Question

Piper owns a vacation cabin in the Tennessee mountains. Without considering the cabin, she has a gross income of $65,000. During the year, she rents the cabin for two weeks for $2,500 and uses it herself for four weeks. The total expenses for the year are $10,000 mortgage interest; $1,500 property tax; $2,000 utilities, insurance, and maintenance; and $3,200 depreciation. If an amount is zero, enter "0".
a. What effect does the rental of the vacation cabin have on Sarah's AGI?
b. What expenses can Sarah deduct, and how are they classified (i.e., for or from AGI)?

Answer 1

Answer:

A) Piper or Sarah's income is not affected by her rent income since the cabin was only rented for 14 days and she also used the cabin for personal purposes for more than 14 days.

B) She can deduct mortgage interest ($10,000) and property tax ($1,500), she cannot deduct any other expenses because she is not engaging in any real estate rental activity. These expenses (mortgage interest and property tax) are expenses that anyone can normally deduct from their AGI.