Q:

Subject: Rental property

 

LOve reading your blog!!!

 

i inherited my mothers house when she died.   now renting it out.   how do i figure out the depreciation on it for my taxes?   mother bought it for 61,000 in 1987 but city has it assessed for 135,000.

keep up the posts!!!

A:

Your cost basis of the inherited property is its fair market value at the time your mother passed away.  If an estate tax return was filed for her, you would use the value shown on the 706.  If the estate was small enough not to require a 706, you should ask a local Realtor or appraiser to give you a value.  Most Realtors will run a CMA (competitive market analysis) for you for free, hoping that you will remember that when you decide to sell the property.

I’m glad that you like my blog; but it seems that you are missing one of the main themes that I thought I was stressing; that trying to navigate the tax world without the assistance of at least one competent professional tax advisor is extremely dangerous. Your question, which any experienced tax pro could help you with, proves that you need to start working with one ASAP. 

Just establishing the overall fair market value of the property is just the first step.  Next, you will need to allocate that between the values for the non-depreciable land and the depreciable building and components (appliances, fixtures and other separately identifiable items).  Any experienced tax pro can help you with that, as well as with maximizing all of the other kinds of deductions that are available for rental properties.

Good luck.  I hope this helps.

Kerry Kerstetter

Follow-Up:

thanks for the quick response. i guess i should get a tax pro like you said. you know what they say — an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure!!!!

 

Q:

Subject: 2008 Long Term Capital Gain

I understand that the 2008 LT CG tax rate for filers in the 10 % 15% bracket is to be 0% on the LT CG.

Assume the following:
Filing status Married, filing jointly
Taxable income of $30,000 (before LT CG)
LT CG (held over 15 years) $700,000

Is the entire $700,000 LTCG at 0% tax

             OR

is it just the amount from $30,000 up to the (approx) $62,000 taxed at 0%, then at the 15% rate for LTCG for filers in the brackets above 15%

If the filer could arrange to keep their 2008 taxable income in the 10 or 15% bracket(before LT CG) this would seem to be an outstanding opportunity to sell highly appreciated capital assets in 2008.

OR, am I missing the real facts here?

A:

It is a common misconception that the special low tax rates for LTCGs apply to the full amount of gain.  A you can see in the Schedule D tax worksheet, that isn’t the case.  The various tax rates are applied sequentially, to the income in the different lower tax rate brackets.

In their divine wisdom, and as part of their smoke and mirrors style of budgeting, our imperial rulers in DC have given a special deal for only 2008 LTCGs, where the gain that would normally be subject to a 5% rate will be given a zero percent rate.  This means that you would use the worksheet and substitute 0% wherever it shows 5%.  The thresholds would also need to be adjusted for guesstimated inflation over the next few years. 

It’s always possible that this one year special deal will be either repealed or even extended.  it is difficult to predict what our rulers will do.

Assuming it is in place when 2008 rolls around,  the best way to really exploit this break would be to do what you can to get your non-LTCG taxable income as low as possible.  A good professional tax advisor can help you with the many ways in which to accomplish this.

I hope this clears up your confusion.

Good luck.

Kerry Kerstetter

 

Q:

Kerry,

 I think I have asked you before and apologise if you have already answered me.  I’m involved in a couple LLC and a couple Sub S Corporations. Currently they are all loosing money. ie interest, dev costs, etc. 06 will produce a big profit from one of the sub s’s. I am about to enter into another partnership. My attorney tells me he see’s absolutely no difference in the two from a liability point of view.  Do you feel there is a difference from a tax point of view?

A:

If the LLC chooses to be taxed as either a partnership or S corp, it is treated exactly the same for tax purposes as a regular S corp is.

Kerry