If this were a refund of state income tax, it would be added to 2018 income as "other income". Is it the same for property tax relief (not "refund")? Or does this just reduce the deduction for 2018 property taxes?
Taxpayer itemized deductions for 2016 and 2017, but will take standard deduction for 2018.