A follow-up question....

I double checked the 2011 1098 for my first mortgage. It does indeed say I paid $10,077.39 in interest. I could not let this go however because it makes no sense that my interest was that low given the rate and principal I owed.

I dug deeper and found a year to date activity statement for my mortgage which reflects something odd... my first payment of 2011 was actually posted on 12/31/2010 (I always mail it early). They have a footnote that says that the interest for this payment is "not reportable this year". It was $924.37, so probably about $175-200 back to me if it had been deducted properly.

I bought the house in mid-Nov 2010. I checked my records for 2010 tax year and found that I apparently did NOT receive a 1098 from the bank for 2010. I made a note in the margins of my copies of the tax return stating that the mortgage interest value I entered was "no 1098, this is conservative estimate".

So my question now is--
If I wanted to recover this interest payment as a deduction, would I attempt to argue that it was actually a 2011 payment (i.e. report an interest paid number that does not jive with the 2011 1098 and say that the 1098 is incorrect) or would I try to file an amended return for 2010, which apparently had no 1098?